the 2015 travers stakes (grade 1)
The last time AMERICAN PHAROAH hit the track, it was the speed favoring strip of Monmouth Park. He got a sweet trip tracking the distance-challenged COMPETITIVE EDGE, and that was that.
I know, I know ... I'm taking an incredibly dim view on a horse that has won eight seven straight races and was barely warmed up in any of them. But I remain not completely convinced. He has encountered little to no adversity in all but one of those races, and in the race he did -- the Kentucky Derby, when he was pretty wide on both turns and was knifed 30+ times by Espinoza -- he only got home by a length.
None of this is to say that AMERICAN PHAROAH is not an all-time great. It's to say that even all-time greats lose when things don't completely go their way. And this is horse racing -- things happen. They haven't happened to AMERICAN PHAROAH just yet, and while saying he's due is just a horrible cliche ... he kind of is due to encounter some adversity.
So, keeping in mind that I really do believe AMERICAN PHAROAH is great, I will play against him for the following reasons:
1) Saratoga is Saratoga. No, I'm not even talking about the graveyard of favorites thing. It's simply much less speed favoring than Monmouth Park. To wit: Just 14% of winners (in 36 races) going 1 1/8 at Saratoga have led wire to wire. At Monmouth dating back to May 9, that figure is 30% at 1 1/16 (the only figure I had available). Granted, those figures in a vacuum are kind of meaningless and ignore pace dynamics, but a disparity that large obviously confirms the larger point -- it's harder to win on the front end at Saratoga than it is Monmouth. (To take an even deeper dive, everyone knows the front is the place to be at Belmont -- especially at 1.5 miles -- and ditto for Pimlico, and particularly in the slop.)
2) Seven races in five months: I'm tickled that they're running AMERICAN PHAROAH in the Travers. Truly, I am, and I almost don't want to criticize the decision to run him here due to not wanting to add to any perception that he's being run too much ... particularly because I believe horses are babied too much these days. HOWEVER, if big money trainers are giving horses lighter workloads these days, maybe there's something to all this rest. I have to wonder what the real fixation on running in the Travers is. Zayat claims it's for the fans, and maybe to some extent it is, but how much has to do with a boost in the breeding rights? They shipped into Monmouth earlier this month, flew back home, and have now flown back again. As insane as it's going to sound for me to question a guy like Bob Baffert, it really doesn't seem like they've mapped out the most prudent plan to get to the Breeders' Cup here. This seems like it's something Zayat wants to do, not Baffert. The much more logical path, working backward from the Breeders' Cup if that is indeed the ultimate goal, would have been to target either the Jockey Club Gold Cup on Oct. 3 or the Awesome Again on Sept. 26 if they wanted to avoid shipping. And then -- here's the key point -- I would have picked *either* the Haskell, the Pacific Classic, or the Travers. Why try to squeeze two races in here if it's not about the money? It's simply one race too many, and if it's going to catch up to AMERICAN PHAROAH, I think the time is now.
3) Competition: While AMERICAN PHAROAH has already soundly beaten most of the real threats here, TEXAS RED is obviously an intriguing new challenger, and he also hasn't faced all of these at the same time. It will be the best field he has faced to date.
With all that said, let's jump to taking a look at his challengers.
#1 UPSTART has put together a very nice year other than his dud in the Kentucky Derby. Freshened before the Haskell, he ran like you would generally expect a horse to run going 1 1/8 off of a three-month layoff ... he was a bit short and languished mildly in the lane. You would expect him to move up in his second race off the layoff -- Violette is 17% with such starters vs. 13% overall -- and his best speed figures do make him competitive with AMERICAN PHAROAH on paper if you can somehow ignore the outside hype. My concern here would be that he appears to be the only horse who might -- *might* -- want to go with AMERICAN PHAROAH early on. But that could also be a positive if AMERICAN PHAROAH isn't himself on Saturday as he might be all alone out there. Getting leading rider Irad Ortiz aboard does not hurt here.
#2 AMERICAN PHAROAH is probably going to win. You know that.
#3 MID OCEAN moves way up in class from a weak maiden special weight on July 14 at Delaware Park. He should appreciate the distance of the Travers, but he could have been claimed for $35,000 back on April 1. I will eat my hat if he wins.
