Unpalatable

I've been fortunate over the years to learn from some excellent horsemen. Rudy Deluidice, Jack B. Haynes, and Jerry Dutton, to name a few. I've owned horses since my first year in this game, and it's funny how things go. You accumulate a few stories along the way, and eventually you start noticing patterns. Some of those patterns will have you scratching your head, wondering what in the hell is going on. But I can assure you, this one is alive and well.

Let's go back to 2006. We purchased two yearlings, Sea of Pleasure and Ten Churros. Sea of Pleasure was by Sea of Secrets, and Ten Churros was by High Brite. At the time, I was working with a pedigree analyst, so I asked her to assess the tendencies in both pedigrees.

Her response?

"Unpalatable pedigrees."

Well, ain't that something. Apparently, she'd gotten a little silver spoon stuck in her mouth, and somebody had managed to put a dent in it.

Here's the thing: horses come in all shapes, sizes, and pedigrees. I've always believed in evaluating the horse as an individual. Paper doesn't run. The individual does.

Sea of Pleasure became a stakes winner and a track-record holder. Ten Churros, who cost us a modest $10,000, became a California-bred stakes winner. We sold her for six figures after her maiden victory.

So much for those unpalatable pedigrees.

Then there's Ms Locust Point. She was another prime example of what I'm talking about. I purchased her as a short yearling for $17,000. Two of my major partners turned her down, using the exact same explanation:

"I don't want cheap horses."

Well, bless your heart.

It amazes me how people equate an auction price tag with class, quality, and eventual success. You mention the words "Into Mischief" and you can practically hear the collective "Ooooooh" as hands start reaching for checkbooks. This is before you've even had a chance to explain that the horse might only have three legs.

We've got a whole generation of buyers who have been classically conditioned to salivate over auction prices like Pavlov's dogs.

Now, Ms Locust Point was by Dialed In out of a First Samurai mare. I had 25% available, and one prospective client sent a bloodstock agent to look at her.

Let me offer a little advice: one thing you never, ever do is send a bloodstock agent to inspect another man's purchase when you're trying to buy into it. Nine thousand nine hundred ninety-nine times out of ten thousand, they're going to find something "unpalatable." Sometimes it's the horse. Sometimes it's the pedigree. And sometimes it's just that somebody else had the good sense to buy her first.

The client passed.

Ms Locust Point broke her maiden second time out, and did it impressively. Never touched.

A syndicate manager called me. Nice fellow. Offered $250,000. I was asking $300,000. Before he made a decision, I asked him to go look at her.

She was an Amazon of a filly. An absolutely beautiful physical specimen, with a body to die for.

He didn't go.

About a month later, she went out and absolutely crushed the field in the Gin Talking at Laurel.

Crushed.

Guess who was the first person on the telephone?

"I guess I should have given you three for her. Will you take $400,000?"

Well, we already had a larger offer on the table. I thanked him, but we were moving on.

And then there's always that one jackass agent who calls with an attitude that makes you wonder if he was dropped on his head as a youngster.

"Bruno, you won't find a better deal than mine. Take $630,000. You won't get a better deal."

I hung up on him.

We had more money on the table!

He calls back a little later.

"I lost you..."

And proceeds to give me the same sales pitch about why I need to take his offer.

"I hung up on you!" I told him.

Apparently, that part of the conversation had escaped him.

The first sale went to new clients at a high six-figure price. Two weeks later, a major sales and stallion farm purchased a small percentage of her.

When all was said and done, Ms Locust Point turned into a $1.8 million horse after her racing career was finished.

A $17,000 short yearling, $1.8 million, but she 'was cheap'

You can't make this stuff up.

And the stories don't stop there.

Let's move up to 2022 and Yuto de Yuto, a Preservationist colt we bred out of Officer Leah. He went through the OBS Winter Sale. In fact, he came off the van at the sale with the elbow swollen. I have no idea what he did.

I had tried to get a video company to arrange a walking video for us. He was a good

looking colt. We scheduled it, but they got too busy and never got it done.

I was told nobody liked the horse.

He sold for $15,000.

Now, here's where it gets interesting. The new owners sent him to the OBS two-year-olds in training sale. He brought $80,000 and went to a Japanese investor.

He's earned more than $250,000 in Japan.

The horse nobody wanted.

Then there's Bo Cruz. We purchased him for $45,000 at Keeneland. One partner had been all-in before the sale and wanted 50%. When I told him wen bought him for $45,000, he looked at me and said:

"'I'll take a 1/4." I have no idea what happened to 50%, this fella didn't do any math.

Bo Cruz went on to win a Grade 3 at Keeneland.

And Banksy's? He was that Paynter foal some folks turned their noses up at. One fellow went off to one of those 200% markup syndicates. He's still looking for his first winner.

