Koch and Friends Brought Hollywood Flavor to Track

This was 1975, long before Snow Chief, and trainer Mel Stute was in trouble. His horses had a bad case of the slows and he hadn’t cashed a juicy bet in months. What Mel Stute had was a bad case of the shorts.

As the bills piled up, Stute had this unraced horse at a farm someplace, an unattractive 2-year-old that he had bred, but the last bid the horse had brought at an auction was $4,000, and Stute needed a little more than that. So he bought him back.

Thinking that Howard W. Koch might help, one way or another, Stute put in a call to the Hollywood producer. They had had a few horses together over the years.

“It’s this way, Howard,” Stute said. “Either buy this horse for $6,000, or just loan me the money. You’ve got your choice.”

Koch had never heard of the horse’s obscure breeding, but he liked Stute. He thought quickly that if he could find a partner, at least the trainer would only be in to him for $3,000.

Koch was with Telly Savalas when Stute called, but because he had raced horses with Walter Matthau, he felt that he better run this opportunity by Matthau first. Matthau hadn’t heard of the breeding, either, and immediately said no thanks.

But Savalas was game. “Hey, Mel,” Koch said when he returned the call to Santa Anita, “I got Telly Savalas and he’s in. He’s got this cop show on TV, and it’s going to be a big hit.”

This, then, is how Howard W. Koch and Telly Savalas got to be partners in Telly’s Pop, a hard-running young horse who won several stakes before his knees betrayed him.

Shortly after the deal was struck, Stute took Koch to the farm to show him his new purchase.

“He’s a handful,” Stute said. “We might have to geld him.”

“Go ahead,” Koch said.

A couple of years and two surgeries later, Telly’s Pop could no longer race. And of course his value as a stallion was nil.

“Gelding him might have been the biggest mistake I ever made,” Koch said.

The story breaks down about how Telly’s Pop was named, and now that Savalas, who died in 1994, and Koch, who was 84 when he died Feb. 16, are both gone, Stute was asked for the real version. No help there. He said you could take your pick.

It makes more sense that Koch named Telly’s Pop after the ever-present lollipops that dangled from the lip of the lead character in the long-running “Kojak” series. But as Telly’s Pop’s victories multiplied, Savalas claimed that he had named the horse after his father.

“If that’s what Telly says, that’s all right with me,” said Koch, well-versed in massaging the egos of stars.

Either way, Koch and Savalas and Stute cut a wide if brief swath with Telly’s Pop. As a 2-year-old, Paco Mena rode him to victories in the Del Mar Futurity, the Norfolk Stakes at Santa Anita and the California Juvenile at Bay Meadows.

“He was the only horse to ever sweep those three races,” Stute said.

A city guy, it took a while before Savalas really knew the implications of Telly’s Pop’s having been gelded.

“At the start, Telly thought that a gelding was a horse color that he had never heard of,” Koch said.

After each victory, the owners’ Hollywood cronies crammed winner’s circles up and down the state.

“Sometimes,” Koch said, “there didn’t look like there’d be enough room for the horse.”

The Telly’s Pop crew would have made a big impact at Churchill Downs--Savalas handing out the lollipops, Koch playing the straight man and Stute leading the cheering section--but the Kentucky Derby turned into an unfulfilled dream. In March 1976, Telly’s Pop won the California Derby at Golden Gate Fields, but after that he ran fifth as the favorite in the Santa Anita Derby and came home sixth in the Hollywood Derby. Knee surgery was required. After more surgery much later, Telly’s Pop foundered and had to be euthanized.

He had given racing a shot in the arm and his handlers a dizzying and lucrative ride. His purses totaled more than $340,000.

Koch, a longtime board member at Hollywood Park during the Marje Everett era, never did come across a horse as good as Telly’s Pop.

“The closest we probably came was a horse named Dock Simon,” Stute said. “He wasn’t a great horse, but he was consistent. He must have won 10 or 12 races for us. Howard named him after his friend, Neil Simon, who doctored a few plays in his time. Howard was a great guy to train for, and he was the kind of guy who got you other clients as well. Besides Telly, there was Matthau and Steve Lawrence and Eydie Gorme, and I’m sure there must have been a few others. I trained for them all.”

Throughout his tenure, Koch rolled with the punches Hollywood Park’s management would occasionally take. All he asked was that you didn’t leave out the middle initial in his name. Hardly pompous, the enormously successful Koch just wanted to make sure the public knew you weren’t talking about Howard (NMI) Koch, not a relative and one of the screenwriters of “Casablanca.”

“I’ve had a few credits in my time,” Howard W. Koch once said, “but not for ‘Casablanca.’ ”

Notes

La Feminn, undefeated in five starts, could do no better than second on a sloppy track Saturday as Go Go, ridden by Eddie Delahoussaye, overtook the favorite in the stretch to win the $134,000 Las Flores Handicap by one length at Santa Anita. Go Go, winning her fourth in a row and first graded stake, paid $15.60 after running six furlongs in 1:08 4/5.

Jockey Pat Valenzuela, who hopes to ride again, and his attorney, Donald Calabria, attended a 75-minute hearing with the Santa Anita stewards Saturday. Valenzuela, who has a long history of drug and alcohol abuse, hasn’t ridden since early last year, when he tested positive for amphetamines. “We need more information,” steward Tom Ward said. “We’ll probably have something to say sometime next week.” . . . Instead of running against Point Given in the San Felipe at Santa Anita on March 17, Millennium Wind will face Dollar Bill, the hot horse in New Orleans, in the $750,000 Louisiana Derby on March 11 at the Fair Grounds. Chris McCarron, who rode Dollar Bill in his last win, will stick with Millennium Wind and Pat Day has been named to ride Dollar Bill. . . . The probable field for next Saturday’s $1-million Santa Anita Handicap includes Tiznow, Wooden Phone, Bienamado, Aptitude, Beat All, Irisheyesareflying, Jorrocks, Jimmy Z, Lethal Instrument, Moonlight Charger and Tribunal. . . . Trainer Nick Zito said that A P Valentine isn’t ready to run in the Florida Derby at Gulfstream Park on March 10. . . . Trainer Noble Threewitt was honored by Santa Anita as he celebrated his 90th birthday . . . . Roger Licht, 47, has been appointed to the California Horse Racing Board. Licht is an attorney who also breeds and races horses.