#4 TEXAS RED has never run beyond 1 1/8 miles and should only get better going longer. He obviously doesn't mind the track given his win over FROSTED last-out and finally gets his shot against AMERICAN PHAROAH. It's a perfect spot and situation for him. My concern: If he could only beat FROSTED -- a horse running on three shoes -- by half a length in his last out, and my thoughts on FROSTED are what they are (see below), what do you do here?
#5 FRAMMENTO is a horse you almost have to feel badly for. For a horse that works so fast in the mornings (:46 4/5 on August 15), he sure lacks early speed in the afternoons. I do have to wonder if this is your surprising speed horse because they can't just keep banging their head into the wall when they've been beaten by double-digit lengths in their last three. Since he has that natural speed, will Zito tell Jose Ortiz to do whatever necessary early to get to the front and see what happens from there? Let's remember that TONALIST and WICKED STRONG unexpectedly were up on the pace last year in a true WTF moment for anyone watching. Just a feeling here that they try to switch the gameplan up given the way the rest of the field looks.
#6 FROSTED is one that I've backed for a while now, but if he couldn't touch AMERICAN PHAROAH at 1 1/2 miles, I'm not sure I want him going shorter. He and TEXAS RED are just about impossible to separate -- especially given the lost shoe debacle -- but I would have to go with TEXAS RED at the same price because FROSTED also may be ready for a break after a campaign dating back to January.
#7 KEEN ICE just keeps getting better and he, too, will benefit from more distance. He also gets Javier Castellano aboard, a guy who I will take *any day* over Kent Desormeaux, so that's a nice upgrade. He closed quite nicely on the speed-favoring strip at Monmouth, and if he has that same kick Saturday, he could be a major factor. The major worry for him is that he will likely need the race to completely fall apart to actually win ... you know he'll be coming late, but horses like TEXAS RED and FROSTED will surely get the jump on him and have plenty of stamina in their own right to hold him off late.
#8 TALE OF VERVE had no chance in a very slowly run West Virginia Derby, and the Preakness notwithstanding, that has sort of been his theme dating back to March. Like KEEN ICE, he appears to be extremely impacted by the race dynamics.
#9 KING OF NEW YORK would be more of a shocker than MID OCEAN. Put this horse back on the turf.
#10 SMART TRANSITION is the one longshot I actually like. I love the breeding of SMART STRIKE to ZARDANA, and while this one might also ultimately prove best on the turf, he has run figures that certainly make him a threat if he can move forward. His Curlin win was probably aided by the two favorites going at each other tooth and nail up front, but he still had to use enough speed to stay close and then go on with it, and that he did. KING OF NEW YORK actually looked like a real threat coming off the turn, but SMART TRANSITION had a real burst and went on to win by more than four lengths. Shirrefs typically manages horses quite conservatively, so to move him up here indicates he thinks he has a real shot. One halfway weird thing is that while Junior Alvarado rode him in the Curlin, Shirrefs is going to put John Velazquez on here. Don't get me wrong -- I'll take Velazquez any day, and it's not as if Alvarado got off SMART TRANSITION to ride another horse in the race -- but it's fairly rare in my estimation to take a rider off after a stakes victory. Finally, SMART TRANSITION has fired two bullets coming into this race. The last time he worked in sub-12 second furlongs leading into a race was April 23 and April 16 leading into a 1 1/16 mile maiden race: He ran a 101 figure and won his first race by two lengths. He seems like a real threat at a likely huge price.
Overall, SMART TRANSITION interests me most, but UPSTART seems to have great potential, too. The triumvirate of AMERICAN PHAROAH, TEXAS RED and FROSTED is stout, but I know I want to play against AMERICAN PHAROAH, and I think FROSTED might be over the top, and if TEXAS RED barely beat FROSTED with three shoes, I'm willing to take a small stab at beating all of them.
One other thing to note here: I think this is a *great* spot to bet show against AMERICAN PHAROAH. If he's not going on for whatever reason, there's no way Victor is going to ask him for anything simply to run second or third. He may well be pulled up if he gets passed on the far turn, and you know the bridge jumpers will be out in full force. I'm usually not a show bettor, but the circumstances dictate it today.
