This is What Man O'War Looked Liked

[johnnym]

Very True Frank.

[Tavasco]

I appreciate and relate to the sentiment of FrankD\'s post. I also value fact checking. However my limited knowledge of Linguistics, suggests Frank, like many promoting an idea, used what linguists refer to as a deletion.

The issue with a linguistic \"deletion\" is that they invite misunderstanding. Frank posted -  \"a Sports Illustrated athlete of the year,\" and the word winner is not part of his phrase. That c/b what he meant or he could have meant nominee and probably didn\'t mean tomato can.

This phenomena is curious because it has become so common in Pennsylvania Ave neighborhoods and accounts. In a related search of Wikipedia I discovered actual winners of SI athlete of the year include Lance Armstrong, Mark McGuire and Curt Schilling to name a few which history and subsequent facts did not result in increased popularity.

In their prime we concluded Lance had superior training technique, Mark was a genetic anomaly and Curt well maybe success spoiled him. Today we suppose BBT has superior training techniques, Arrogate is a physical freak and to date the team\'s accomplishments are like no other. Until they make a movie about the horse and cast a gal as attractive as Diane Lane (Streets of Fire fame .. eh Richie) and age the Arrogate story I can say with certainty I\'m glad I fell asleep Sat morning when planning to bet against Arrogate.

[belmont3]

Frank,

Glad you posted this.
First thing I did after reading Silver\'s post was to pull up Secretariat\'s PPs.
Just a note, one of his 5 losses was a DQ in the Champagne.
Ran 12 times as a 3yo?? 5 times against elders with 2 huge wins on the sod.

So, I have a letter from Penny Tweedy hanging in my office. It is dated Feb. 23, and addressed to Dick Schaap (the late great sportswriter, editor, TV sports personality). The letter was in response to Schaap writing that Secretariat and Riva Ridge were the two most famous stablemates since Joseph and Mary.

http://www.nytimes.com/2001/12/22/sports/dick-schaap-dies-at-67-ubiquitous-sports-journalist.html

Part of the letter reads,

\"I understand that you are the Editor of Sport Magazine.....our appreciation of Secretariat being named \'Man of the Year\'....I recently ran into O J Simpson and there was a little kidding about a horse being a \'man\". When Secretariat and RR (that would be Riva Ridge) have all their mares in foal this summer, I\'m going to sport a bumper sticker saying \"Secretariat for Father of the Year\"....\"
Sincerely
Penny Tweedy

Arrogate certainly has established himself as a \'great\'race horse. Still needs to complete his resume.

[jbelfior]

Never thought we would ever again be talking about a horse in comparison to Secretariat. The question that\'s been posed to Baffert regarding comparison to American Pharoah should no longer be one.

btw: another amazing thing about Arrogate\'s race was when he was bumped by Mubtaahij in the lane---never lost his balance or momentum. Home in :23 4/5.

Good Luck,
Joe B.

[TempletonPeck]

I don\'t think that Arrogate has an overall resume yet which justifies the comparisons to the other all-timers, but I am totally comfortable saying about this one race that it was one of the great performances I have ever seen.

[Silver Charm]

All good fellas. Arrogate holds the track record at Saratoga. In the Travers no less. He beat better older horses in dirt in the BC Classic than Big Red did. Who lost to Onion and Prove Out on two different occasions. Taking The Wood Memorial off to prep for the Derby can be excused.

Everyone has a right to get defensive about this argument. Coming off his 2YO season Big Red had the hype and expectation of Triple Crown and delivered in brilliant  unforgettable fashion. But those 2 losses to Onion and Prove Out can\'t be wiped from the record either. His Turf brilliance perhaps helps put a line through them....

[philywheel]

If I can recall ,I think Onion was a 40K claimer in the beginning of that yr
 Philywheel
Cant take away from what Secretariat did , But Arrogate is a freak

[richiebee]

There is a generational difference here. Spectacular Bid was raced frequently
at ages 2,3,4. Secretariat raced frequently throughout his two- and three- year
old campaigns.

Arrogate seems effective racing every 60-90 days for a trainer who is
comfortable and competent with this spacing between races.

Arrogate IS a freak. His track record Travers could have been faster, but Iron
Mike knows it is important to leave some gas in the tank. Arrogate showed grit
in his wins in the BC and the DWC.

Ah, but the Triple Crown is three races in five weeks. Could Arrogate answer
the bell three times in five weeks, with his best performance coming in the
third leg? Of course we will never know.

Entries today for the Florida Derby card. Imagining Frank (Stronach, not D.)
will put on no less than 14 races, with 7 or 8 stakes races featuring a
heaping helping of Chad and Todd, and apparently only seven set to go in the
Florida Derby.

[Furious Pete]

Final figure looks very reasonable. As many have pointed out that race was certainly about a lot more than the figure earned, and I don\'t think I\'ve ever seen that kind of determination in a horse before as what Arrogate expressed in those last couple of furlongs.

Was it a close call for you Jerry, to have last years world cup about a point faster? I guess you \"couldn\'t\", partly because of Mubtaahij, but I\'m not really sure how you could have had him 1w4w as he was inside almost all way around.

[TGAB]

He certainly wasn\'t 4w at any point on the turn. We\'ll revise the figure and re-post the sheet on Saturday.

[Furious Pete]

That\'s why I can\'t bet US racing without Thoro-Graph! I like that attitude, specially given that it\'s mostly of \"academic interest\" by now.

[Wild Again]

Thank You for posting the Meydan numbers.

After looking at the superhorse\'s sheet it kinda makes me wonder?

Does anyone else feel that way?

A 9 point move and no reaction

Just wondering.

[TGAB]

We\'ve reviewed the ground for the World Cup and made a change to the variant so the figures for that race are a little different than the initially posted Meydan card.  

For the record the path info for Mubtaahij after review is posted as 1w3w. Actually it is 1.5/2.5 for the turns but that gets shown as 1w3w due to space limitations with an emphasize on showing any divergence from the grace path, the 2 path.

[Furious Pete]

I really hate to be a pain in the ass but I was actually talking about last years world cup race when commenting on the 1w4w issue with Mubtaahij. Felt you might have been a little over the top with the ground on him this year too, but not nearly as seriously as last years mistake, which possibly could have had an influence on California Chrome getting a neg 3 2/4 instead of maybe a neg 4 2/4. Just watch the replay of last years world cup and you will see what I mean instantly. You don\'t need to do anything about it and I won\'t bring it up again, just thought I should let you know.

[Wamsutta]

IMO, no. The horse has proven he can run to huge figures, so the 9 point jump doesn\'t retrospectively seem outlandish based on prepping well into a race that better suited his physical make-up after having had a hard time coming healthily to hand. Had the horse then been consistently campaigned at ~4-5 week intervals, it would be more eye-brow raising not to have had a reaction. But the intervals between his runs since the Travers have been 10, 12, and 8 weeks. If the basis of the bounce / reaction is physical – the horse is run back too soon after not having had time to recover following a taxing effort – the way to alleviate that would be to allow him time to recover between races. You could argue that it might still take a high caliber physical specimen to not react even to that, but it would be hard to argue that Arrogate isn\'t that specimen.