You really think LDK should have the 3yo award, or are you talking older horse the following season?
Tiz was the better horse.

Good discussion. I'll just add that even if Java Gold had won the JCGC at 1-9, I don't think HOY was a "gimme". If the BC Classic finish line was 10 feet further, Alysheba would have won it and I don't think a Derby-Preakness-BCC winner is going to be denied HOY.

You might counter that reasoning by saying you were assuming Java Gold wins the 1-9 race but everything else stays the same. But everything else could have been affected by a differently run JCGC. Maybe the BCC lineup would have been affected. It wouldn't take much of a perturbation to have reversed the finish of Alysheba and Ferdinand.

I agree with both you and BTW that thinking of those great horses makes the state of racing today all the sadder.

--Dunbar

Older Horse

Had Alysheba won the Classic, it could have made things very interesting. I don't think at the time that the Classic held as much weight as it does now though. Back then, horses ran and faced other top contenders more often and with longer campaigns, there was a bigger body of work to look at than there is today. Today, u only have three or four other starts to look at and often, they don't face another marquee horse in most of them so the BC takes on more significance because it's one of the very few times we see them all together. Also, in 1987, the BC was still pretty much in its infancy (4th year) and wasn't quite the prestigious event it is today. I remember a few Eastern trainers didn't really care too much about coming out here. Mack Miller wasn't planning on sending Java Gold that year. Creme Fraiche won two JCGC's and didn't come either year. Personal Ensign skipped the 1987 Distaff. Forty Niner wasn't sent for the 1987 Juvenile. It took them a few years to get past the mentality that the fall races at Belmont were no longer considered the championship races. I feel that a JCGC win for Java Gold would have sealed it no matter the outcome of the Classic. I feel that had Alysheba won the Classic, it would have been looked at as another 3yo beating older that year (to go along with Polish Navy's Woodward, JG's Whitney and Marlboro, Gulch's Met Mile, Very Subtle's BC Sprint) and not even that good a group of older, considering Ferdinand would have been 3-10 on the year and was considered the best of the group.

Leaving Gone West off was a mistake. He won the Gotham over Gulch and lost that close one to him in the Wood. He later won the Dwyer and Withers. He wasn't third though in that Whitney. Broad Brush was third. I think GW might have been fourth. Very nice horse though. He was also second in the Hutcheson and Peter Pan and third in the Fountain of Youth. I remember being surprised by him because I didn't know him at all coming into the year and thinking that Florida races were flukes until he handed it to Gulch in NY.

KG
 

I agree with a lot of what you're saying but on the specifics....Miller toyed with bringing Java Gold to the Classic after he lost the JCGC but an injury prevented that. Creme Fraiche was a gelding and was most likely also not nominated ( his sire, I believe, was Rich Creme ). Personal Ensign most likely didn't come as she had renently won two races in 12 days and was coming off a severe injury. Shug was not averse to shipping back then ( didn't Polish Navy run in the previous Juvenile? ).

I loved Gone West. The Gotham was in the slop...which he relished.

Would have you given Charismatic the 3 year old award that year?

It was the year 2000. LDK was a four yr old and Tiznow was a three yr old.
LDK won :
The Whitney
Woodward
Suburban
Brooklyn

Tiznow won :
The Breeders Cup
Super Derby
Goodwood.

though not highway robber LDK did get Champion Older Horse, I still would have voted LDK for HOY.

speaking of eclipse voting...

how does bernardini get more top 3 yo votes than barbaro, but barbaro gets more for HOY? that doesn't make sense!!

and how does cacique not get even ONE vote for top turf?!

Cause the Bernardini voters voted with their brain while the Barbaro voters voted with their heart. So everyone stubborn enough to vote Barbaro 3yo of the year was stubborn enough to vote him HOY too. The ones that voted Bernardini were smart enough to recognize Invasor as HOY.

Excellent logic.

I was wondering the samething too and that makes perfect sense. Good job.

I like the way u think.

Yeah, we definitely agree on this one.

thanks, seems a good explanation.

I think the BC Classic was already shaping Eclipse thinking by 1987. IMO the BCC was a considered a good bit more important than the Woodward, Whitney or Marlboro. Doesn't Ferdinand's HOY demonstrate that?

--Dunbar

I felt the door was opened by JG losing the JCGC. Had he won, the Classic would have been moot in my opinion. So no, I don't think Ferdinand's win demonstrated that. The Classic might have been more important than those other races as individual events but not when u put them together as a collection. At that time, a Whitney-Travers-Marlboro-JCGC resume would have outdone a Hollywood GC-Goodwood-BCC. At that time, the Goodwood was a grade three race too.

Yeah, the people old enough to remember Roseben making seven starts in six weeks, during the fall of 1906, must have really thought those paper champions racing in '87 were a bunch of wussies.

Roseben was 7-6-1-0 over that stretch. Carrying 150lbs, and spotting the winner 41lbs in his only loss. He finished up his tear with a 6 length win in the 1906 Manhatten handicap on Oct 12th. He gave the runner up 36lbs. 4 days later, he returned to win at Belmont Park by 20 lengths, getting 7 furlongs in a then world record 1:22 flat. Getting his last 1/8th in a supersonic 11 3/5ths.

Horses have become less and less Roseben like with each passing decade. Hopefully, in the very distant future, they don't one-day become like boxers, and only show up two or three times a year.

DrugS
 

As an aside, back in 1906, what did your great great great grandfather use for athletic socks?

I have no clue what my male ancestors used to catch their nut with.

Just for that, I think I might just start a "best horse through the first six races of his life" thread.

Why not just change your name to " The Redundant Drugs "?