Find Nuts Occasionally.
Is an old saying implying the unlikely rarely, but not never, end up with a prize or something to that effect?
I\'m been betting and touting Japanese horses on this board for at least a decade. I\'ve been beaten black and blue in U.S. races and been vindicated @ Dubai & Meydan.
Once again I have a prospect in the B.C. Juvenile. Jasper Great from Arrogate\'s first crop out of a good mare.
I won\'t be able to lay off the unbeaten colt at anything near the double-digit morning line odds. Arrogate was probably great because of PED\'s but it\'s a fun tradition for me now.
Heard it here first.
The dam Shop Again did produce the good Baffert Runner Power Broker by Pulpit.
Ever since, she has burned a ton of sales money.
2012 filly by Malibu Moon $1M - earned $73k
2015 filly by Tapit $500k - earned $26k
2016 colt by Pioneerofthenile $200k - $6k
2017 filly by Curlin $325k - unraced.
But hope springs eternal. Good Luck.
I still cannot believe how breeders / buyers continue to pay top dollar for horses trained by Baffert. It\'s like they time and time again do not learn their lesson. The answer is right in front of them and yet they still for over money hand over fist.
The BC site seemed to imply Shop Again was something. Being by Wild Again a BC race winner. But as Gary points out she has simply burnt money as a Dam.
So I went to Equibase to see how she fared in competition. A Florida bred, she debuted @ SAR in 2004 and took until 2006 (some 16 races later) to win her first race. A 40-45k maiden claiming race at Belmont. Trained by H. Jerkens and ridden by Chantal (Lady Godiva) Sutherland. Claimed by James Imperion out of that race.
She left New York for easier pickings and found just that at Prarie Meadows and Remington. Eventually getting fast enough to win a minor Stakes and Allowance race in good time.
Apparently with a questionable racing future and the advancin=ng years she was sold to a Japanese buyer as breeding stock.
Bottom Line as you point out
She is/was a tomato can!
Whatever hope I had in Jasper Great, is a tiny fraction of what it was. How he won a stakes race at a major Japanese track (by 10 lengths) really clouds the picture probably reducing the amount of my bet to the minimum.
Yikes!
I did not mean to impart my own personal biases onto your runner. He could be anything! I merely stated facts.
I use the pedigree site much too much. It is a habit I am trying to lessen.
My personal bias is against sire sons of Unbridled\'s Song, who famously had bad feet. He has been a wonderful sire ( a great damsire) but not a great sire of sires. Liam\'s Map has risen to the top of his sons.
While I regard Arrogate with the same doubt as the others, nothing has been determined. He is off to a slow start, that is all.
I just saw on YouTube Jasper greats race visually impressive Jasper Race (https://youtu.be/qi9eD-QxeNA)
I am leaving all Japanese entrants out. They have had years of failure and I suspect an underlying problemwith their overall approach.
My best wager will be on Koala Princess.
Perhaps the goal was to breed her to The Green Monkey - but two wrongs wouldn\'t necessarily make a right.
Koala Princess in a race with none of the fillies attracting too much attention. @ 6/1 I\'ll join you. I like everything about this one. Love the sire\'s (More Than Ready) progeny on the turf. Add to that the Dam\'s Sire Lonrho is/was a super sire down under.
Versatile, ran from the front in her sprint debut and from off the pace strongly stretching out. IMO, Rosario rides more correctly than mistakenly. Thanks for the idea DB.
But I do like the horse named Japan. Lost to Gufo in Sword Dancer with a terrible trip-woulda won easily. Next in Joe Hirsch did nothing, but his regular jockey stayed behind. Check out Japan\'s results with Ryan Moore rather than Lordan.
O'Brien horse?
What was the distance of that race? 9 furlongs? A mile and 3/16s?
9 furlong's
Shop Again\'s dam Shopping was an Allen Jerkens/Hobeau Farm runner also.
In addition to Shop Again, she produced Trappe Shot ($700k+ earner) and Miss Shop ($1.1 million + earner).
In uninflated $\'s. As uninspiring as the dam may be, she won\'t be running and the colt truly could be any kind and may or may not tun his race. One reason why I love this sport so much.
