Proper Handling of a Difficult Situation

Two weeks after the tragic injury and almost immediate euthanizing of Eight Belles minutes after the filly had finished second in the Kentucky Derby, NBC Sports has decided to add an extra half hour to its Preakness coverage on Saturday to examine the ongoing issue of racetrack safety for the thoroughbreds literally risking life and limb every time they leave the starting gate.

It's exactly the right move for a network that also received somewhat mixed reviews for its coverage of Big Brown's victory in the first leg of the Triple Crown. That included some harsh criticism from my colleague, Post columnist Sally Jenkins, over NBC's decision to cut away ("cowardlike, from the sickening picture," she wrote) from Eight Belles as she lay writhing on the ground with two shattered ankles.

But in a telephone interview this week, Sam Flood, the coordinating producer of that NBC telecast, once again defended his decision not to show live or even taped video of the horse in agony, and it's difficult to find fault in his logic.

"The image of the horse on the ground is not something we wanted to put on the air," he said. "It's not something you want your kids to see. It's 6:30 at night, it's in that family viewing time. And I've had a number of notes and e-mails from people saying 'thank you for not putting that on the air. I was watching the race with my seven-year-old niece, my eight-year-old daughter, and she was crying.'

"The bottom line is that the information of the story is that the horse died. To show a visual did not change the outcome of the story. It wasn't necessary, and I wouldn't change a thing."

Flood also was criticized in some quarters for not getting to the story of the filly's breakdown until nearly two minutes of a recap of the race itself had been completed. Eight Belles was on the ground seconds after the race, and some thought NBC should have gone to and stayed with the story far sooner than it did.

"We reported that Eight Belles was down and we were trying to get as much information as we could during that 1:40," Flood said. "We had the interview with the winning jockey and the trainer and then we transitioned right into the (Eight Belles) story. We did the interview with the veterinarian (track vet Larry Bramlage) as he was getting the radio report on the progress of the horse. As soon as the decision was made to euthanize the horse, America knew it.

"As we've learned in election coverage, being first is not always being right. We were first with the right information. I still wonder what more could you do than tell the story of the horse going down, and that's what we did."

Part of the problem in telling that story was that NBC did not focus one of its eight one-on-one replay cameras on Eight Belles during the race itself. The only footage Flood had of the horse actually going down past the finish line came from a blimp shot overhead. That was aired for about ten seconds later in the broadcast, as well as a very brief long shot from across the track showing the horse being attended to by track medical personnel.

After Bramlage's live and shocking news that the horse would not survive, NBC went to a commercial. The network stayed with the Eight Belles story for several more minutes, even delaying the start of the trophy presentation to continue reporting, and then went to another commercial before heading to the winner's circle and a shift in focus back to Big Brown's impressive victory.

At that point, the juxtaposition of tragedy with triumph proved to be somewhat jarring when the network came back to a far more celebratory scene, even though host Bob Costas said afterward he had alerted most of the principals who were about to speak about the Eight Belles tragedy.

"I mentioned to the people with whom I would speak what I had just learned," Costas told the N.Y. Times. "I said 'I'm not saying you should comment, but I want you to be aware of it.'"