Nobody Asked Me, But...

[TGJB]

Buoyed by my recent future book success (Funny Cide, PP in the BC), I bet The Cliff\'s Edge (don\'t understand why you guys don\'t like him), and a little on Fire Slam (the hoof thing will either be a problem, or the best thing that could have happened, and the price was right).

[Michael D.]

i noticed the cliff\'s edge closed at 28-1, quite a bit higher than where he is trading in vegas. good value in my opinion, and now that i look closer, i probably should have ranked him. has the pedigree to get the job done, with mr prospector on top, and northern dancer on bottom (fupeg type pedigree). dosage is a touch high (4.0), but, again, the track on derby has been very quick lately, and speed/stalker types have run very well. i have the feeling TCE will eventually wind up being a better miler, but that does not mean he can\'t win the derby. good luck.

[derby1592]

I can\'t argue with the surprising 28/1 on The Cliff\'s Edge. My concern with him was the 2 very fast races as a 2yo and the lack of a 3yo start to date. The breeding also looks a bit suspect for the Derby. Still, I have to agree that he looks like one of the better values in the Future Pool 1.

Fire Slam seems like a bit more of a stretch to me but I probably not much more of a stretch than Shaniko..

You should get a good read on TCE this Saturday.

Good luck.

Chris

[Chuckles_the_Clown2]

His owner dumped Manny Azpurua as trainer. I\'m very disappointed in that. He picked up Martin Wolfson who is a helluva trainer, but Manny did a great job with this horse. If there was any fairness in the world, Manny would still be the trainer, but then if the world was fair we wouldn\'t have killed all those innocents in Iraq and Bobby Frankel wouldn\'t have pulled Laffit Pincay off Megadeath for the Triple Crown in \'02.

Sir Oscar supposedly bled last. I guess the owner felt he should of been on Lasix already. How else can you possibly fault Manny\'s job? Manny is a true gentleman, heres what he said and he said volumes with just a few words:

\"The owner is the owner, and he has the final say...Sometimes in this business we know how to win but we don\'t know how to lose a race.\"

http://drf.com/news/article/53470.html


TGJB has two crafty selections for the future bet. Though Fire Slams breeding looks somewhat suspect to me, I love the way the horse looks and moves. I thought Holy Bull looked light on stamina for awhile too, despite the similar breeding to Dr. Fager.

I don\'t really like the route The Cliff\'s Edge is on, but I\'ll defer to Zito on that. The Iroquois Win at the track could be significant.

I don\'t really care if Sir Oscar is a good horse or not now.

CtC



Post Edited (02-19-04 04:43)

[TGJB]

I think given how fast horses have to run to win the Derby now, asking them to get there from a slow 2yo top may be asking too much (development). Funny Cide may be the beginning of a new trend, although I would still look for late 2yo development as opposed to earlier numbers.

I am very happy TCE hasn\'t started yet-- in a perfect world he would only start twice before the Derby, a la Victory Gallop.

Meanwhile, some guy on the Rag board bet the same two I did, which is very disturbing.

[derby1592]

What is the \"ideal\" 2yo/early 3yo form? How fast is too fast? How slow is too slow?

I agree it may have changed in recent years but I am still not necessarily convinced that Funny Cide is the new model.

Last year, all the other fast 2yos failed to get to or fire in the Derby last year (and there were a lot) and the top 3yos other than Funny Cide all were not that fast at 2 and relatively late developers that made a big jump in the March time frame. For example:

Empire Maker\'s top was a 6 until mid-March and he actually ran the fastest fig in the Derby despite running 2nd.

Peace Rules top was a 7 until mid-March.

Atswhatimtalkingabout was unraced at 2 and had a top of only 6.5 until the end of Feb.

Ten Most Wanted had a top of 7.25 until mid-April. (He was an also-ran in the Derby but had a terrible post/trip and redeemed himself in the Belmont.)

Going back to other recent past years:

War Emblem had a top 8 until mid-March.

Proud Citizen had a top of 6 until mid-April.

Perfect Drift had a top of 5.25 until mid-March.

Medaglio D\'ORo had a top of 7 until mid-March.

Monarchos had a top of 7 until mid-Feb.

