Candy Ride (obvious talent / very fast)

Curlin (Demonstrated great ability right off the bat with multiple terrific performances in an incredibly short period of time from his debut to the Preakness....unbelievable)

Ghostzapper (obvious talent / very fast)

Discreet Cat (obvious talent / very fast)

Empire Maker (This horse always had the reputation of being a bit of a goof. He never seemed to really put it all together mentally, and had some injury problems, etc. He won three G1s and never finished out of the exacta on talent alone)

The title of your thread got me thinking. I believe Raw Talent was the name of the autobiography of 80's adult film star, Jerry Butler. A humorous read, if I recall correctly.

I dont know about Discreet Cat, what was he? A true true miler? If thats the case then I guess so. I think Midnight Lute was a better sprinter and Bernardini would have killed him going 9f.

Given his performance in the Cigar Mile, I'd say yeah.

That was a WOW type effort... A lot like the Borrego video I posted the other day.

Hmmm Good Question I want to say she went in 21 Flat and when she did it that was unheard of, I actually Checked Fasig tiptons Website they have an Archive for Under tack shows but it only goes back till 2003. Mitch:D

Ghostzapper. Fastest horse the last 10 years.

Mineshaft. The best handicapper season since Cigar.

Curlin. As already stated, to go from a late debut to the Preakness with so little foundation against a good crop. He validated it later on.

Smarty Jones. Ran the 3 fastest spring sheet numbers ever at the time. Before he got to Churchill, he was the fastest they had on record. 3rd in the Belmont was 8 lengths back.

Point Given/Empire Maker. This is subjective. While both accomplished quite a bit- particularly PG's 4 straight million dollar races- I'm not sure we saw the best of them. I think either could have been a monster at 4.

Very difficult to leave off Barbaro, whom many think was better on turf, Rachel Alexandra, the best 3yo filly I ever saw, or Midnight Lute when he was healthy.

Kickin n Screamin-bad trainer
Hank-Don't mess with him
Lloydobler- Able to place many times with a slimmed down Sciacca galloping him
Joe the Dude-you don't know yet
Angry Dragon-Shiek Kauffman calls the shots

I know Midnight Lute gets many a mention on this thread, but I'm not sure he's fully being appreciated even so. If not for a breathing problem, he'd be more like Ghostzapper in terms of range of distance. Baffert originally figured him as a TC/BCC hopeful, but couldn't fix the air issues in time. Given how he stayed sprinting, I guess it was never fully resolved.

http://sports.espn.go.com/sports/hor...aul&id=3120551

Baffert flat out says he was going to be his Derby horse. I believe it. I think you're talking a horse with the raw talent to be a world beater at any distance. I'd be excited to have one of his foals on the way, honestly. I've always felt Real Quiet was underrated, and it's a real shame ML had those problems. If he gets a TC hopeful, what do you wanna bet someone's gonna go 'well his sire was a champion sprinter so you can't expect him to go long.' Completely underestimates the potential of his progeny (provided he doesn't also pass on his own physical flaw).

Besides a few of the aforementioned horses, I would add Bellamy Road.

He was a really good one, but if your going to add a horse like him, off of 1 giant effort, then I guess I can add Borrego off of one giant effort.

he had more than one giant effort. his win before the wood was a big one, and he ran well in the travers off a layoff. obviously a very, very talented horse.

Where were you yesterday? LOL I could have used this backup. His Pacific Classic before the JCGC was huge also.

She's talking about Bellamy Road, not Borrego.

What's the view on Lost in the Fog? He did do a 1:07 and change 6f. He's also a King's Bishop winner. RIP to him and Harry "Battle of the G** D*** Bulge" Aleo. One of the funniest moments of live sports tv interviews I've seen. I bet more than one producer passed out. I think Quint was the interviewer, and he went pretty pale. In fairness, it was a pretty stupid question.

Good point... In that case, the Gulfstream allowance filed SUCKED. It was a disaster he should have cruised. I agree about the Travers, I have said multiples times I thought the Travers validated him as being very good. As far as huge efforts and being brillant he had 1 IMO, but I guess he would be very high on any raw talent list and thats what this is.

I don't care about your opinion. I just found it funny you totally didn't read her post and just responded for the sake of responding.

More thread pollution.

nevermind, it's been covered.

Big brown, midnight lute, fusaichi Pegasus of the ones that haven't been named