affirmed, the bid, secretariat
 

As I read through yet another secretariat vs. the bid thread i again wondered why the hell affirmed does not even get to be part of that conversation.
Champion 2yo
Champion 3yo
Champion Older horse
2-time HOY
Triple-Crown Winner.

And for those of you who (rightly) compare the competition that these two superstars faced to the laughable competition that bernardini has faced....try comparing affirmed's competition to either of them.
NO HORSE IN THE LAST 40 YEARS HAS CONSISTENTLY RUN AGAINST THE LEVEL OF COMPETITION THAT AFFIRMED FACED. Period. And yet he still had 22 wins and 5 places out of 29 races.
Neither Secretariat OR Spectacular Bid faced a horse like Alydar on a consistent basis.
Along with Alydar, Affirmed ran against two horses you might have heard of named Seattle Slew and Spectacular Bid.
Those are the true superstars he competed against, but there were also others. The horse he beat in the Jim Dandy, Sensitive Prince, was a 6-time graded stakes winner who set 3 new track records. Affirmed also faced 10-time G1 winner Exceller multiple times. How many 10-time G1 winners did Secretariat, Spectacular Bid, and Bernardini face?

And let me add that Affirmed didn't just compete against these horses.....he usually beat them. He dominated his matchup with Alydar, he beat Spectacular Bid in their one and only matchup, he beat Sensitive Prince, and he beat Exceller in the Big Cap.

I'm not saying he is better than Spec. Bid. and Big Red.....but he belongs in the conversation.

You get no argument from me on Affirmed. Definately one of the toughest, most competitive racehorses ever.

In my opinion, both Spectacular Bid and Affirmed were clearly better than Secretariat. I think that any top 10 list that doesn't include Affirmed is not legit.

Clearly? I can understand thinking they are better but to say clearly better is a little crazy when they never ran against each other or even the same horses.

no horse who ever lived is CLEARLY better than secretariat. people could certainly construct a decent argument for one of a few horses being better than him.....but to say that anyone was clearly better than him is simply ignorant.
of course the fun part about this type of discussion is that is unanswerable. my point with this thread was that affirmed should be included in this unanswerable discussion. if the three of them lined up against each other going 10 furlongs.....any of the three of them could win. but if i had to answer the unanswerable question........putting money on either of the other two horses would mean betting against secretariat.
watch all of his triple crown races again.......does that seem like a wise proposition?

I think u and Sniper misunderstand what I mean when I say clearly better. I don't mean that I think they would beat the hell out of him by 5+ lengths. I mean that I think that the majority of the time, they would beat him. I'd say maybe 7-3 if it were Bid and 6-4 if it was Affirmed. In my opinion, that's clearly better. Sort of how u might watch a European race and see that the winning margin was 1/2 length and see the comment saying that the winner was dominant throughout. I don't saying clearly better means would dominate. Just means that I have no doubt who holds the advantage, however large or small it might be.