BB bounced all the way back to a 1 negative with a pattern that now looks no good at all, especially given that he will be running his 3rd race in 5 weeks so there\'s little reason to believe that he can come back to his bigger numbers

Casino Drive, Dennis of Cork and Tale of Ekati have all run 0\'s and are bred better for the 1 1/2 AND will all be coming in with rest.

There is going to be some great debate on this with the biggest pushback being that the number would have been alot better had Kent not geared him down in the last 1/8th but honestly, how much could that have really cost the horse in TG terms?  I don\'t think it was more than 1 point, was it?  If that\'s what it was, then the pattern is still bad and he\'s still not that much faster than the others, made all the more troubling by 3 races in 5 weeks.

Why would we take 1/9 odds on a horse that is only 1 point faster than 3 others in the field with a terrible pattern and questionable breeding for the  1 1/2 mile?

These numbers sealed the deal for me, I will be taking a big stand against Big Brown and trying to make the score of a lifetime here.

miff: All three fig makers within one point so it\'s confirmed that the Preakness was a pretty slow race for BB as performance figs go.

Surprised that there is any question(?) that BB was held/geared down the last 1/16th or so.

Mike

jimbo66: Agreed Mike.

I also would have expected the capital \"H\", not the small \"h\".

Jerry, does the jockey have to drop his feet like Fred Flintstone and bring the horse to a screeching halt to get the \"H\"?

Covelj,

Take note, no bi/bo designation.

Lost Cause: After seeing those sheets my mouth started to water..I have learned the hard way in the past to trust the TG sheets and not my gut...My gut says Big Brown but the sheets say to look elsewhere..At the prices you gotta try to beat him..Whatever your angle, Breeding, number regression, you gotta take a shot and with these sheet numbers I feel a lot more comfortable..

covelj70: Jimbo,

I did see the no bi/bo, that will put that issue to rest as far as I am concerned. Won\'t hear any more about that from me.

Very interesting stuff though overall.

ajkreider: Yeah, but the trick is where to put him.  Can\'t see him bouncing all the way out of the tri/super - but that\'s what needs to happen for the score of a lifetime.

TGJB: Jimbo-- news to me we have a capital H. I went so far as to ask Alan if I missed something.

For what it\'s worth, I don\'t think BB would have run too many lengths faster if the jock had asked him all the way. There is a difference between not urging a horse and restraining him. I think he did the latter only the last few jumps. Best guess-- and it is a guess-- is 2-3 lengths, tops. (A separate and unanswerable question is what would have happened had BB been asked for his best earlier. You could argue that it was the equivalent of a \"S. Pace\" race, though I would tend to disagree).

I looked at the BI/BO. It\'s a close call, made complicated by Kent looking back. Can\'t tell if the horse did it on his own or not.

Lost Cause: ajkreider Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Yeah, but the trick is where to put him.  Can\'t
> see him bouncing all the way out of the tri/super
> - but that\'s what needs to happen for the score of
> a lifetime.


I\'m more thinking of the Pick 4, pick 3 and pick 6 ...Do they still do the Acorn/Belmont stakes double I made a killing the year when Smarty Jones got beat..

tmon: You made a statement Dennis of Cork and Tale of Ekati are bred better for 1 and half mile. DoF, Tok and BB have sires who are better at throwing milers rather then 12 Furlongs horses. All 3 get their distance ability from the dams side. Now Casino Drive I agree is better bred for 12F but him only.

covelj70: sure, I was absoutely referring to the bottom side for DoC and ToE.

marcus: Lost \' - i like that approach for the big score but i\'m going to try to make a case for BB to somehow be on the p3/4 ticket .  sure that bounce was almost 4 pts and he\'s not a cinch to run back but at least he didn\'t \"bore out\"   ...

imallin: I think that the connections realize his numbers were really fast and made him \'regress\' on purpose? Kent saved ground (somewhat) on turn 1 and also, another factor is the horse really didn\'t have any serious training during the week. He didn\'t have a published workout to my knowledge, so maybe he was \'short\' and will be more fit for his next start?

If Kent had been 3 wide on the first turn, and was all out to the line, i\'m sure he would have been able to come close to his previous numbers.

fkach: JB,

On my figures the pace came back about \"average\" for Preakness caliber horses. IMO, that means it was actually probably a little too fast for some of the horses in the race because they were subpar Grade 1 horses (the top two wilted badly). But IMO it\'s virtually impossible to use pace figures to determine how an even quicker pace would have impacted a horse like BB. When horses win with that much authority IMO it is telling you one of two things.

1. The horse was superior to his competition and got away with such an easy trip, it allowed him to run faster than he would have had he been challenged harder by equals.

2. The horse was superior to his competition and got away with such an easy trip, it caused him to run slower than he would have had he been challenged by equals because he has very significant reserves of stamina and ability.

Most of the time, you can determine these kinds of things by looking at a horse\'s overall record and using some visual skills. If you put a gun to my head, I would guess BB is still better than a -1. More like a -2 or -3.

Take your pick. ;-)