We don't operate that way. We don't mark things up. We're pretty straightforward about our pricing, and we believe people ought to know exactly what they're buying.

Over the years, we haven't had the budget to go shopping for the Into Mischiefs and Curlins of the world. That's not our marketplace. We work hard to find quality, apply a little common sense, and recognize that horses don't come off an assembly line.

I don't mind a dent, especially if we can fix it.

Today's buyers seem to want perfection. And I've got a favorite saying about that:

Today's buyers want to buy clean horses so they can fuck them up at the two-year-old training sales.

They want everything pristine, perfect, and ready to go. They want a horse they can take to the track and have breezing by December. Then, six months later, everybody gathers around and wonders why the breed isn't as durable as it used to be.

Well, I don't know. Anybody got a mirror?

We bought a Good Samaritan colt at Keeneland for $35,000. Potentially a six-figure horse, but he had a chip in his knee.

And, naturally, I heard it.

"Why would you want to buy a horse with a chip in his knee?"

It's the same old mentality. A lot of these buyers don't mind putting a chip in a horse's knee with their own training program, but heaven forbid they buy one that already has one. The moment they hear the word chip, they start running for the exits. And that's precisely where the opportunity can be.

I got hold of a longtime friend, a veterinarian and surgeon, and asked him to examine the X-rays before I ventured into the auction ring.

His first comment?

"The vet report is scarier than the chip."

Well, that's reassuring.

He explained that it was a small, nondisplaced fragment of the distal intermediate carpal bone. A good diagnosis, apparently.

Of course, I needed that translated into English.

The chip was in a favorable location for removal, but he was quick to add that we should wait 30 days and see how things developed. We might not need to remove it at all.

Good deal.

The partners and I were all in. We got him for $35,000.

Last Thursday, we took another set of X-rays. The chip had dissolved, the area had healed, and no surgery was necessary. Thirty days turned out to be just what the doctor ordered. He can now begin his training career.

Another horse nobody wanted.

We're over here making chicken soup out of chicken broth, with carrots and all.

And that's become part of how I look at the marketplace. Nowadays, when I see faces turning up and noses wrinkling over a horse we've got, I almost take it as reassurance.

Maybe we're onto something.

Take the stallion Heartland. Mention his name and you get that familiar look.

"Who?"

Well, Heartland is a son of Justify, out of the dam of Classic Empire, a champion out of a champion. We have two outstanding foals on the ground, both with good size and already looking like they'll make very nice short yearlings. We've got three more on the way.

But I suspect there will be a few more raised eyebrows when the name comes up.

That's fine.

We also have two Tom's d'Etat colts, including a half-brother to Banksy's and a half-brother to the very smart-looking Sonny's Style. You can see Sonny's Style's video works on the KTA website.

There are small percentages available in both.

The Banksy's half-brother is a looker. In fact, at this stage, he's better looking than Banksy's was at the same age. Both colts have the kind of physical presence that makes you think you're looking at three-year-olds in the making.

And, you guessed it I have had some turn nose up on the stallion, a son of Smart Strike, which many handicappers nowadays say 'Smart Who?'

But I know how this business works. Somebody will find something to pick apart. That's just the nature of the beast.

We've learned a few things over the years. We've learned from good horsemen, made some mistakes as in the case of Yuto, had successes, and occasionally had to listen to people explain why a horse we bought wasn't worth owning.

Meanwhile, those same horses were out there winning races, and making money.

I don't pretend to have all the answers. But I do believe we've gotten pretty good at recognizing value where other people see a reason to walk away.

There is no such thing as a perfect horse. There are horses with good qualities, horses with things to improve, horses with good pedigrees, and horses with pedigrees somebody doesn't like. There are horses that cost a fortune and horses that cost $15,000.

And every now and then, the $15,000 horse will make everybody look like they left their reading glasses at home.

My old friend Jerry Dutton used to tell me something repeatedly whenever I'd compliment him on one of his horses.

"Bruno, we ain't sitting around here licking our 🥜."

And you know what? He was right.

We're not sitting around admiring auction pedigrees, staring at price tags, or waiting for somebody else to tell us what's worth buying.

We're out there looking, evaluating, doing our homework, and trying to find the horse.

We bought 4 yearlings this year, none last year and the two years before that, it's not like we buy quantity, which is exactly what money buys, its not quality, its quantity, buy enough and you get one worth the time. Well, great idea, but we can't do that. We have to do with what we got.

Because at the end of the day, the auction price doesn't win the race. The pedigree analyst doesn't win the race. The bloodstock agent doesn't win the race.

The horse does.

And we'll keep looking for the little nugget everybody else seems to have a problem with. Sometimes those are the best opportunities in the entire business, word.