The visitor seat is empty this week on the Friday Present, however not for lack of attempting.

Given the controversy surrounding the choice by Churchill Downs Inc. to increase the corporate’s personal property ban on Corridor of Fame coach Bob Baffert – which started shortly after Medina Spirit failed a drug check following his first-place end within the 2021 Kentucky Derby – we thought this might be alternative to present Baffert an opportunity to inform his aspect of the story and for us to ask some questions which have lingered over the previous few years.

We reached out to Baffert and his legal professional, Clark Brewster, inviting the coach to hitch us on the Friday Present – to no avail.

So we’re saddled with an empty chair and a pocket book filled with questions for this week’s Friday Present, through which Ray Paulick and information editor Chelsea Hackbarth focus on the Baffert case, one which’s had extra turns than a marathon on a bull ring and entails two outsized egos: Baffert and Churchill Downs Inc. CEO Invoice Carstanjen. Baffert needs to guard his popularity and Carstanjen needs to guard his model, the Kentucky Derby, which can be celebrating its one hundred and fiftieth operating in 2024, apparently with Baffert on the skin trying in.

Watch this week’s episode of The Friday Present under: