California Figs

[jimbo66]

Jerry,

Question for you about something discussed on this board before.  You are on record here a few times in the past talking about a bias in the Beyer figures in that he has the california races a little too fast, although I think you recently said you are seeing some correction there.  

Granted that one day of races is a small sample, but yesterday was a day where it looked like the \"bias\" is more towards T-Graph having the California horses a little too slow.  If you sit down and look at the Beyer, TGraph and Rags figures for the 1st race, Juvy fillies and Juvy Colts, the California horses really outran their TG numbers.  

In that first race, Captain Squire looked like an absolute bet against on TG.  Similarly Ghostofachance was also a bet against.  Weight adjusted, CS was maybe 5 points slower than the east coast horses.  That is a big difference.  The California horses ran 1-2.

In the Juvenile fillies ran, the outside horse from the Mullins barn looked too slow to contend and figured to lose ground from the outside post.  The horse lost ground and ran 2nd.

In the Juvenile Colts race, Stevie Wonderboy was slow again on TG, albeit with a healthy running line and good possibility to move forward.  Considering that race was 2 seconds faster than the filly race, that probably means Henny Hughes ran his number, which means Stevie must have had a 5 point move up on TG.  Tough to swallow, even for an improving 2 year old.  His move up on the other figures is not as much.

There were some high profile cases the last year or so as well, like the Kentucky Derby and also the Pimlico Special from last year, which was a ROTW where Southern Image was a real bet against and ran well to win.  

Granted, this isn not a scientific analysis of the day to day figs, but just a few examples.

Anyway, don\'t mean to be critical, because I used Tgraph all day yesterday and never before have I been to the IRS window three times in one racing card, so obviously most of the figs held up real well, especially a very hittable super in the Classic and a real juicy exacta in the distaff.  So, thanks for the product!

Jim

[HP]

Jimbo,

I\'m sure Jerry can weigh in on this later but Wild Fit and Stevie Wonderboy were both usable, and figured as possible winners with some improvement.  Both of them were in the six range.  The best horses in either race ran 1\'s (First Sam) and 2\'s (Folklore).  In my opinion, if  Wild Fit and Stevie Wonderboy move up (two points, a definite possibility) and the faves back up a little (two points, also possible), they are right there (running threes or fours) without too dramatic a \"move up\" for either one.  Even if Henny Hughes ran his three, Stevie Wonderboy could easily move up three points off the pair of sixes and win.  I think your evaluation of Wild Fit and Stevie Wonderboy as \"too slow\" is just a little simplistic, no offense intended.  

I thought the California horses might have a problem handling the track, but some of them were obviously okay!  

HP

jimbo,

Beyer had some races at Golden Gate too fast early in the year that I know of. He then went back and corrected them. Buzzard\'s Bay was one high profile example. Since I don\'t follow GG closely, I\'m not sure if the whole circuit was too fast at that time or just some isoloted races.

I see no evidence that he has the major CA circuit too fast. I compare his figures to two other sets of Beyer scale figures and they are all pretty much in line.

It\'s even more difficult to compare the TG and RAG scales to Beyer than is commonly thought. Beyer partially builds ground loss and weight into his variant to a small degree. I don\'t want to go into here because I will certainly get tarred and feadthered for going off topic. If you want me to elaborate privately, let me know.

[miff]

TG figs for California have always been a tad slow vs Beyer and to a lesser extent Rags. The examples cited by Jimbo are fairly consistent on just about any day you compare TG,BEYER,RAGS.

In watching California for the last few years,I think the Beyers look a bit too fast. Seems like too many maidens(especially) run 90\'s and the usually glib surfaces in So Cal are not \"adjusted\" for variant too well by Beyer.

The most interesting fig of the day has to be Stevie Wonder Boy who carried 5 lbs more than the older Magna Graduate and ran within 2/5ths raw time.Looks like Stevie will get a 1-ish, imo.

[jimbo66]

Ok HP,

So you think my view that two horses that are at least 4 points slower than the figure horses in the Juvenile races, plus two california horses in the 1st race being 4 or 5 points too slow, all moving up together is too much of a coincidence.  

Too much coincidence for me, so coming to your conclusion seems too simplistic to me, no offense to you.

YOu can always justify any result in any race.  We can all do that.  But when you have what could be a trend, I think you have to question it.

Henny Hughes did not back up 2 points in the Juvy.  Not unless there was some big track variant change between teh Folklore race and his race.  The colts ran 2 seconds faster.  Folklore ran in the \"2\" range last time.  Stevie Wonderboy had run in the \"6\" range.  I am betting Henny Hughes ran close to his \"0\", not his \"3\".  Since SW seemed to lose ground, he had to run even better than that.

