Chicago Cubs embrace thrilling off day at Churchill Downs where Alex Bregman’s horse wins race

CINCINNATI — The Chicago Cubs took off-day fun to another level.

The team spent Thursday at Churchill Downs in Louisville, Kentucky, watching horse racing that culminated in third baseman Alex Bregman and his family’s horse winning its race to set off a raucous celebration by the Cubs, who watched along the rail near the finish line. Act of Parliament, a 3-year-old colt ridden by jockey Axel Concepcion, delivered a thrilling come-from-behind victory at the famous racetrack.

“Churchill Downs is a really cool place,” manager Craig Counsell said. “It’s a historic place, much like Wrigley Field. It’s kind of like the version of Wrigley Field for horse racing, and it was fun to just introduce a bunch of guys on the team to a different world that they normally don’t get to see, and then we got to spend a lot of time together outside of baseball.”

The off-day excursion coincided with the Cubs’ annual rookie dress-up trip as part of their big-league initiation. The Cubs learned about a month ago that the trip to Churchill Downs would be happening.

Rookie infielder Pedro Ramírez and two first-year members of the Cubs staff, major-league video and technology coordinator Brad Moylan and major-league physical therapist Jozef Palasiewicz, all dressed up as jockeys. That left reliever Ryan Rolison the position of being the horse and donning a full-body costume he wore through the evening.

At one point, Ramírez, decked out in his jockey outfit, walked Rolison around the grounds by the ear of his horse costume.

Rolison thought he wouldn’t be apart of the dress-up shenanigans since he exceeded his rookie status last year with his 42⅓ innings for the Colorado Rockies. When Counsell shared the off-day plan a month ago during a pitchers meeting, a few teammates noted that would be the ideal time for rookie dress-up and noted he would be part of it. Unfortunately for Rolison, the lefty declared he wasn’t a rookie, prompting Counsell to declare, “If you say you’re not a rookie, you’re a rookie.”

So the horse costume was all his.

“The problem with the Cubs is there wasn’t enough candidates either — we only had one player (Ramírez), that player needed a friend,” Counsell said with a smirk. “Greater good, always.”

Rolison was a good sport and committed to the bit, despite wearing it for 12 hours in the hot weather.

“It was worth it,” Rolison said. “You can go two ways with it: Embrace it or run away from it. I took it head-on. It felt like a movie, honestly, just the way (the race) ended.”

Counsell and Bregman demurred when asked for specifics of who came up with the costumes, instead giving everyone credit for what became a memorable day. The Cubs got in a late-morning workout at Wrigley on Thursday, then headed to the airport to fly to Louisville in the early afternoon. When the festivities at the racetrack ended, the team bused the roughly 100-mile trip to Cincinnati that evening.

“We had a blast,” Bregman said. “It was a lot of fun to be able to share that experience with them. Obviously, just being around the group and this time of year is super important, just building the camaraderie.”

Horse racing has been part of the Bregman family, starting with his grandfather, who loved it and passed that on to the rest of them. Bregman estimated the Bregman Family Racing’s horses have won around 25-30 races over the years. While Thursday’s at Churchill Downs was probably the smallest race they’ve won, “that one was more meaningful.”

“That was probably core memory for me right there, doing it with this group of guys,” Bregman said.

Rolison plans to keep the horse outfit and save himself a trip to a Spirit Halloween store to buy a costume for the holiday next month.

“Maybe need to get it washed because it was like 100 degrees,” a grinning Rolison said, “but maybe we can make it work again.”