"because the introduction of statins Crestor and Lipitor during the trial period improved the standard of care for the placebo patients to an extent where ABL on it's on wasn't as effective as everyone thought it might be."

Background statin therapy has been included in standard of care for secondary prevention long before the BETonMACE trial. And per trial design, all patients in BETonMACE were required to be on Crestor or Lipitor. Your statement above is a bit misleading. Instead, one could say that the low-HDL, recent ACS, diabetic placebo patient population in BETonMACE on current standard of care (includes many drugs, not just statins) experienced a lower than anticipated event rate. 

BDAZ