I guess he\'s not taking his shot on Saturday but potentially next Friday.

http://ukpress.google.com/article/ALeqM5iqNDeXI7yOmwBAZKZLrtRAHJfRaA

I\'m with Miff.  Commentator is a complete toss in the Classic for me, as is Big Brown.  The main questions for me are 1) who the Euros send over and 2) whether Curlin will run as poorly on Pro Ride as he did on Turf.  On dirt Curlin is miles better than the other US horses.  

I am watching to see whether they send Duke of Marmalade over.  His Euro numbers are pretty imposing.  He is supposedly being considered for a synthetic track 9f prep on Saturday but cannot find any recent news stories to confirm or not.

I posted on the \'other\' site my guess that he had to have run a negative number on the Ragozin scale.  Reasoning thus:

Other horses figured to run between a 5 and 8.  Give them an \'8\' or maybe a \'9\' if they quit at the end.
Commentator wins by 14 lengths, which is about 8 points.
Commentator gave about 10 lbs (2 points) in weight.
Commentator raced outside of the 2nd place horse (or so it seemed) for most of the race.  1/2 point.

My guess -1 or -2 or so for Ragozin.  He had run a -5 on TG last race (a figure he had run several times) so I have to think he ran at least that fast in the Mass Cap.

I pulled my own Albarado on Friday with Lemon Drop Mom in the PE stakes.  No doubt in my mind when they crossed the wire that she had won, so I gave a nice fist pump and got up to cash my exacta (I also had some nice DD\'s with the next race winner).  Oops.

Luckily, I had Colonel John in the Travers to Win along with the 2-9 exacta box so a tip of the cap to Albarado for keeping me off tilt for the weekend.

Strange occurrence at DMR in the last race on PC day.  Lots of value in the race with #12, Pictular being a good horse to key in exactas -- decent pattern and #s similar to the favorite.  20:1 ML and drifting up throughout.  As the horses were loading he was 26:1.  He broke on top and sat 3rd down the backstretch.  As they showed the #s of the top 4 horses he was 16:1 -- his final odds.  There was nothing funny in the P3/P4 or P6 pools, where he was easily 25:1 or higher so curious as to how he dropped so dramatically.  It was about $5,000 of last second money that went in on him.

As for the synthetics -- it has really changed handicapping for So Cal tracks for me.  Horses are actually running patterns now and it looks like they are able to come back more frequently.  Those huge move-ups are rarer (maybe it is the crackdown on drugs as well) and horses seem to bounce less frequently and less severely off new tops.  It\'s almost like handicapping Calder now (though not quite).

Well I was clearly wrong about Big Brown.  The bigger problem for me yesterday was being wrong in the other races I bet, since I only bet $168 on the Belmont and did not have BB on any of those tickets anyway -- I missed the Da\'Tara bandwagon too, unfortunately.

Good call on BB, Jerry.  Every race is a learning experience and I have some good additional data points for the memory bank.

Jerry:  I\'ll save you the dime.  There are 13 races on the card so hopefully there will be some better betting opportunities than the Belmont.

I will have $2 win on BB just for a souvenir.  I will probably key him in a Super on top of every horse not named \"Casino Drive\".  If I bet more than 10% of my day\'s bankroll on the Belmont than I am in big trouble!

Opinions are cheap (mine included). As Harvey Pack used to say -- \"That\'s why they make you run around the block.\"

Only if you believe that BB will move back ward off of his Preakness number should you even attempt to try to beat him in this race.

I would be very surprised if he does not run a faster number in the Belmont than the Preakness.  He is much more like Smarty Jones, Point Given, and Afleet Alex than his is Charismatic, War Emblem, etc. in that BB is consistently fast and the -1, while faster than you\'d like to see a 3 y.o. run in May is not a disastrous number, given the races behind it.  SJ, PG, and AA all were able to run strong races with big numbers in either their prior race or two back.  

I am usually very averse to watching \"how a horse did it\" in a particular race and project the next effort off of that, as horses generally tend to put out close to 100% efforts, even when they are eased somewhat in the late stages, but BB basically galloped for the first 7 1/2 furlongs in the Preakness, ran hard for 1/8 mile, then galloped the last 1/8.  The Preakness was a non-effort  and if Touch Gold could win the Belmont with a hoof as bad as he had, BB should not have a problem with the small quarter crack he suffered.

The bottom line with BB is that his slowest number this year is faster than the fasted number (or very close to it) for every other horse in the race, ex. CD.

I love to try to beat favorites but save your money trying to beat BB.

