Great students of the game we have here with all these trainers who collectively have decided that the Preakness is not a race worth winning.
We are left with another relatively paceless & rag tag field that once again features a dearth of horses coming out of the Kentucky Derby.
Pletcher & Cox didn't think Kingsbarns & Verifying might take a page out of Snow Chief's or Louis Quatorze's rewrites at Pimlico?
Cox didn't think Angel of Empire could emulate the redemption of beaten Derby favorites Prairie Bayou, Timber Country, Point Given or Hansel?
Rivelli didn't think that Two Phil's might get a boost on the more speed friendly confines of Pimlico a la Summer Squall, Tabasco Cat, or Curlin?
Mott & Cox didn't think that Derby pretenders Rocket Can & Hit Show might actually come to hand in Baltimore like Gate Dancer, Tank's Prospect, Risen Star, Oxbow, War of Will, Shackleford, or Pine Bluff?
And where's the imagination of all these international trainers who are willing to throw their impressionable 3yos at the Derby behemoth and expect (or pray) that they can handle all the shipping, quarantines, and hoopla surrounding that race but don't think a second go 'round two weeks later might be on more favorable terms with a race under their belts?
Derma Sotogake wouldn't have a relished an anemic pace scenario at Old Hilltop like he did in Dubai? Aidan O'Brien doesn't have a bunch of floundering Quality Road, Justify, or American Pharaoh colts sitting around at Ballydoyle that might actually wake up on a dirt track?
Well, at least we got Ed Moger, who basically admitted he's only running because he & his owner want to have front row seats to the Preakness party, bringing the winner of the El Camino Real Derby, a race that has produced 6 Preakness winners since the 1980s...
I guess Confidence Game is going to the front?
|