Invisible Ink had a top of 6.5 until mid-Feb.

Congaree had a top of 13.5 until mid-March.

FuPeg had a top of 6.5 until mid-March.

Aptitude had a top of 7 until April.

Impeachment had a top of 7.75 until April.

Charismatic had a top of 8 until April.

Menfee had a top of 5.5 until April.

Cat Thief had a top over 5 until April.

Real Quiet had a top of 7 until mid-March.

Victory Gallop had a top 8.5 until mid-March.

Indian Charlie had a top of 6.75 until April.

If I go back any farther the Derby winning figs get to be much slower so it becomes much harder to compare.

I think the jury is still out but the trend may be more of having lightly raced 2yos that are not that fast but that make a big jump (4-6 pts) off a strong line sometime in or near March. At least the was the angle I played in the Future Book 1 this year(perhaps foolishly).

Of course, the not-so-easy (maybe impossible) trick is to somehow predict this pattern ahead of time.

However, I will still avoid any of the fast horses in early Future Books given even the limited data. The top Derby finishers in recent years, even last year, (with the one obvious exception) have been much slower than many of their competitors at 2 and early 3 but then dramatically jump past them in their final 1 or 2 Derby preps. Most of the early developers (fast at 2 or very early 3) don\'t even make it to the Derby and those that do seldom perform very well.  

I am hoping that Shaniko makes one of those big March jumps in the La Derby and that many of the faster horses regress between now and the Derby. Time will tell.

The Derby Future may be a dumb bet but it sure is a lot of fun...

Chris

[Chuckles_the_Clown2]

The truth of course is that Funny Cide made Empire Maker run like hell a couple times. So much so Frankel put him away to ambush the Belmont and then almost got beat by Ten Most Wanted, who ran a faster number than Empire Maker.

Empire Maker was monumentally over-rated. Who beat him in the Jim Dandy? I forget. I love big hype three year olds, which brings me to The Cliff\'s Edge. Tampa is a track horses get along with or they don\'t. I can\'t count the number of times I\'ve seen better east coast Florida horses ship in there to steal stakes money and get beat. I know Zito knows what that track is like. I\'m surprised TCE isn\'t working over it, but add the 3 month layoff and the outside post to the mix and is this an odds on horse? TCE isn\'t in Tampa for a stakes score. He\'s there to prep and he caught a relatively weak field for it. I\'m not sure what winning is gonna demonstrate. That is if he wins.

CtC

[TGJB]

I\'m not saying that the model has changed (I think I might have invented it), just that it may be changing, or being modified. I think there were other factors involved in the sudden move-ups of the Frankel horses last year.

You will like the number the Pletcher horse ran. Problem there may be that his horses tend not to develop through campaigns, but there is nothing wrong with the sheet right now.

[Michael D.]

i took the pletcher horse in vegas. i think the horse ran well, given the speed bias that day. good to hear he got a nice #. and remember, pletcher has said shaniko \"is a work in progress\" ..... so he may be training this one a bit different than the rest.

[Silver Charm]

Anybody know anything about him. I was talking to a friend of mine who said he talked with Satish Sanan and Sanan told him this horse was his Derby runner. When I looked him up as a Triple Crown nominee he was listed as Mike Mitchell trainee with another group of owners. Maybe Sanan already has a small piece or he was in the process of purchasing the horse. Who knows maybe someone out does.

This has really been fun reading what you guys have to say about the Derby hopefuls in the context of a future book bet. Derby 1592 welcome back and how in the hell do you come with a name like Derby 1592, give out a Cold Triple of the Nina, Pinta, and Santa Maria. I heard Friedman said they were throwouts because Chris Columbus stats at ROUTES were irrelevant. I mean the man had to be a 100% or we would have never heard him. Right???