CD is an interesting toss given 2nd start US and if you can get him out of the Super there is value there.

Don\'t say I didn\'t warn you.

Sorry.  I got tix thru NYRA.  Thanks for the offer!

I have had the distinct pleasure of being present for the failed TC bids of Real Quiet, Charismatic, War Emblem, Funny Cide, and Smarty Jones.  Maybe this is the year?

I am flying out to NYC on Friday and am looking for two tix to Belmont.  We have an application with NYRA -- submitted two weeks ago -- but I don\'t know if that is going to come thru.

I am willing to pay a reasonable price.  Anybody with a line on tix or suggestions?

Thanks.

Sorry for the late response -- been traveling.

Derby

We boxed 11 horses in a trifecta for $990 and the tri came back $1,700+ for the $1.

We played BB over 11 horses in the Super which cost another $990 and returned $29k pre-tax.

We played a few smaller super tix as well that whiffed.

Total investment ~$2,500 for a $31k return

Preakness

I played a Super key for $60 BB over 5 horses then $270 in Super keys of BB w/ RR w/ all w/ all keying RR for 2nd, 3rd, and 4th

Total investment $330 for an $1,100+ return.

We did better in the Derby.

A great example today of the \"throw it up against the wall\" theory.  I keyed BB on top w/ RR for 2nd thru 4th with all in the other two spots.  Two horses that I never would have used helped key a decent Super.

Lost the P6 when my other single -- Bear Now -- didn\'t win.

Jerry -- I guess you win the Gayego/Hey Byrn bet.

The food is better there, but the conversation is better here.

Jerry,

I\'m not trying to pit Rag v. TG or engage in any gamesmenship.  I\'m one of those people who wants as many inputs as possible (e.g., both sets of sheets + breeding + post, etc.) and then I\'ll make my decisions.

The reasons I like to post here are that people actually post here.  The Rag board is relatively dead.  I am happy to make the same post over there.  Watch for it in a few minutes.

I agree that we can\'t really have a meaningful discussion about HB now because of the post position.  I don\'t necessarily think it\'s that much of a negative but so be it.  I\'d have picked against him if he was in the 3 hole but he\'s not so I guess I can\'t prove much if he runs out.

Since they only pay you if your horse finishes in the money, whether Gayego or HB runs a better number isn\'t all that interesting to me, except as an academic exercise.  I think Gayego is most likely to run a 5-7 on Rag and HB 7 to 10 on Rag, so probably a 90%+ chance that Gayego runs better than HB.  Gayego is in the 12 hole so that post won\'t really help him that much relative to HB.

Given that Gayego is likely to be the second or third choice, there\'s not much value in using him in exotics absent at least one big long shot hitting, so I can\'t say I am super-excited about thinking he\'s one of the top six contenders.  Nonetheless I think you have to use him.

I know that I am using a different set of Sheets to handicap this race, but, having looked at both TG and Rags -- for what it\'s worth:

All of you using Hey Byrn -- There must be some form of mass hysteria propogating the Internet.  Hey Byrn is probably 10% to hit the board and 0% to Win.  Save your money.  On Rags none of his numbers put him in the money and on TG one of his races puts him somewhere, maybe.  Complete toss in my book.

As for Big Brown.  It is true that the last two horses to run close to this fast in the Derby -- Monarchos and Barbaro -- ran horrible or worse in the Preakness.  But I do not think BB is in the same category as these other horses.  Both Monarchos and Barbaro had a lot of spacing throughout their careers.  BB had one big gap to fix his hooves and he has run three consecutive races without a big break.  Hoof issues are not the same as general soundness issues so I don\'t read his pattern as such a flashing red light.  Additionally, either of his races prior to the Derby destroy this field (absent a big jump up by somebody -- very rare in the Preakness).  You\'re never happy to see a young 3 y.o. run that fast and a bounce is likely, but I don\'t think 2:5 is necessarily a price I want to play against.  Unlike TGJB I would put him at about 70% to Win.

Gayego is an interesting horse.  I\'m willing to forgive the Derby performance since it was a complete non-effort.  His Rag pattern is more favorable than his TG pattern and he will be involved in the pace early this time (sitting 2 or 3 most likely).  

Racecar Rhapsody is an interesting longshot, as is Stevil, though I would prefer RR at the same price.  Kentucky Bear is o.k. -- as fast as anyone not named BB but no pattern to gauge.  Finally BATB is competitive with no obvious negatives.

Those are my top 6 with BB sitting at the top.

If Hey Byrn hits the board, then congrats to you all!