Money time at Oaklawn

The only Monday card of the local racing season finds Oaklawn Park management extending one magnanimous gesture after another.

Look for many attending the Presidents' Day program, starting at 1:05 p.m., to wear caps issued Sunday in an annual track promotion. There's no Triple Crown winner with Oaklawn connections this time -- American Pharoah, Arkansas Derby and Rebel winner of 2015, spoiled us -- but the back lettering reminds patrons to "stay until May," for an unusually late close to the season.

Scanning the program, veteran racegoers may not believe their eyes when they tote up the purse money. It comes to $1,789,000 for the 10 races, $1.2 million just for three Grade 3 stakes. The $200,000 Bayakoa, the $500,000 Razorback Handicap and the $500,000 Southwest form a pick-three wager considered unthinkable not that many years ago.

Credit booming business throughout the plant for a purse increase that sees Arkansas-bred horses run for $88,000 in the opener, maiden 3-year-olds for $93,000 in race 3 and first-level allowance horses for $94,000 in race 5.

Horsemen following the money, like Woodward and Bernstein with Watergate in "All the President's Men," results in a who's who of American racing assembled that the late Charles J. Cella, the track's longtime president, would have welcomed to his track.

Race 3, for instance, features three Hall of Fame trainers -- Steve Asmussen, Wayne Lukas and Nick Zito -- and a fourth, Todd Pletcher, who's as sure for the Saratoga Springs, N.Y., shrine (once he becomes eligible) as the sun rising in the east.

Mark Casse, Keith Desormeaux and Dale Romans have sent horses to join those trained by Oaklawn season regulars Brad Cox, Larry Jones, Joe Sharp and Dallas Stewart. The Razorback Handicap, named for an Arkansas athletic mascot, has a regional flair with Californian Simon Callaghan, New Yorker Jeremiah Englehart and Louisianan Wesley Hawley included.

This is not to take away from established local horsemen such as Jinks Fires and Paul Holthus, both represented in the Southwest, along with Robertino Diodoro, better known as a master claimer but sending out one in the Razorback.

And look who's riding. Start with Hall of Famer and two-time Kentucky Derby winner John Velazquez for Donnie Von Hemel in the Bayakoa and Pletcher in the Razorback and Southwest. Jose Ortiz, 2017 Eclipse Award winner, has two stakes mounts for Asmussen, who has five horses in the Southwest and 14 on the card. Corey Lanerie and Florent Geroux know their way around, and Stewart Elliott rode Smarty Jones.

Then again, they're treading on the turf of Ricardo Santana Jr., who at 26 has six consecutive Oaklawn riding titles and, setting the bar high, speaks longingly of matching Pat Day's local record of 12 straight.

Even so, David Cohen surged past an absent Santana into first place in the standings Saturday. Cohen rides two stakes mounts for Casse and locally owned Dutch Parrot for Will VanMeter in the Bayakoa.

Gates open at 11 a.m. for what looms as a red-letter day in Oaklawn history. The track's gaming center, a major partner in live racing's success, opens at 8 a.m.

As at a baseball game, you'll need a scorecard to keep track of the players. And a calculator to count the purse money.