by Tessablue » Sat May 20, 2017 1:24 am
Interestingly, Always Dreaming and Classic Empire were pretty close together in the Black Eyed Susan will-pays, and they are currently 4-5 and 5-2 in the win betting. The Derby winner does tend to get heavily bet down, but we might get some like even and 2-1 in the exotics. Will be keeping an eye on that tomorrow.
Anyways, I think I'm just going to key AD on top and play around with the tris and supers. I've elaborated above why I think he's a horse of considerable talent whom I believe to be notch above the rest of these. However, despite how highly I think of him, I won't be shocked by any result tomorrow. I don't love the draw reins and there is that nagging Pletcher trend in the Preakness - I think it's overstated, but there are so few datapoints for Pletcher in this situation that anything could be possible. That being said, on a scale of Super Saver to Smarty Jones, I lean heavily towards expecting the latter.
As for who else to key underneath... there are a lot of potential choices here. In some years I might just key Always Dreaming over Classic Empire and spread for third and fourth, and I'll do a bit of that, but I'm leery of depending on Classic Empire that much. I respect him a lot and he could absolutely win, but this will be his third tough start in five weeks and he's going to be pushed for speed earlier in this race than the others. He'll no doubt try, but if the tank is starting to empty a bit- or if Julien gets cute and goes after Always Dreaming too early- I fear he could get passed late.
Who might pass him? Well, I've been high on Conquest Mo Money for a bit now, and while he's unlikely to pass Classic Empire in the stretch, I think he's a talented, fresh horse who will run hard the entire way around. CMM has no quit in him and might appreciate a somewhat gentler pace than he has experienced in his last few starts. He has to clear and there's a chance he gets caught in a duel early, but I like him to just stick around in the stretch at a decent price.
I liked Hence a lot in the Derby and I'm happy to just draw a line through that race and hope for something better here. There's no way he wanted to be last early but he finished with a surprising amount of interest for an 11th place finisher. The talent is there, and I expect him to be midpack rather than far back early in this race. He has that sustained closing ability that makes him tough to fend off if he fires, and I can't really resist 20-1 or higher. The other horse I loved in the Derby, Gunnevera, is less intriguing to me- he's an honest horse and I'd love to see a good effort, but I worry that he's tailing off and I'm not sure he'll get his pace here. AD/ Gunnevera/ Hence was my Derby tri so I'll put a couple of bucks on it, but looking elsewhere for the most part.
I want to use one other horse underneath but I can't decide between Cloud Computing and Multiplier. CC I talked about above, he is certainly talented but has a lot of unknowns and may dislike the distance. Still, he looks fantastic and Brown knows what he's doing here. Multiplier is a horse who looks completely different depending on which PPs you're looking at, I still don't really have a read on him but his Illinois Derby was really good and he might be one of the strongest closers in here (and on that note, I'm content to let Lookin at Lee beat me- no disrespect, but he got just about the best Derby trip a horse can get, and I just don't think the race will shape up for him this time). I'm not really going out on a limb by picking literally half the horses in the race, but there's a lot of ambiguity in here besides the top two and I think the exotics could potentially pay out very nicely even if the favorite wins.
Always Dreaming
Classic Empire/ Hence
Conquest Mo Money/ Cloud Computing?
