SMARTY JONES and ThoroGraph's data-based stats...

[JohnTChance]

As Jerry said in his analysis, the key to handicapping the Kentucky Derby
was deciding what to do with SMARTY JONES, a colt who came into the race
off some mind-boggling, freaky fast ThoroGraphs. Jerry said this was \"a little
disorienting\" and it certainly was. Especially, I think, to veteran ThoroGraph
users. [Simplistic \"best last two Beyer\" systems touted all over the web must\'ve
thrived in Saturday\'s race. They finally got their Derby favorite.]

Would SMARTY JONES implode? Or hang tough for at least one more race?

Given SMARTY JONES\'s freaky ThoroGraphs, his tactical speed, and the
late afternoon thunderstorm that left a wet track which favored his style, he
was a \"must use\" in the win slot on those counts for sure. But there was another
reason. Without going into a long discussion about SMARTY JONES, Bobby Bonds
and modern pharmacology, reference is made to the following figure-based stat from
SMARTY JONES\'s ThoroGraph sheet:

Trainer John Servis: 1st Time Lasix - 78 Starts - 49% Top! Wow!

If you were on the bubble about what to do with this colt - to leave him off the
win slot of your exotics, or leave him in - that startling stat might\'ve swayed you.
It did me. SMARTY JONES may not have run a new top. But with first Lasix, he
\"hung tough\" enough to get the job done.

[Chuckles_the_Clown2]

Agreed on the Lasix. I didn\'t mention it but I factored it positive.

From my perspective the 0-2-X is a very speculative bet with a developing three year old. If Smarty was 6-5 I probably would have bet him to 0-2-X but essentially he ran at the same odds of the other horse I liked. For me it was a no brainer.

Its too early to speculate whether 4-1 was value, but the chance exists come July we\'ll look back and say \"Sheez, how did we let that horse go?\"

I\'ve liked Smarty ever since the Southwest when two horses came to him late and he refused to let them pass. Prado and Two Down were right on him but light on conditioning he would not let them by. 7-2  in the Rebel was generous, even money in the Ark was fair and 4-1 in the Derby on the facts was glorious.

[BitPlayer]

What\'s interesting to me is that Servis is not alone.  The overall stat for new tops by first time Lasix horses is 45.6%.  First time blinkers is right behind with 41.9%.

Of course, with both of these stats, one has to wonder how much they are skewed by that fact that much of the sample is 2yos, who are at an age when they are likely to run new tops anyway (35.6%).

[TGJB]

Yeah, the tricky part of creating and working with these studies, as we are finding out as we work through the uncharted waters, is setting up the criteria. The delay in putting out the pattern studies (we had hoped to have them for the Derby, and could have put them out \"raw\") was due to trying to figure out exactly what we should be doing-- for example, if you are doing studies of June 3yo\'s off 0-2-x, do you count horses with 3 lifetime starts? 4? 5? 6? More? Split colts and fillies? Use horses with distance, surface, or trainer changes?

In setting up a lot of the figure based trainer studies we used criteria that seemed reasonable at the time, working it out as we went along. We are going to review all this over the next few days and weeks. You should have the pattern stats by the Preakness, and maybe by next weekend-- the big delays come when we change criteria, and have to have the computer do a new run of the whole data base.

After that we will go on to other projects. Catalin, that means you.

We are moving forward very quickly now. Honestly, the stuff we are doing and will be doing is so far ahead of anyone else it is not funny.