Preakness 133: A Handicapping Profile

1--MACHO AGAIN 20-1: Overcame wide and rough trip to win the Churchill’s Derby Trial at one mile, a race that has become somewhat fashionable as a Preakness prep, given its timing. While he did get jostled about in the G2 Lanes End, both his two-turn efforts have been wanting, giving the impression that one turn, and one mile, might be his best go. Wayne Lukas protégé Dallas Stewart owns a profitable 26 percent winning rate with horses seeking repeat wins. Give the colt this: He tries hard.

2--TRES BORRACHOS 30-1: Form has improved since getting off the synthetic surfaces, a common occurrence among horses with early speed. With not a lot of speed signed on here, he might get away in relatively soft fractions. He set a lively pressured pace in the Arkansas Derby--shadowed by Gayego throughout--and held very well for third, re-breaking after being passed by a would-be show finisher. Has been trained aggressively since then and appears to be responding. In-the-money finish not impossible here, especially given inside draw.

3--ICABAD CRANE 30-1: Unlike many of this year’s sophomores, he might be the only one to have won three starts on dirt while losing his lone synthetic try at Turfway Park. Significantly, one of those three victories came at Pimlico, the only Preakness starter with experience at “Old Hilltop.” Ridden by Jeremy Rose, who won this race with Afleet Alex in 2005, he is trained by another local hero, Graham Motion, who has Hall of Fame talent but has lacked a high profile runner. This isn’t that horse.

NBC Taking on Eight Belles Issue Head On

By the time Saturday’s Preakness Stakes telecast ends at 6 p.m. EDT, all will know the potential implications that the June 7 Belmont Stakes will have on racing history. But the opening segment on the NBC Sports coverage beginning at 4:30 p.m. will have nothing to do with a potential superstar colt named Big Brown.

The storyline of Kentucky Derby 134 still very much is about the filly Eight Belles, euthanized about a half mile from the Churchill Downs finish line where she fatally injured herself while galloping out after the race.

Resultantly, the telecast’s host, Bob Costas, will use a roundtable format--similar to the one which gained him and the HBO cable network critical acclaim for his series on sports and the media--to open NBC‘s Preakness Stakes coverage.

Costas will begin the telecast with a 30-minute taped piece featuring a round table discussion among Churchill Downs’ attending veterinarian, Dr. Larry Bramlage, the filly’s trainer, Larry Jones, racing analyst and Hall of Famer jockey Gary Stevens, and New York Times sports columnist William Rhoden.

When describing horse racing, Rhoden used the words cruel and unusual in the same sentence.

Contentious Preakness Telecast Coming Up

Heaven help horse racing if there's an unfortunate accident at the Preakness. Unlike the Breeders' Cup Classic, in which the top colt George Washington broke down in mid-stretch and was euthanized, the Preakness is the middle jewel of the Triple Crown. With the first race in this hallowed series, the Kentucky Derby, already marred by tragedy, and the Belmont, still to be run, there will be no let-up to the negativity about the sport that persists.

NBC-TV isn’t making things easier. The network announced that it has invited New York Times sports columnist William Rhoden to join host Bob Costas and jockey-turned-analyst Gary Stevens, Eight Belles trainer Larry Jones and track veterinarian Larry Bramlage for a nationally-televised, pre-Preakness panel discussion about horse safety. Rhoden likened thoroughbred racing to dog fighting and called for its abolition in a recent column. See now if the protesters from PETA at Pimlico get screen time.

Big Brown Preakness Victory Worth Millions to NYRA

Big Brown’s biggest cheering section won’t be at Pimlico, but at Belmont Park. A Preakness victory for the Kentucky Derby winner would set up the sixth attempt to win a Triple Crown in ten years. Each time a horse finds itself in this position, the New York Racing Association reaps the rewards of an attendance increase the likes of which the spacious racetrack was built for.

Without a Triple Crown on the line, Belmont Park attracts a crowd of about 60,000 people for the Belmont Stakes. With the Triple Crown a possibility, over 100,000 fans will show up. These are conservative numbers. It could be a swing of 50,000 fans at stake on Saturday.

What are 50,000 fans worth in terms of revenue? Well, if you figure an average general admission ticket price of $50 and per capita wagering of $200 and the price of parking and a hot dog and a beer, it’s about $13 million.

This Time, It’ll Be an Inside Job

Five of the last six odds-on favorites in the Preakness have accounted for bags and bags of paper debris at old Pimlico. Their names are Linkage, Swale, Easy Goer, Fusaichi Pegasus and the unfortunate Barbaro. It's likely that some of the tickets on Barbaro wound up in memory books instead of the scrap heap.

Odds-on choices don't always lose at Pimlico--Smarty Jones was 7-10 when he won--and Big Brown isn't expected to join Linkage and the others when they run the Preakness, the middle jewel in the Triple Crown, for the 133rd time time on Saturday. The easy-does-it Kentucky Derby winner is running off two weeks' rest for the first time in his brief career, but there is nothing in the stars over Baltimore that presages a meltdown. "If he gets a clean trip, I don't know of anyone who can run with him," said Michael Iavarone, one of the colt's owners.

Britches That Jingle Jangle Jingle

Two days before the Kentucky Derby, as I packed the car in the driveway for the 300-mile trip to Las Vegas, a UPS truck pulled up in front of the house. The driver handed me a package that contained Charlie Leerhsen's new book on Dan Patch.

"You're going to be in the Kentucky Derby, aren't you?" I said to her.

"What?" she said.

"The Kentucky Derby," I said. "Saturday. Big Brown."

"Huh?" she said.

The New Shooters’ Stakes

SAN MATEO, Calif., May 13, 2008--You'll need a scorecard for the 133rd running of the Preakness. Yankee Bravo? That name sort of rings a bell. Behindatthebar? Seems familiar. Giant Moon? I remember him. Vaguely. The Preakness has always been a haven for the Triple Crown's new shooters, but this is ridiculous. This isn't a field, it's a road company of "Ben-Hur." These were the understudies for the Kentucky Derby. They weren't good enough to run in Louisville, and now some of their names will actually be hung on the marquee in Baltimore. Next Saturday, Pimlico should let everybody in on twofers.

What happened to Denis of Cork? Didn't he earn enough shipping money at Churchill Downs? Recapturetheglory, fifth in the Derby, was Preakness-bound for a while, but now he's not scheduled to run. Louie Roussel, his trainer, says that Recapturetheglory has a temperature. Roussel may have also noticed that his horse finished 11 3/4 lengths behind Big Brown in the Derby.

The Cruelest Game

LAS VEGAS, May 6, 2008--Less than two weeks after Serena's Song ran 16th in the 1995 Kentucky Derby, the filly's aggressive trainer, Wayne Lukas, wheeled her back in the Black-Eyed Susan Stakes at Pimlico.

I remember that as the horses were being loaded into the gate in Baltimore, I stood on the catwalk in front of the press box, high above the crowd. I had lavaliere binoculars in hand, and my heart was in my shoes. "I hope nothing happens to her," I said to myself.

I had had a bellyful of Ruffian, Go for Wand, Union City, Prairie Bayou and all the others. Hell, we had lost three in one day in the 1990 Breeders' Cup at Belmont Park. Before Go for Wand, whose mercy killing had taken place right in the front of the grandstand, two horses died in the same race, Mr. Nickerson of a heart attack and Shaker Knit of a broken back when he stumbled over the other one.