The trophy, the one Dennis Diaz held over his head 20 years ago on hallowed ground at Churchill Downs, sits in a safe somewhere in Tampa. It’s 22 inches tall, topped by a gold horse and rider.
Diaz doesn’t need to look at it to remind him of what he accomplished … or the controversy he created.
“I don’t take it out and moon over it come Kentucky Derby time,” Diaz said. “But I can tell you this time of year brings back a lot of memories.”
For Diaz, the owner of 1985 Kentucky Derby winner Spend a Buck, his experience winning the classic race is unlike that of the other 130 winners.
“One minute we were heroes,” Diaz said. “The next we were dogs, the money-grubbing newcomers who weren’t supporting the Triple Crown.”
Diaz, a Tampa Realtor, began building a farm northwest of Tampa in 1983 with modest hopes of breeding and racing a few thoroughbreds.
In the process, Diaz was told by a cousin living in Lexington, Ky., of a farm being repossessed and some horses that might come cheap. One of the colts was Spend a Buck, whom Diaz purchased for $12,500.
“I was always taught you’d rather be lucky than smart,” Diaz said. “And in this case, all the stars just happened to line up.”
They lined up at Churchill Downs on May 4, 1985, when Spend a Buck, trained by Cam Gambolati, went gate-to-wire in winning by 5 lengths and running what was the third-fastest Derby.
Diaz was racing’s darling for all of 48 hours. Because Spend a Buck had won the Garden State Stakes and Cherry Hill Mile at Garden State Park, he was eligible for a $2 million bonus if he could win the Jersey Derby, which was to be contested nine days after the Preakness, second leg of the Triple Crown.
Unable to run Spend a Buck in both the Preakness and Jersey Derby, Diaz decided to give his colt the extra rest (he had raced four times in 42 days) and run for the $2 million.
Diaz was vilified.
“There were personal attacks, bitterness … people questioning your patriotism and system of values,” Diaz said. “It was like, ‘How dare these people come into our business and snub … 100 years of tradition?'”
It wasn’t that Diaz just shook the establishment, he rocked it. The Derby winner always went to the Preakness, no question.
So Diaz’s decision left him ostracized by the thoroughbred community. He received hate mail, was accosted in a restaurant and widely criticized.
Twenty years later, Diaz has every right to sound disaffected.
“It was not pleasant,” he said. “Certainly winning the Derby was the experience of 10 lifetimes. But what tempered my ability to enjoy the moment was the controversy and bitterness and hatred.
“One thing I found out was it’s a cut-throat business. It’s vicious, and it’s not all populated by gentlemen.”
Spend a Buck won the Jersey Derby and the $2.6 million payday, the richest at that point in thoroughbred racing.
Diaz admits he became star-struck. He bought a 700-acre farm in Ocala and had more than 100 horses three years after winning the Derby.
But by the early ’90s, Diaz estimates he lost $6 million and sold the horses. A semiretired Realtor in Tampa, Diaz, 62, says he hasn’t raced a horse in 10 years.
“Sometimes I wish it didn’t happen so quickly,” Diaz said. “If I had spent five or 10 years learning the business, I might have appreciated things more. There’s something to be said for not being so lucky so early. When this happens — where do you go from there?”
Credit should go to Diaz. Just months after he bypassed the Preakness, officials from Churchill Downs, Pimlico and Belmont instituted a $5 million bonus to any horse who could sweep the Triple Crown.
No one from the Triple Crown has credited Diaz for taking the series kicking and screaming out of the dark ages.
“The horsemen, trainers and owners, they thanked me,” Diaz said. “But the establishment never gave me credit. That’s OK. What I’m resentful of is Spend a Buck never really got the credit he deserved.”
Spend a Buck, Horse of the Year in 1985, died in 2002 standing stud in Brazil; he had an allergic reaction to penicillin.
As for Diaz, no one is calling on this 20th anniversary to reminisce.
But he’s still the one who knows where the trophy is locked away.
Dave Joseph can be reached at .