Thanks for the added data Fairmount, just doing deep research or considering the grey at the price?
Before designer drugs really took over the game, pedigrees had more meaning esp in graded stakes. They still do but not the same way. It is not mentioned much in specific detail but many sires flat out could NOT get horses to go 1 1/4 for instance until the last decade or so. Just wasn\'t happening. There were limitations and you could BANK on it. Then some trainers started making it happen for some of these sires and then people started talking about it must be from the Dam side. Ex. City Zip as a sire. I\'ll let others connect dots on that one.
So long story short, in my early days of playing, I followed pedigree more and followed all of Jerkens horses very close during 2000-onward when I dove into the game. I knew with the name Shop Again she had to be related to Miss Shop and did not recall the Trappe Shot connection who was trained by McLaughlin until I looked it up.
Fairmount:
\"many sires flat out could NOT get horses to go 1 1/4\"
How are you defining \"NOT get horses to go 1 1/4\" in speed figure terms? What kind of a decline are you talking about?
RC,
Very fine question. When I wrote that I was generalizing based on what I recall as automatic handicapping angles in stakes races. I follow Lauren Stich\'s train of thought that Sires determine the surface and distance preferences and the mare determines the ability or so-called class. I don\'t like that term but let\'s say that certain mares certainly throw ones that run and it is a clear pattern and others don\'t.
So when I made my comments, I was basing my thoughts on the sire\'s influence as to surface and distance. That said I did not have any evidence, specifically, figure based to back it up.
A look at CZ Rocket\'s sheet might be enlightening as he is a City Zip from a TG perspective.
From a Beyer perspective, fwiw I don\'t know, his average Sprint Beyer was 48 as a sire and 54 as a route sire. He had 9200 plus starters in sprints and 2800 plus starters in routes. He had 16 percent winners in both sprints and routes with 44 percent hitting the board in sprints (WPS) and 46 hitting the board (WPS) in routes.
All that being said as to his total record as a sire . . . If I could see the list of all his dirt graded stakes progeny, I could make some more evidentiary based statements to support or deny my claim that City Zip\'s (for instance) did not win at route or \"classic\" distances on dirt at least until a trainer or two figured out how to \"stretch\" that pedigree to a mile and a quarter. I don\'t have all of that info and given I\'m looking at more BC stuff, I\'ll leave it for another day.
I did want to respond though so you know I appreciate your point and I\'ll try to do better in the future with avoiding assertions.
On Friday\'s card, I\'m high Pappacapp in the race that started this string. I haven\'t checked TG yet as that will be my last review tomorrow morning but have to believe he fits on there. Lots of other reasons to also support him. If you go back and watch his race two back, you have to give further thought. His last was behind a golden rail, front running Baffert horse and he was 3w, 3w. I\'ll play him with JC who I think will have a nice trip from the rail actually given the runners next to him several stalls out.
I hate Echo Zulu and love JuJu\'s Map.
Good Luck to all.
Nice to see real breeding thoughts on a handicapping board. I am very defensive about my passion. I never want to bore.
Re Pappacap, I have been looking out for runners out of Scat Daddy mares since Whitmore.
Re JC - If the Half Ours doesn\'t catch up to him tomorrow (Sat) I lose.
Re Comandperformer - While I hold that Union Rags don\'t train on, they can run early.
I want to go on but have to bite my tongue.
Thank you, Fairmount.
I don\'t know anything about that track, but the time was pedestrian....and he looked all out.
He had a nice work on Wednesday
I actually noticed your post about Japan runners this week, , and thought it was interesting.
Would you now say they have repaired any defect in their regimen ?
drbillym Wrote:
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> But I do like the horse named Japan. Lost to Gufo
> in Sword Dancer with a terrible trip-woulda won
> easily. Next in Joe Hirsch did nothing, but his
> regular jockey stayed behind. Check out Japan\'s
> results with Ryan Moore rather than Lordan.
Sadly, Ryan Moore didn\'t get to 3rd, but sure did help the SPR, which was not me. any Appleby\'s or Japanese breds in the classi
Oh Godolphin!