Dutrow gets Danger to Society

[dodie]

Jerry
  For what it\'s worth, it\'ll be very interesting to see what Tricky does with one of McPeek\'s top Derby contenders who tanked at GP on Saturday. Robbins gave him to Tricky 2 days after the race.  I think Kenny\'s largely on the up and up.  I can\'t wait to see Danger to Society\'s next start.

[smalltimer]

This would have been one of my early choices as a Derby contender.  I think McPeek is very, very good with horses.  What Dutrow is capable of makes me think Danger to Society becomes a much larger threat.  (Sorry to say).

[covelj70]

Below is an blurb from James Sculley\'s post today on KentuckyDerby.com.  It won\'t be popular here because he defends Dutrow.

As I said in my post over the weekend on Patena, I have no expertise on the topic.  I will express an opinion and take a stand when I have some analysis and expertise to back those thoughts up but I don\'t on the juicing/drug topic.

However, I do think Scully brings up a good point in this article that gets brushed off too often on this board.  Some trainers can move horses up naturally.  There is such a thing as a better trainer improving a horse.  Kirian and Billy do it all the time.  I love Kirian and he trains a whole bunch of horses that I own a piece of but he got slapped with a drug suspension last year and had to sit out some days and no one ever brings that up when one of his horses runs off the screen.  Again, I love the guy and think he\'s a great trainer and an even better person but there are alot of inconsistencies with how this board treats these situations.

Again, I will bring it back to the numbers that I discussed and to which Jerry responded last week.  Patena has paired 6s in his last two races.  Paired tops for a two year old/young three year old suggest improvement in the next race and it\'s normal that a  healthy, well bred 3 year old in the spring can NATURALLY achieve 3-4 points of improvement from their 2 year old top.

JB, you kindly responded to my post and said that a 3 is one thing but a 3 negative would be a different story.  I totally agree with you.  If Patena runs a 3 negative next time, that would be a joke.  However, what if he runs a 1 or a 2 and wins the Lousiana Derby by 5 lengths.  The racing world/press will go insane but wouldn\'t it be reasonable for a horse that could/should naturally get down to a 3 move up to a 1 or 2 with a different training regime, feed program (one on Kirian\'s big focus issues by the way), shoes, spacing of races, etc?

I hate cheating more than anyone, whether it\'s horses, baseball or Wall Street.  There\'s no place at all for it and its clear that there are cheaters in racing and they need to be dealt with.  However, as an group, we need to be fair and consistent with how we are dishing out the acqusations.

the relevant piece of Scully\'s article is pasted below.

\"Dutrow factor -- Disgruntled bettors/turf writers couldn\'t have been more off the mark in their recent criticism of Richard Dutrow, who took over the conditioning of the three-year-old This Ones for Phil (Untuttable) and won the Sunshine Millions Dash with him at long odds. You might as well tell me that trainers aren\'t important. Say what you want about Dutrow\'s character, but there\'s no denying the fact that he\'s an outstanding horsemen. He\'s going to move up any developing three-year-old who moves to his barn from Kathleen O\'Connell or 90 percent of the trainers out there. Trainers have always played a huge part in Thoroughbred racing, and Dutrow\'s one of the best.

Now he\'s stocking his Kentucky Derby arsenal. Canadian stakes winner PATENA (Seeking the Gold), who opened 2009 with a good second in the Lecomte S. (G3), was purchased by IEAH Stables and transferred to Dutrow in late December. The promising late runner will make his first start under Dutrow\'s care in the Louisiana Derby (G2) on March 14. And earlier this week, Gulfstream allowance winner DANGER TO SOCIETY (Harlan\'s Holiday), who was in tight during the early stages of the Holy Bull and wound up seventh as the 9-5 favorite, was moved by owner Lansdon Robbins to Dutrow. Danger to Society suffered his first career setback on Saturday, but don\'t be surprised to see him rebound with a much better showing in his next start.\"

[TGJB]

Let me show you how this works, and why I say the math itself is conclusive, using a very famous, very clear example that has come up here before.

Frankel had already proven he was a great horseman before the spring/summer of 2001. But during that period, ALL his horses-- most of which were older, with clearly established form-- rocketed forward 3-4 points at the same time, meaning in their next start. Now, Frankel horses are extremely steady, especially the grass horses, which make up a high percentage of his barn-- the chances of any one of these horses jumping forward that far in any one start is probably 5%, but to be generous let\'s say it\'s 10%. So the chance of two in a row doing it is 10% of 10%, which is 1%. When you start getting to the third, fourth and fifth horses, the numbers get ridiculous, and when you get to ten...

That\'s how I do it. When I see an UNUSUAL jumpup-- not from a lightly raced horse, not a change of surface-- I make a mental note. When I see a second from the same trainer I start paying attention to all his starters. When I see several in the same time period, I draw a conclusion.

This is the exact way I explained things to the Jockey Club committee. They got it.

By the way, it later turned out that spring 2001 was when Allday started working for Frankel.

Oh, almost forgot. It was the Dutrows that suggested Frankel use Allday, and introduced them.