THE NONEEDTOCALLIT PLAYS: $10 WPS UPSTART, $10 WPS SMART TRANSITION, $2 EXACTA BOX UPSTART-SMART TRANSITION-AMERICAN PHAROAH (a bit of a saver in case our savior shows up again)
I know, I know ... I'm taking an incredibly dim view on a horse that has won eight seven straight races and was barely warmed up in any of them. But I remain not completely convinced. He has encountered little to no adversity in all but one of those races, and in the race he did -- the Kentucky Derby, when he was pretty wide on both turns and was knifed 30+ times by Espinoza -- he only got home by a length.
None of this is to say that AMERICAN PHAROAH is not an all-time great. It's to say that even all-time greats lose when things don't completely go their way. And this is horse racing -- things happen. They haven't happened to AMERICAN PHAROAH just yet, and while saying he's due is just a horrible cliche ... he kind of is due to encounter some adversity.
So, keeping in mind that I really do believe AMERICAN PHAROAH is great, I will play against him for the following reasons:
1) Saratoga is Saratoga. No, I'm not even talking about the graveyard of favorites thing. It's simply much less speed favoring than Monmouth Park. To wit: Just 14% of winners (in 36 races) going 1 1/8 at Saratoga have led wire to wire. At Monmouth dating back to May 9, that figure is 30% at 1 1/16 (the only figure I had available). Granted, those figures in a vacuum are kind of meaningless and ignore pace dynamics, but a disparity that large obviously confirms the larger point -- it's harder to win on the front end at Saratoga than it is Monmouth. (To take an even deeper dive, everyone knows the front is the place to be at Belmont -- especially at 1.5 miles -- and ditto for Pimlico, and particularly in the slop.)
2) Seven races in five months: I'm tickled that they're running AMERICAN PHAROAH in the Travers. Truly, I am, and I almost don't want to criticize the decision to run him here due to not wanting to add to any perception that he's being run too much ... particularly because I believe horses are babied too much these days. HOWEVER, if big money trainers are giving horses lighter workloads these days, maybe there's something to all this rest. I have to wonder what the real fixation on running in the Travers is. Zayat claims it's for the fans, and maybe to some extent it is, but how much has to do with a boost in the breeding rights? They shipped into Monmouth earlier this month, flew back home, and have now flown back again. As insane as it's going to sound for me to question a guy like Bob Baffert, it really doesn't seem like they've mapped out the most prudent plan to get to the Breeders' Cup here. This seems like it's something Zayat wants to do, not Baffert. The much more logical path, working backward from the Breeders' Cup if that is indeed the ultimate goal, would have been to target either the Jockey Club Gold Cup on Oct. 3 or the Awesome Again on Sept. 26 if they wanted to avoid shipping. And then -- here's the key point -- I would have picked *either* the Haskell, the Pacific Classic, or the Travers. Why try to squeeze two races in here if it's not about the money? It's simply one race too many, and if it's going to catch up to AMERICAN PHAROAH, I think the time is now.
3) Competition: While AMERICAN PHAROAH has already soundly beaten most of the real threats here, TEXAS RED is obviously an intriguing new challenger, and he also hasn't faced all of these at the same time. It will be the best field he has faced to date.
With all that said, let's jump to taking a look at his challengers.
#1 UPSTART has put together a very nice year other than his dud in the Kentucky Derby. Freshened before the Haskell, he ran like you would generally expect a horse to run going 1 1/8 off of a three-month layoff ... he was a bit short and languished mildly in the lane. You would expect him to move up in his second race off the layoff -- Violette is 17% with such starters vs. 13% overall -- and his best speed figures do make him competitive with AMERICAN PHAROAH on paper if you can somehow ignore the outside hype. My concern here would be that he appears to be the only horse who might -- *might* -- want to go with AMERICAN PHAROAH early on. But that could also be a positive if AMERICAN PHAROAH isn't himself on Saturday as he might be all alone out there. Getting leading rider Irad Ortiz aboard does not hurt here.
#2 AMERICAN PHAROAH is probably going to win. You know that.
#3 MID OCEAN moves way up in class from a weak maiden special weight on July 14 at Delaware Park. He should appreciate the distance of the Travers, but he could have been claimed for $35,000 back on April 1. I will eat my hat if he wins.
