In my opinion, for anyone who adheres strictly to sheets and sheet theory, the Travers is about a stragithforward of a betting race as you will see.
Of course we all know that every race doesn\'t go according to strict adherence to the sheets for various reasons but for those of us that bet most races (except the Belmont and the BC Marathon given the distance) as if it does given that the percentages will work out for you in the long run, this one is a green light type of situation.
As usual, I am not going to give precise numbers since that would be taking money out of Jerry\'s pocket and heaven knows I wouldn\'t want to do that
but we can get the full picture without giving away the numbers.
First, the 3 favorites (Stay Thirsty, Coil, and Shackleford) are all coming off of big new tops and drew outside. So all of them are likely to bounce and/or lose ground. There\'s a long run to the turn at a mile and a quarter at the spa so the horses with tactical speed should be able to get over before the turn but the outside posts still create some ground loss risk.
It\'s always dangerous assuming 3 quality horses are all going to bounce so if I lose this bet, it\'s likely going to be because one of them is able to pair up but I am willing to take this risk. All 3 of them are coming off of relatively short rest given the kind of new tops they ran. Also, Coil is a candidate for the 2nd time poly/dirt bounce that Jerry likes to highlight. He breezed awesome this week (got that from people who saw it) but so did Plum Pretty before the Alabama and we saw how important that was last weekend. Of the 3 favorites, Stay Thirsty is the one that worries me the most because he is the fastest of the 3 favs and because we have no worries about the surface or distance with him. I do worry about the distance issues with Shackleford and he looks like a bounce candidate as I mentioned before anyway so I am more confident tossing him.
So, if we don\'t like the 3 favorites, who do we like.
The sheets point us very clearly in the direction of Ruler on Ice who would be a fabulous play at the 6-1 ML.
1) he\'s as fast as anyone in the race other than Stay Thirsty\'s last
2) he has paired tops so not as obvious of a bounce candidate as the 3 favs
3) there\'s no distance concerns given that he ran a top at a mile and a half in the Belmont
4) if the track comes up sloppy, we know he can handle that from the Belmont slop fest
5) he drew a good post so he shouldn\'t lose too much ground, at least on first turn
The one question mark is that he hasn\'t run over the surface at Saratoga but the horse has run his race (pair or new tops) on 7 different racetracks in his last 7 races. Good horses can run their race over any surface and he seems like a good horse so I am willing to bet that he can handle the spa surface, especially given that the issue at the spa this year has been how tiring how the track has been and he seems to be the stamina type that would be ok on this year\'s spa surface.
In terms of the others,
Bowmans\' Causeway is slow slow to compete with these
Rattlesnake Bridge is somewhat interesting but also is coming off a new top which still isn\'t fast enough to win and with the Cherokee Run on the bottom side, I don\'t know that this one wants a mile and a quarter
Moonshine Mullin is also a bit too slow and subject to the 2nd time poly/dirt bounce as is Coil
Malibu Glow would be interesting if he hadn\'t born out in making the new top last out
Raison D\'etat would be very interesting with fast paired tops if he hasdn\'t born in AND born out in his last
JW Blue has a healthy pattern but is a bit slow and drew outside. If you are looking for a bomb to get a piece, he\'s not a bad choice
As always, there are a million way this analysis could be wrong.
If I miss here, it\'s most like because one of the favorites can pair up and overcome the outside draw or one of the horses that BI/BO last time isn\'t effected yet.
However, if you subscribe like alot of us do to what the sheets are all about, this one is straighforward and therefore deserves a large play on Ruler on Ice.
thoughts/criticisms welcome as always.
Good luck on Sat.