[covelj70]

JB, thanks alot of the example.  Its an awesome one and it makes a ton of sense.  I get it, when there is smoke (and in this case flames), there is fire.  The numbers don\'t like in almost every case.

I hope you or anyone else doesn\'t think that I am saying that there aren\'t cheaters, there are and shame on them and I am with you in wanting to do something about it. I am not one of the 20k per week guys that you mentioned but I bet plenty and I want a level playing field as much as anyone (well, maybe not the guys that you talked about at the million level but you get my point).

My only point in all of this is that just because a horse runs better when one trainer takes them over, especially one that knows what they are doing, it doesn\'t NECESSARILY mean they are cheating.  There is some level of natural improvement that Kiran, Billy, Dutrow, Steve and many others can achieve.  Shame on anyone who has acted in a way in the past that calls their current achievements into question but we can\'t just say that any improvement is automatically because the horse is juiced.

A am as big of a skeptic as there is on any topic (just ask the companies I follow in the market) but I also want to be fair and balanced.

In the example you gave, This One\'s for Phil ran out of his skin but Arson Squad ran a clunker a week later. One might have expected Arson Squad to fire (and the betting public did also given the odds he went off at) but he didn\'t.

[TGJB]

DRugs are not the only factor, and Arson Squad had already made his explosion.

But you accidentally raised another point. Guys who have gotten themselves in a position where they can bet huge amounts of money are not stupid. You think maybe the invisible hand might have created a market for certain information? That makes it doubly tough-- horses you might consider betting look like underlays, so you don\'t bet them...unless you know what\'s going on. There are certain trainers whose horses run a whole lot better when they get bet-- Miff might be able to tell you about one in NY, he was the example I used for the JC.

[covelj70]

good point.  I have heard you use raise this issue in the seminars about looking at the board for first timers, for example, for certain trainers.  The first timers that get bet from certain guys tend to run very well, the ones that are cold on the board, don\'t normally run well.

Maybe they are just chatty about who\'s training well or maybe there\'s other stuff going on.

Maybe a point for another day but I do want to understand better how the issue of the non-natural one-time explosion works but doesn\'t sustain.

Whether it was Arson\'s Squad huge move up in the Meadowlands Cup and his subsequent flop last weekend or Brownie\'s Fla and Kentucky Derby and then the drop off/collapse in the Preakness/Belmont or what we are likely to see at some point from This One\'s for Phil.  

Is the answer that whatever is being used to create the explosion doesn\'t prevent that huge effect from taking it\'s natural toll on the horse (i.e. whether a young horse runs a 3 negative naturally or it\'s enhanced, the effect is the same and that effort takes alot/everything out of the horse)?

thanks for all of the thoughts, very informative.

[Josephus]

I\'m not so sure Arson Squad ran a clunker. He had a terrible trip, esp. at the beginning of the race.

[imallin]

If this one\'s for Phil\'s latest win is legitimate and was just done on great horsemanship and no cheating, than it should be expected that \'phil\' will continue to churn out Beyer figs in the low 100s on his worst days and touch off 120 on his best.

If Phil was a one hit wonder drug horse, he\'ll revert back to his previous ways with this one number sticking out like a sore thumb and he might not be able to duplicate it.

I don\'t think any amount of cheating is going to make an 80-Beyer type of runner  keep churning out beyers in the 100s. this horse will find his level drugs or not. his next few starts will tell a lot i believe. If Dutrow is telling the truth, we should expect Phil to be running beyers in the high 90s or low 100s on this worst days and touching off 120 on his best. Lets see what this horse has for us going forward.

[Silver Charm]

This is a raw deal for Kenny McPeek. The horse was 2-2 and had a bad day on a bad day. Now he is off to Dutrow?

Where the F is the loyalty?

I do not know what the story is and hate to root against the horse. But I hope he chips a knee in his next work and vanishes from sight forever.

[P-Dub]

Silver Charm Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
 
> I do not know what the story is and hate to root
> against the horse. But I hope he chips a knee in
> his next work and vanishes from sight forever.


Charm,

You\'re beginning to sound like a certain exiled Clown. You\'re better than that. Rooting for horses to get injured that will make for an interesting spring does nothing for the sport.

[Silver Charm]

Then ban me.

The horse figures to improve over the spring and this makes McPeak look bad who did a good job for the owner.

Lets root for the guys who have been under criticism for MAYBE using illegal drugs to get ahold of every horse in training and then wouldn\'t that be fun to bet on.

[SoCalMan2]

am surprised nobody saw any humor in the horse\'s name.  All sorts of fun things you can do with words.

[richiebee]

... not to mention the slight irony that DTS\' sire raced for McPeek as a 3YO and was taken away and given to Pletcher after the Preakness...

[miff]

If you are watching Gulfstream the entire meet, you could conclude that Mc Peek\'s horses are being helped.Most running lights out, big new tops and he\'s the leading trainer so far.Just about every day in NY there is info coming from GP re a Mc Peek runner. The horses are being bet down and winning at a rate of more than what you would expect from this outfit.

Might want to check his \"halo\" or maybe it\'s just a red hot barn where all the horses are firing,it happens.


Mike