I lost on this derby just as much as the next guy, but I feel a little heartened by it.
I thought this derby, more than any other, a 50-1 shot could win and I bet it that way. My only problem is the wrong 50-1 shot won. For example, I thought Join In the Dance could get a pure rail trip and run a 2 or a 3 and that with a super tight 1w 1w somebody overtaking him would have to come up with either an impossibly good trip or run a huge number to beat him. Also, I thought that Summer Bird (dang, wrong Bird horse), could actually move forward and I noted that his little known jockey had great path stats (not as good as Borel, but better than anybody else) and figured to be on the rail first turn and might be able to pull an upset. If either of those horses had been the 50-1 upset, I would have hit a $20 exacta and a $2 trifecta and would be crowing that this was my best derby ever. To a certain extent, I look at Mine that Bird and just say well if he can do it, my 50-1 can do it too one day. You don\'t need that every year. Just every once and a while.
The thing that gets me is that, if Mine That Bird had been something like 85-1, I might have considered using him. My main problem was that I wanted to choose a longshot and I thought the ones I chose looked better than him for what was basically the same price. However, if Summer Bird had been 25-1 and Mine That Bird 75-1, then I would have switched \"Birds\" Oh well!
Here is another question -- is Mine That Bird a case of Synthetic-to-Dirt Jump Up Syndrome? Maybe the figures at Woodbine could be weighed the way one would weigh I Want Revenge\'s synthetic figures. If those synthetic figures were all the equivalent of \"5s\" on dirt instead of \"8s\" they were, then maybe Mine That Bird\'s pattern looks a whole lot better and the jump up not so far-fetched. If you do look at it that way, then all of a sudden, he looks pretty strong in the Preakness in my view at what might be a pretty good price.