Not sure you have the same benefit as I do in having all the figs in front of you, but Rags gave SW the equivalent of a 2.75 TG figure in his last race.  The jump up from that fig to yesterday\'s race seems more plausible to me.

The bigger evidence to me was the result of the 1st race, which were not young 2 year olds, they were grizzled veterans with established figure levels.  You cannot come up with Ghostofachance and Captain Squire on TG.  

Hey, there are 15 figs yesterday from Rags that look like crap in hindsight.  I could name them, but it is a waste of time.  If the three races I just pointed out had nothing in common, I wouldn\'t even ask Jerry, but the fact that they are all races where the horses came from California and JErry has previously said that he thinks that Beyers has that circuit too fast, that is too much coincidence for me.  I have to ask the question.

I will try not to be so simple minded in the future HP.  I ask that you do the same.

[jimbo66]

Miff,

I think that Stevie Wonderboy ran faster than a \"1\".  We will see what Jerry give him, but he ran over 2 seconds faster than Folklore, with ground loss.  It won\'t go into the figure, but the horse also stumbled or clipped heels.  That horse ran huge.  Henny Hughes didn\'t run a clunker, he ran very well too.

[davidrex]

     Jimbo,
 I too had access to rags and  took a financial bath early on. The disparity in leftcoast #s was evident w/all other methods being used at my table.
 Any in depth analysis on this topic may have to be done privately(for I am labeled an antagonist)....and correctly so...

PARTYpokerON!

 

[miff]

Jim,

Maybe so, but in any event a hugh forward move which brings to question his previous 6.50.I felt that going in and made my biggest bet of the day only to get split by HH who arguably ran the best race of all of them,figs aside.I was wrong on HH and it cost me big time.

[jimbo66]

Alright Miff, I guess I misread your earlier post.  I thought you were disagreeing with me on the 6.5 fig for Stevie Wonderboy.  Sounds like you are in agreement.

I loved HH and was lucky enough to hit the exacta, as I used SW only because I knew TG was alone on that 6.5.  

ON an unrelated note the killer for me was Dutrow winning the Sprint, nipping Taste of Paradise.  I have that pick 4 for $5 if Taste of Paradise gets up.  TOP was a similar price to the winner and the pick 4 paid 5 figures.... Oh well.  Next year....  

[miff]

Jim,

Of great concern to me is the now useless \"scale of comparison\" between TG and RAGS which had relevance and a 3 or 4 point scale difference for  many years that I compared notes with my RAGGIE friends.

Looking at yesterdays Rags and TG(which I did all day) left me very conflicted on both sets regarding certain races and many runners. It seems like Jerry and Len have taken a different fork in the road.

[ronwar]

I\'m with you Jimbo. I usually only play Southern Cal unless there is a big day at Belmont or Churchill. If I\'m wagering, I\'m using TG so did get me wrong, but there are countless examples of horses shipping in with surperior #\'s against slower so cal horses only to get the snot kicked out of them...Your examples of CA horses shipping to Churhill, Pimlico, and Belmont are good examples...Taste of Paradise will get drilled the next time he steps into a graded CA sprint...  As was said, anybody can finish forth but Brother Derek shipping in with so slow #s and picking up check irks me. argh!

Jim maybe you should ask Class for his thoughts.  Perhaps its the faster splits So. Cal horses are use to running. j/k lol

The pace of the Folklore race was pretty savage. Compare the fractions of that race to the other 3 routes while keeping in mind that these were 2YO fillies and the rest of them were either older horses, colts, or both. The filly race collapsed final time wise because of the pace.

[richiebee]

Speaking of Beyers and TGs, an interesting study is Pleasant Home, whose Beyer\'s were kind of ordinary IMO. Hell, I\'ll say it-- her Beyers were much slower than the rest of the field. Her TGs seemed to give her a much better chance in this race.

Not to mention that elusive, enigmatic (to me) Pair/Pair/Pair pattern.

[miff]

Rich,

I agree and it was obvious that closers were dominating the winners circle on the dirt(exc Folklore)

Pleasant Home made my day \'OK\' yesterday. I had a small win and place bet on her, but I really needed Happy Ticket first or second to hit a grand slam. She didn\'t have much of a Beyer figure, but she was \"wide\" in her last trying to \"close\" off a somewhat \"slow pace\". I thought she ran well there. The TG figure has the wide baked in. She seemed like she was improving slowly. THis was only her 4th race off a layoff. She was coming back to Belmont where she would probably do better and the pace looked like it might be lively this time around. Granted this is all redboarding. However, I made a similar case for several other horses I bet yesterday that didn\'t do much running (like Wend). PH, was the only one that broke through, but sometimes you only need one.