Randy Moss: NYRA and Fox ‘incredibly petty’ for apparent attempt to shift blame of Triple Crown demise onto Preakness
Who knew there would be so much drama in horse racing months after this year’s Triple Crown was etched in the history books?
But quite like how we’re all talking about Boston College men’s basketball in August for some reason, we’ve also spent much of this week following along to a series of major developments regarding the Triple Crown and the future of high-level horse racing.
It all started on Monday, when the New York Racing Association (NYRA) and Churchill Downs Incorporated announced a new season-long horse racing series that will pit the best three-year-old Thoroughbreds against each other in a six-race circuit with a champion crowned at Churchill Downs in September. But curiously, when the series was announced, it included the Kentucky Derby and the Belmont Stakes, but not the second leg of horse racing’s Triple Crown, the Preakness.
A couple days later, Maryland Governor Wes Moore held a press conference to announce that the Preakness Stakes, which historically was run two weeks following the Kentucky Derby, would now be held three weeks and a day after the Derby. The shift was made with the hope that more Derby horses, including the Derby winner, would participate in the Preakness. In recent years, the vast majority of Derby horses have skipped the Preakness due to the quick turnaround time, instead eyeing the Belmont five weeks later.
At the press conference, Moore also announced that the Preakness would remain on NBC Sports through 2032. Various reports indicate that Fox, which owns rights for the Belmont and various other high-profile horse racing properties, had been an interested bidder in the Preakness, but NBC ultimately won out.
One of the top voices in horse racing took notice of how this week’s news played out from a timing perspective, and believes there were ulterior motives at hand. Randy Moss, the longtime horse racing analyst for NBC Sports, believes NYRA, and potentially Fox, timed the announcement of the new six-race Championship series for days before the Preakness announcement in an attempt to shift criticism about the devaluation of the Triple Crown onto the Preakness, rather than the NYRA and Belmont.
Petty @TheNYRA -FOX lose out on Preakness TV contract after trying to bully Maryland racing? pic.twitter.com/eqk7QjwIwS
— Gulf-SchemePark(Decoupling soon) (@Jackpotkimm) August 5, 2026
“The announcement, two weeks after the Kentucky Derby, the Belmont was going to be three weeks after the Preakness. And lo and behold one week ago, they were informed that NBC would retain the rights instead of giving them to Fox. Alright, so what happened? The press conference was scheduled for the announcement by Governor Wes Moore of Maryland that NBC would get the rights and that the Preakness would be three weeks after the Kentucky Derby, which was the understood plan between Maryland and the New York Racing Association, at least that’s what they thought,” Moss explained, alluding to prior reporting that the Preakness would move back in conjunction with the Belmont to fix the Triple Crown’s schedule.
“NYRA purposely rushed out the announcement of the new series, which now excluded Preakness — I don’t know if Preakness was ever involved in that or not, but they’re not now, at least for the time being. They purposely rushed the announcement to come out on Monday to beat by two days the announcement by Wes Moore and by NBC Sports that the Preakness would be moved one week. Now why would they do that? Because they want to be able to say, ‘Hey, we kept the Belmont dated June the 5th. That’s what it’s always been. Now, here comes the Preakness moving it one week, it’s the Preakness, it’s the Pimlico people that are blowing up the Triple Crown. It’s not NYRA, it’s not us, it’s not Fox.’
“I don’t know if Fox was the one that actually drove this bus or whether it was NYRA, I have no idea which was which, but they wanted to be able to say publicly, ‘This is not our fault. This is Maryland’s fault.’ When in reality, it is their fault. They’re being incredibly petty about this whole thing. And that’s the one word, petty, that’s been used repeatedly by other industry executives in the aftermath of this whole thing.”
Now, as a longtime NBC Sports employee, Randy Moss’s remarks here should be taken with a grain of salt. But the timing of the Monday announcement certainly seems odd given when the Preakness announcement was set to be made. This very well could’ve been a damage-control play by NYRA, who appears to be stubborn in its insistence on running the Belmont Stakes in its traditional spot, rather than moving it back a week to accommodate the modern recovery needs of race horses.
It should be noted as well, NBC Sports has an equal stake to Fox in the new season-long championship series, with each network slated to broadcast three races each for the circuit. One would think NBC would’ve been informed about the Monday announcement in some manner. If they weren’t that’d be a clear sign that this was done to make the Preakness look bad. If they were informed, perhaps there’s nothing nefarious going on here.
One thing does appear clear, however. There’s some level of disagreement between the NYRA and the Maryland Jockey Club, which operates the Preakness, over the Triple Crown calendar. And until that’s resolved, and the best horses are running in each leg of the Triple Crown again, this will continue to be a meaningful rift in the sport.
