Quote:
Originally Posted by Cannon Shell
Smarty Jones, Afleet Alex and Bodemeister all had injuries that would have healed and allowed them to come back to racing. We know why they were retired. I'll Have Another as well. Mine That Bird was only good for 2 weeks in his whole career anyway. His post TC races were still far better than his Pre TC races.
Let's be honest here the TC ends careers of the best horses because of the low bar required to become a hot stallion prospect these days.
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I'll Have Another had a bowed tendon. Afleet Alex had a condylar fracture. Can horses like these possibly come back from such injuries. It is possible but the chances of them ever being the same horse are not good. I Want Revenge eventually made it back and he wasn't anything close to the same horse. If that is your definition of being able to come back again, then I agree with you. You can try to bring practically any horse back. But if a horse has a serious injury, is worth $15 million, and is 50/50 at best to ever be the same horse, it doesn't make much sense to try to come back. They actually did try to bring Afleet Alex back and he got hurt again.
Mine That Bird was a very good horse as a 2 year old. I believe he won about 3 or 4 races in a row including a couple of stakes races.
Anyway, this whole argument has strayed from my original point. My original point was that having these 3 TC races in 5 weeks is extremely hard on the horses. It knocks them out and puts them at a much higher risk for injury than if these races were spaced further apart. If you talk to any of these guys (Pletcher, Baffert, etc.) who have run in these races on a regular basis, they will all tell you the same thing. I don't remember the exact quote but someone was saying that Baffert was quoted as saying that after the TC when you get to the barn and you look at your horse, you hardly even recognize the horse because he is so skinny and so knocked out.