#4 TEXAS RED has never run beyond 1 1/8 miles and should only get better going longer. He obviously doesn't mind the track given his win over FROSTED last-out and finally gets his shot against AMERICAN PHAROAH. It's a perfect spot and situation for him. My concern: If he could only beat FROSTED -- a horse running on three shoes -- by half a length in his last out, and my thoughts on FROSTED are what they are (see below), what do you do here?
#5 FRAMMENTO is a horse you almost have to feel badly for. For a horse that works so fast in the mornings (:46 4/5 on August 15), he sure lacks early speed in the afternoons. I do have to wonder if this is your surprising speed horse because they can't just keep banging their head into the wall when they've been beaten by double-digit lengths in their last three. Since he has that natural speed, will Zito tell Jose Ortiz to do whatever necessary early to get to the front and see what happens from there? Let's remember that TONALIST and WICKED STRONG unexpectedly were up on the pace last year in a true WTF moment for anyone watching. Just a feeling here that they try to switch the gameplan up given the way the rest of the field looks.
#6 FROSTED is one that I've backed for a while now, but if he couldn't touch AMERICAN PHAROAH at 1 1/2 miles, I'm not sure I want him going shorter. He and TEXAS RED are just about impossible to separate -- especially given the lost shoe debacle -- but I would have to go with TEXAS RED at the same price because FROSTED also may be ready for a break after a campaign dating back to January.
#7 KEEN ICE just keeps getting better and he, too, will benefit from more distance. He also gets Javier Castellano aboard, a guy who I will take *any day* over Kent Desormeaux, so that's a nice upgrade. He closed quite nicely on the speed-favoring strip at Monmouth, and if he has that same kick Saturday, he could be a major factor. The major worry for him is that he will likely need the race to completely fall apart to actually win ... you know he'll be coming late, but horses like TEXAS RED and FROSTED will surely get the jump on him and have plenty of stamina in their own right to hold him off late.
#8 TALE OF VERVE had no chance in a very slowly run West Virginia Derby, and the Preakness notwithstanding, that has sort of been his theme dating back to March. Like KEEN ICE, he appears to be extremely impacted by the race dynamics.
#9 KING OF NEW YORK would be more of a shocker than MID OCEAN. Put this horse back on the turf.
#10 SMART TRANSITION is the one longshot I actually like. I love the breeding of SMART STRIKE to ZARDANA, and while this one might also ultimately prove best on the turf, he has run figures that certainly make him a threat if he can move forward. His Curlin win was probably aided by the two favorites going at each other tooth and nail up front, but he still had to use enough speed to stay close and then go on with it, and that he did. KING OF NEW YORK actually looked like a real threat coming off the turn, but SMART TRANSITION had a real burst and went on to win by more than four lengths. Shirrefs typically manages horses quite conservatively, so to move him up here indicates he thinks he has a real shot. One halfway weird thing is that while Junior Alvarado rode him in the Curlin, Shirrefs is going to put John Velazquez on here. Don't get me wrong -- I'll take Velazquez any day, and it's not as if Alvarado got off SMART TRANSITION to ride another horse in the race -- but it's fairly rare in my estimation to take a rider off after a stakes victory. Finally, SMART TRANSITION has fired two bullets coming into this race. The last time he worked in sub-12 second furlongs leading into a race was April 23 and April 16 leading into a 1 1/16 mile maiden race: He ran a 101 figure and won his first race by two lengths. He seems like a real threat at a likely huge price.
Overall, SMART TRANSITION interests me most, but UPSTART seems to have great potential, too. The triumvirate of AMERICAN PHAROAH, TEXAS RED and FROSTED is stout, but I know I want to play against AMERICAN PHAROAH, and I think FROSTED might be over the top, and if TEXAS RED barely beat FROSTED with three shoes, I'm willing to take a small stab at beating all of them.
One other thing to note here: I think this is a *great* spot to bet show against AMERICAN PHAROAH. If he's not going on for whatever reason, there's no way Victor is going to ask him for anything simply to run second or third. He may well be pulled up if he gets passed on the far turn, and you know the bridge jumpers will be out in full force. I'm usually not a show bettor, but the circumstances dictate it today.
THE NONEEDTOCALLIT PLAYS: $10 WPS UPSTART, $10 WPS SMART TRANSITION, $2 EXACTA BOX UPSTART-SMART TRANSITION-AMERICAN PHAROAH (a bit of a saver in case our savior shows up again)