Derby Top 10

Derby Top 10 (Apr 9th)

1. Great Hunter (2)
2. Street Sense (3)
3. Any Given Saturday (1)
4. Ketchikan (6)
5. Notional (8)
6. Scat Daddy (9)
7. Nobiz Like Showbiz (7)
8. Officer Rocket (10)
9. Hard Spun (4)
10. Circular Quay (5)

Well, this weekend was nothing if not interesting and it's left me with a few dilemma's. All three of this weekends races were underwhelming, Cowtown Cat got away with a a very slow pace and he beat a bunch of 4th rate horses. I don't consider him a Derby horse at all. Tiago capitalized on what was a very weak Santa Anita Derby and he merely ran past his staggering rivals in the lane. Tiago's Santa Anita Derby was basically just like Giacomo's Kentucky Derby. I do not think he will be able to repeat the trick in the Derby. Despite this crop looking like they're just as slow as the 2005 group. I think we could have a soft pace in the Derby and its hard to see this horse out closing Street Sense, Great Hunter and Circular Quay. Liquidity proved that he was overrated from the beginning and Sam P showed that he is nothing special. He is simply a consistent horse who ran a great race two back. Now for the big race, the Wood Memorial. What do we do with Any Given Saturday and Nobiz Like Showbiz? As you can see Any Given Saturday has been demoted to 3rd place in my top 10. It is the lowest ranking he has had since the Top 10 began in November. By default Great Hunter becomes the 3rd horse to be ranked #1 (Tiz Wonderful was #1 until his injury) I think most would agree with Any Given Saturday no longer being #1 but many will think that he is still too high. Allow me explain my thinking. The Wood Memorial was not a good race for him. He again failed to pass a horse in the stretch and he looked washed out in the final 1/8th. He clearly does not fit the profile of what a Derby winner should look like. However with every prep race that passes it is becoming increasingly obvious that virtually no one is fitting the bill. I think he still looks like the best of the rest, at least until the last major preps are run. His past performance lines look eerily similar to Bluegrass Cat's and I will be using him underneath on Derby day. I hope John Velasquez is not on this horse for the Derby. In my opinion he has butchered his last two races. Nobiz Like Showbiz only maintained his spot because Hard Spun and Circular Quay have been moved down. I do not really like the proposed schedules for those two horses and Circular Quay in particular has a lot of question marks. But back to Nobiz, I figured the blinkers would not be the magic bullet and although he won the race I don't think they had much effect. Yes, they made him run straighter, they did not however aid him in running faster. This race looked something like the Holy Bull and Nobiz Like Shobiz really has not gotten any better in my opinion. I prefer both of the horses coming out of the Florida Derby to him, and although he beat Any Given Saturday this time at least with the Pletcher horse we know he is capable of better. That was Nobiz's best shot and although it does look "fast enough" to compete with the rest of the crop he simply does not look good enough. Ketchikan has ridden the wave of disappointments all the way to 4th. He still has everything to prove and really maybe only a win in Arkansas would be good enough. I have also deleted my radar list, at this stage in the season there is no need for one. Curlin would be the only horse on it anyhow. I am very much looking forward to see how he and Ketchikan matchup. The Blue Grass will most likely not decide anything unless one of the big two runs very poorly. Did we see the Derby winner run this past weekend? My instinct says no, but then again this does not appear to be a very fast group so anything is possible.