Unbelievable! Rachel and Z's HOF Ceremony closed to the public

I had seriously been thinking of going this year's Hall of Fame ceremony since I was a huge fan of 2 of the 4 inductees, a casual fan of a 3rd and basically a non fan of the 4th (even though he did train one of the two inductees that I was a huge fan of). However, on a day that was already filled with bad news with Nyquist's Belmont defection, this came along my Twitter feed.

This year's HOF induction now restricted to Museum members. Talk amongst yourselves.

— Alan Carasso (@EquinealTDN) May 24, 2016

A few minutes later, this came from the National Racing Museum and Hall of Fame. Basically members are getting 2 tickets and that's it. That's right no public is invited due to "high demand and limited seating". Now before you go on and say the press release says that it's going to be streamed on the HOF website (which is true), and that HRRN will be having the radio feed as well... that's not the point.

Individual Membership is $50 US which includes free admission and % of tours of the Oklahoma Training Track and shop purchases ect. That's quite a bit less expensive the Museum of Natural History which has two different options for the lowest membership level (Family and Adult). However, not all fans can afford membership to a museum that they are going to visit minimally only once during their lives. Add in the hotel/Airbnb plane tickets/train tickets/gas fees that is going to add up.

Which leads me back to the streaming, I'm personally glad that they are streaming it however even there there are problems. Many times for some people when they are streaming something it will freeze for no reason. While the ceremony is for a niche sport, you know there will still be a bit of an influx of viewers considering the fandom of both Rachel Alexandra and Zenyatta. So hopefully the feed doesn't freeze that many times... if at all.

Now of course I can try to get a credential, but I'm not going to. I'm not a member of a media organization sadly and even if I did try the likelihood that I would get it is very slim.

Even with the frustration that I have, there is also part of me that understands the HOF's view on this. Part of me is thinking they want to make sure the HOF'ers who are attending get seats which is understandable. Secondly this is a good way to not let "interlopers" (aka PETA) get in. However, I'm sure they will someway somehow get in.

In the end, couldn't they just move it to a larger place? Or was it that they just want to be traditionalists and hold it at Fasig Tipton. Regardless of the reasons, there are going to be a lot of people not happy.