[derby1592]

TGJB - you make two good points regarding the trainers. Looking back, you have to figure in the Frankel factor.  Looking forward, I am indeed a bit nervous about counting on a Pletcher horse to dramatically improve several months into a campaign. However, Shaniko started out as a 2yo under the notoriously patient Drysdale and Pletcher did not get him until late in his 2yo year, which means that he was probably not pushed to develop early the way a typical Pletcher horse would be (at least that\'s my rationalization and I am sticking to it..:-)

I am pleased to hear that I will like the fig Shaniko ran in his last. Having to guess at that was what almost caused me to pass completely but after looking at all the sheets and times for the day and watching the replays a couple of times, I was convinced that he probably ran a new top, which was good enough for me. If SFTF had not been in the same allowance race, Shaniko would have swooped around the entire field (with a Derby-winning-type move) and drawn off to win by 3 and probably had his odds cut in half.

Thanks

Chris

[derby1592]

Silver Charm - Sorry but the guy who made a big score on the \"America\'s Cup\" future book by taking Columbus at 1000/1 (back before Chris went to Portugal and was still in Venice making maps or something like that), was my great-great-great-great-great Grandfather Derby1492...

[Chuckles_the_Clown2]

Interesting that Shaniko\'s number was a \"move forward\".

23.43, 47.29, 1:12.02, 1:38.04, 1:50.67

If thats the case either the day was split or Swing For The Fences ran a very strong one. If its the latter the Fountain of Youth was in an entirely different kind of ballpark.

23.97, 47.70, 1:11.21, 1:36.16, 1:42.71

Note both SFTF and Shaniko were reserved off the early fractions in their race.

Shaniko was making his second start for Pletcher and Pletcher didn\'t miss with much else on the card. It wasn\'t that Shaniko stopped running, it was that he stopped and SFTF ran like a good thing.

Now is the time to discuss breeding. Does Shaniko have superior breeding? When you try to decide if he does look closely at the direct tail female family of both horses. My guess is that Shaniko is gonna be hard pressed to beat SFTF at any distance. Time will tell. But it seems to me one is looking for significant moves forward for Shaniko at this point and most A.P.\'s come along slowly. SFTF was one that I thought would give Second of June fits in the near future.

24.33, 48.84, 1:12.82, N/A, 1:42.40
23.62, 48.10, 1:12.94, 1:39.39, 1:52.66
21.45, 43.48, 1:09.17, 1:22.86
22.18, 44.61, 1:08.91, 1:21.42
21.93, 44.16, 1:09.14, 1:16.19
21.37, 44.00, 56.00, 1:08.85
23.43, 47.29, 1:12.02, 1:38.04, 1:50.67
21.68, 43.73, 1:08.96, 1:22.23
23.97, 47.70, 1:11.21, 1:36.16, 1:42.71
22.16, 45.14, 57.53, 1:10.09

I don\'t completely trust Gulfstream figures and I don\'t envy Jerry making them for this card.

CtC



Post Edited (02-20-04 17:35)

[derby1592]

Chuckles - This may be preaching to the choir but keep in mind that looking at the fractional times can be very misleading.

There are different runups for 9f vs. 8.5f and the different fractions are run on the turn for 9f vs. 8.5f. Also, with young, lightly-raced 3yos 9f is significantly more taxing than 8.5f (particularly in the final 1/8th). Additionally, note that differences in weight and ground-loss are not taken into account in the raw fractional times.

Not to mention the possibility of the track changing speeds, split variants, etc.

All that makes the comparing fractions (and even final times) between the 9f race and other 8.5f races even on the same day very tricky and potentially misleading.

Fortunately, we can just let TG worry about all that (at least the stuff that relates to the final figure).

I certianly did not mean to imply that I thought Shaniko is faster now than SFTF or RTF or a bunch of others in the future book. Just that he is lightly-raced with a solid,forward-moving line that seems capable of the improvement needed to win the Derby and that his sheet looks a lot more like the recent top Derby finishers than do the sheets of the other faster horses such as RTF or most of the other horses listed in the Future book. In fact, based on past history, the fastest horses in Feb. don\'t usually run that well in the Derby.

Chris

[Chuckles_the_Clown2]

I understand run-ups and pay them little mind, because they are never constant. But most tracks try and maintain consistent run-ups. The gist of my post was that The Fountain was either spectacular or the product of a track aberration. I think they say Zito is stacked. I make him holding secondary cards. Though he may have one hole card.

And I want to add good luck on those Futures. It may even be that I arrive at the same conclusion later.

CtC



Post Edited (02-20-04 21:16)