Squirrel!

HANDICAPPERS HAVE THEIR FAVORITE TRACKS. I GET IT.

100 percent.

That's the circuit they grew up with. That's where they learned the game. That's where they had their first big score, their first $20 exacta that turned into $200, their first Saturday afternoon sitting in the grandstand thinking they had this whole horse racing thing figured out.

You develop an attachment.

New York is one of those circuits.

They can serve you an enema on a regular basis and those people will still line up on Union Avenue the next morning like it's Christmas at the North Pole.

I get it.

I used to be a California boy.

Del Mar.

Santa Anita.

Hollywood Park.

That was my jam.

I used to love going to Fairplex Park, playing the bullring, taking my life in my hands getting there, then sitting in traffic for two hours trying to get home.

I loved it.

Until one day I realized...

It wasn't my thing anymore.

There were other choices.

And my choices became less about where I liked to go and more about how the player was treated and the quality of the racing.

That's where my problem with New York starts.

The New York product, in my opinion, is not very good.

And without the influx of Kentucky horses, I don't see that changing dramatically.

What I don't understand is the Country Club mentality surrounding a product that doesn't necessarily have the extra quality to justify the attitude.

Horseplayers are treated like they'll keep coming back no matter what.

And, well...

They do.

The New Belmont Park is going to attract people. Of course it is.

It's new.

It's shiny.

It's Belmont Park.

But here's the problem:

It's still the same racing.

You can put a new chandelier in the dining room, but if you're still serving yesterday's meatloaf, it's still yesterday's meatloaf.

And there is this delusion that horses coming out of Saratoga are automatically coming out of superior races.

THEY. DO. NOT.

Let me say that again for the people in the back:

THEY. DO. NOT.

And when those horses win somewhere else, they're often winning for a fraction of what their Saratoga form suggested they were worth.

Yet there are talking heads who absolutely LOVE horses coming out of Saratoga.

They see Saratoga on the past performances and apparently start hearing angels sing.

As we head into Keeneland, watch what happens.

The emphasis will be on horses coming out of Saratoga and Kentucky Downs.

Why?

Because that's what everybody has been told to believe.

What happens at Saratoga and Kentucky Downs has a tendency to stay at home.

But the droves will gravitate—and levitate—toward those performances.

Meanwhile, Ellis Park and Colonial are treated like the red headed stepchild.

Figure makers and horseplayers routinely downgrade those races.

I beg to differ.

Ellis has moved upward in a big way.

Colonial had a very good meet.

But because it isn't Saratoga or Belmont, suddenly the performances need an asterisk.

Why?

Because the figure says so.

And that's where I start having a problem.

Figure makers aren't necessarily objective.

They're selling a product.

And when you sell a product, there is a natural tendency to oversell the product.

Then everybody wonders why the horse doesn't run back to that magnificent Saratoga number.

Well...

Maybe the number wasn't magnificent.

Maybe it was just a number.

I look at figures from certain venues skeptically.

I use them.

I respect them.

But I view them for what they are:

Someone's interpretation of what happened.

Not the word of God carved into the stone tablets.

Keeneland brings its own mystique, too.

And one thing I've always liked about Keeneland is that form tends to hold up over time.

That's information.

That's useful.

Numbers and statistics are important.

But they're being used to death.

Overused is the better word.

Handicappers have become lazy.

Give them a rating.

Give them a number.

Give them a speed figure with three decimal places and they'll follow it off a cliff.

They rarely ask the meaningful questions anymore.

Why did the horse run that race?

Who did he beat?

What was the pace?

What happened before the race?

What happened during it?

How did the horse look?

Did the trip make the race?

Was the track playing differently?

Is the horse actually improving?

Or did he just get a number?

Those are handicapping questions.

But somewhere along the way, we've decided it's easier to let somebody else answer them.

And since there really isn't much racing media left asking those questions, there aren't many answers.

There is just cynicism.

Handicappers complain about CAWs.

They cheerlead auction prices.

They complain about everything except occasionally looking in the mirror.

A CAW didn't make you bet a 4-5 shot.

The auction price didn't make you bet the horse.

The number didn't make the horse win.

Sometimes the reason you didn't pick the winner is simply because...

you didn't pick the winner.

And that's okay.

It happens.

I've been doing this for 40 years.

It happens to me.

You don't need a conspiracy theory to explain every race you lose.

You need to handicap better.

And the auction prices?

Please.

I rarely find a million-dollar horse that I'm interested in betting simply because he sold for a million dollars.

He's still a horse.

He's just a horse that somebody put a gigantic price tag on.

Sometimes the horse deserves it.

Sometimes he doesn't.

And sometimes he's been living in bubble wrap his entire life because everyone is terrified of damaging the $1 million investment.

But he has a following.

Because people love price tags.

They love numbers.

They love ratings.

They love being told what to think.

That's where we've gotten in this game.

Handicappers are looking at all the wrong things.

And yet, every once in a while...

every squirrel finds a nut.

The trick isn't finding the nut.

The trick is figuring out why the hell it was there in the first place.

That's handicapping.

Not worshipping a racetrack.

Not worshipping a figure.

Not worshipping an auction price.

Not worshipping a talking head.

Watch the horses.

Think for yourself.

Ask questions.

And remember the most important thing in the game:

Horses don't read their past performances.

He doesn't know what his Beyer was.

He doesn't know he sold for $1 million.

He doesn't know what the talking heads said.

He just knows how to run.

Maybe we should spend a little more time trying to figure out that guy.