Close but Not Quite
 

I was watching replays of the 1988 Haskell and Travers, where Forty Niner edged out Seeking the Gold both times. Then I thought about STG's 1/2 length loss in that year's BC Classic and his close loss in the following year's Met Mile. So, it got me to thinking. Not including classic race winners, which horses over the past 20 years have come the closest to cracking that barrier between good and great? Those four losses, by a combined margin of less than a length, if turned into wins, would probably have us mentioning Seeking the Gold in the top five horses of the last 20 years. Instead, he's often forgotten. Who are some others that come to mind?

sakhee.

it's weird how their post racing breeding career's affect perception. go back another 10 years and i doubt anyone mentions alydar.

i was thinking about giant's causeway after i posted sakhee.

indian charlie.

Alysheba. Had he gotten his nose in front of Ferdinand in the 1987 BC Classic, he would have been a two-time winner.

Ferdinand would also be on this list. The nose losses to Snow Chief and Broad Brush in the 1987 Strub and Big Cap and the close losses to Alysheba in the 1988 Big Cap and San Bernardino.

Alysheba and Ferdinand are classic winners. And I hope you arent saying that they were merely good

Of course not. I'm saying that a couple of noses or heads in another direction and both could be in the convo of top 10 horses of the past 25 years. Imagine Ferdinand having two Big Caps and a Strub (back when that race meant something) added to his record. Or imagine Alysheba with a second Classic and a Haskell. As it is Alysheba is probably already in the convo but Ferdinand certainly isn't.

Depends on who is having the conversation. On the top of his game there is no horse in the last 25 years that either couldnt beat on a regular basis at 1 1/4. Despite the attitude that prevails now, close losses to fellow great horses does not show weakness. The problem now is that horses get nice clean records but they never beat ( or lose to) anyone truly great because those horses simply dont exist any longer.

None of that do I disagree with. But I do think that as far as public perception goes, if you asked everyone on this board that's been around 20+ years to name the top 25 horses of that period, Ferdinand's name won't come up that often.

Speaking of losses to other top horses, in another place, I'm having a debate on the merits of one Medaglia d'Oro and his abilities at 10f. It's my position that the knock people have on him saying he couldn't do it couldn't be further from the truth. Losing to Candy Ride and that 2003 BC Classic effort.....those were absolutely winning efforts but just so happened to come against better horses or horses that got better circumstances. They didn't show weakness on his part simply because he lost.

You could make that case however he was not nearly on the level of Alysheba or Ferdinand nor were the horses he lost to. I think that sometimes in the cases of horses like Alysheba and Ferninand people who either arent old enough or didnt follow close enough let these horses lack of success as stallions taint their records somehow. I was having a discussion with a guy who was comparing Curlin to some great horses and I said that I wasnt sure that he would beat Skip Away more times than he wouldnt and he made the comment about Skip Away being a bad sire, like that has anything to do with a horse's racing standing.

I don't put him in the class of Alysheba or Ferdinand or any of the top 25 runners of the past 20 years. Not at all. I do think that Candy Ride is in that class though.

Curlin couldn't hold Skip Away's jock. Big Brown couldn't hold Medaglia's. The game today has changed so much. It's sad what's considered great. People are calling Zenyatta great too. It's gotten out of hand.

Candy Ride simply didnt do enough for me to put him in that league. He may have but he didnt.

Alysheba is pretty easily a top 10 horse of the last 25 years. At least going 10f on dirt anyways. When Ferdinand finally got good, he was awesome too.

I always thought Precisionist and Greinton would hand most of these horses running these days their asses on a platter too.

The fickle Gentlemen, when he was feeling good, was as good as just about anything I've seen run.

There are a bunch of horses that were spectacular but had abbreviated careers, such as the aforementioned Candy Ride and Indian Charlie.

One horse from the 70's (before my time) that has intrigued me was Believe It.

He ran third in both the Derby and Preakness to Affirmed and Alydar. Interestingly enough, he also sired the most memorable (to me) horse with three starts that nobody has ever heard of, Swear, who won all three of his races by daylight.

congaree lost a few close ones-altho he got a lot of respect in his narrow loss to the repeating milwaukee brew in the big cap. why he gave weight to MB that day i don't know...

i'm in the same boat with you on candy ride.
as for medaglia d'oro-he lost too often to too many horses imo to be considered a really good horse. really good horses win those races. it's not as tho horses like volponi and sarava really resonate with the racing public.

I had both of those :D

Volponi is the reason those guys got caught in the pick 6 scam. A favorite wins and they may not have drawn attention to themselves. if Medaglia d'oro was great then Lemon Drop Kid is

on topic:

Cigar won 16 races in a row including the BC classic and the inaugural Dubai World Cup and there are those that claim he wasn't great. Of all the horses that beat him I think Skip Away is the only one that is. But because he hasn't caught himself in the breeding shed he falls short of great.

In what alternate universe is Cigar NOT great?

He certainly was a great racehorse.

but aewingnut is correct in saying that there are people who say he wasn't great- they usually knock his competition.

Cigar was a great horse though his competition was a bit suspect. He did accomplish great things which you need to do if you dont have top competition which is my main knock against a horse like Curlin. What exactly has he done that is extraordinary? He is a very good horse but against some of the other horses in this thread he may not have won a single race.

Cigar was a great ambassador of the sport. I get annoyed when I hear the complaints about the level of competition he faced. Who the hell was he avoiding? What monster made him go from track to track across the country? What race was he going to run in but didn't when this mythical beast was purported to run? Who was he avoiding when he went to Dubai?

The topic of the thread should be close but no Cigar.