Tim Smith has resigned from as the commissioner of the NTRA and his hiring as the new head of the New York Racing Association is imminent. This man must be crazy. It's a good thing for New York racing that he is.

I'm sure that running a league office and trying to bring together the million or two different factions in this sport, most of whom have narrow-minded and self-serving agendas, to work toward the common good of the industry wasn't exactly a load of fun. But by his first day on the job at NYRA, Smith's time at the NTRA will surely seem like a stroll in the park to him.

Every racing state has its problems and headaches, but there's not another that can compare to New York. It's a place where an off-track betting system was set up to compete with the racetracks and then the OTBs were given a inordinate amount of power. It's a place where the politicians have a frightening amount of control over what goes on and a frightening lack of knowledge about the industry. The results is that it's painstakingly difficult to get anything positive accomplished.

It's place beset with serious financial problems. In the last year, it became a place where a handful of miscreant mutuel clerks nearly brought down NYRA, which must now operate under intense scrutiny and function with outside monitors watching its every move. It's a place where no one can move forward on getting slot machines in because NYRA's legal problems and a recent court ruling concerning the legality of giving slots money to horsemen have things tied up in knots.

Why would Smith want to take on such a hornet's nest of problems? That question becomes more relevant when considering that he was making $750,000 a year to run the NTRA and NYRA has never paid an executive anywhere close to that amount. Surely, he's not going to have to settle for a huge pay cut, but it's a mystery how NYRA, which has been ordered to tighten its belt several notches, can afford him.

Since he has yet to come to terms with NYRA, Smith has said little about his future in New York or his motivation for making such a drastic career change. The best guess is that he likes a challenge. It's no secret why NYRA wants him. They need a fresh start in the executive offices and a person who can negotiate his way through the morass, get the slot machines up and running and get the NYRA franchise renewed before it expires in 2007. That means holding off the full-court press Frank Stronach is making in Albany to take over the NYRA tracks.

The Smith that grabbed the reins of the start-up NTRA back in 1998 would have been a poor choice for the NYRA job. He knew little about horse racing and seemed unprepared to deal with the intransigent nature of a sport that never lived by the words, "Why we can't we all just get along?"

But he grew into the job, primarily because he became an adept diplomat. He managed to keep everybody reasonably happy, no small task in this sport, and the game is better off with the NTRA than it was without it. Perhaps the NTRA didn't accomplish everything people had hoped it would, but there were plenty of skeptics at its inception that thought it would crash and burn like so many other racing initiatives had? It didn't and, at the very least, it became an effective national marketing outlet for the sport.

Smith is just what NYRA needs. With the surfeit of problems that threaten the future of the organization, they need someone who can get things done and they need someone who won't arrive in Albany with any baggage or have to deal with any political enemies.

Smith's impending hiring will mean NYRA Chairman of the Board Barry Schwartz will no doubt take a less active role in the organization. Schwartz was a tireless advocate of the customer and, particularly through his efforts to lower the takeout, did more for racing fans than any 10 track executives combined. Smith must continue on the same path. The customers are what make this game go, something too many racetrack managers fail to appreciate.

Schwartz also liked to speak his mind, which could get him in trouble. As much as it probably would have pained him to do so, he should have been more deferential when it came to dealing with the politicians.

So the NYRA got-to guy will soon be Smith. He will need to smooth some feathers. At the same time, he will have to be a fighter, what it will take to deal with the Stronach threat and the politicians who may want to think twice about renewing the franchise. And how much can he accomplish in a state where OTB wields so much power? And can he get those slots machines turned on any time soon, despite the roadblocks? What about revitalizing on-track business at Aqueduct and Belmont, where there hasn't been life, save Belmont Day, in those buildings in 25 years.

Is he sure he wants to do this?