Eclipse voting
 

Someone voted for Tale of Ekati for Champion 3YO and Henrythenavigator for Male turf horse?!?!?

I can't say I'm not disappointed that Music Note didn't win, but she deserved to finishe ahead of Eight Belles -no knocks on Eight Belle, of course. I just thought Music Note had a tremendous season.

I want somebody to tell me how Adena won the Champion Owner award.

Say whatever you want about IEAH, complain about Iavarone, the way they buy horse, etc. but they had a huge year and compared to Stronach?

Did I miss some races throughout the year that Stronach won? I was absolutely dumbfounded at the result.

For what it's worth, I also thought Stonerside should have gotten the Champion Breeder award, but I'm horribly biased. I guess breeding Midshipman and Raven's Pass was not a big enough accomplishment.

NT

So who were the two voters who voted for Ginger Punch over Zenyatta, they should have their votes revoked.

How about the one who voted for Peppers Pride as HOTY?

NT

http://www.drf.com/eclipse/2008/votes.html

Three people also voted for Bustin Stones as the champion older sprinter. Joe Rocco as outstanding jockey is another one of my favorites, as is Chamisa Goodwin as champion apprentice, and both Howard Wolfendale and Mike DeKock as champion trainer.

NT

I think Visionaire's one vote for sprinter and Albertus Maximus's vote for older horse take the cake...

You're absolutely correct and I agree with you 100% on that!

How could Conduit get Male Turf Horse Of The Year off of only one North American start? They should have some kind of rules like Canada has for thier version if im not mistaken isn't thier version called the Sovereign Awards?

They are probably the same people that didn't vote for Rickey Henderson.

They really should.

I'll assume that you are a fairly new fan so I'll explain to you that horses winning the award off of only one NA start is hardly unprecedented. The list of such winners includes Miesque (twice), Arazi, Daylami, Johannesburgh, Ouija Board (twice), Kalanisi, Islington, Singspiel, and High Chaparral (twice). The interesting thing about Singspiel is that he never won a race in the United States during the year he won his award. He won a race in Canada and finished second in the BC but still won the award. The interesting thing about High Chaparral's second win is that he didn't even win his one race outright, finishing in a dead-heat with Johar in the BC yet still being voted as the NA champion. So having that in mind, you have your answer as to how Conduit could win the award. Whether you think it's fair or not or if you think the rules should be changed are a different discussion. Under the current rules, it's fair.

Ive been following this great sport for years now. Let me ask you this if an American won a race like the Prix De La Arc Triomphe do you think it would will the Cartier Award off of just that one European start. Probably not. I dont think its right to reward a horse who has just one North American start. The list of the winners you i do remember especially the High Chaparral's dead heat with Johar. That was the year that Richard Mandella won four Breeders Cup race on one day. You gave a pretty opinion and I respect it, but I must say I also disagree with it.

there were plenty of folks who thought GZ should have gotten HOY that year he ran once, that the performance was that good.
i disagreed with that as well-i don't think conduit should have gotten it-problem is, there was no compelling alternative.

but Henrythenavigator NEVER ran on the turf in this country!?!? at least those two horses ran in the US.

If, and BIG IF, Curlin would have taken to the turf and won the Arc, I have no doubt, that he would have won the Cartier Award...

I can't comment completely on the question that you asked because I don't know the necessary criteria needed to be considered for a Cartier. I'd like to hope that the Europeans are smarter in this area and have made it mandatory to have the majority of your starts in Europe or at least more than one but I don't know. I do know that if an American went over and won once, he wouldn't win any awards but again, I don't know if it's because of rules or because they have more common sense. I wish the Americans did also. I personally don't like the fact that a one-time winner can walk away with the award and think the criteria should be changed. However, until it is, I also have a hard time not supporting a Euro winner. The criteria simply says that a horse has to have made at least one NA start and it's hard for me, in a situation like Raven's Pass vs. Big Brown, to believe that Raven's Pass is not the most deserving. I believe his one start was better than Big Brown's best was. Also, it's unfair to stop giving awards to current horses when others have won it without changing the system. One thing that the Euros would never do is open the floodgates from the start, which the Americans did. If you don't want to award Conduit this year, they should have never awarded any of those past winners.

That's it for me folks.....
I'm done with this sport.

I had no problem with it. I might have voted for Einstein personally, but it's not like he was some dominating force. The male Turf HOY was a terrible division this year.

I'm just glad Forever Together won Female Turf.

Will people give the Pepper's Pride thing a rest? We all knew she didn't have a chance in heck of winning and it's just someone's idea of a token vote to go "Yay Pepper! What an accomplishment!" Joe Allen got owner votes didn't he? What for if not campaigning Pepper? Curlin was a landslide and for all the talk about Zenyatta, sounds like a lot of those jokers knew it so no harm, no foul, vote for a horse that got a lot of folks excited. I thought it was sweet, but I wouldn't have done it as I had a horse I felt stronger about.

Finding out about this was less shocking, if it's possible, than finding out Clay Aiken was gay. :eek:

Fortunately those voting didn't share this same opinion. Big Brown was the clear run away winner in the 3 yr old male category as he should have been. Certainly congratulations are in order to Raven's Pass for winning the BC.

Next year there should be a category that allows for a vote for Steve!

Talk about an over reaction!

I might be wrong here, but I think the Cartier awards are based on something like 50% on points throughout the year in stakes races and 50% on fans/journalists votes, so if Curlin did win the Arc, he still probably wouldnt win the award.

Well at least we all know Raven's Pass would crush Big Brown in a fair race.

Heck Tiago would crush Big Brown in a race with pace. Big Brown would have finished....7th or 8th...if he ran in the Classic healthy.

I'd say it's unfortunate because the horse that was the clear best 3yo male to perform in NA in 2008 didn't get the award and instead, our "champion" might have been the third best 3yo male to race in this country.

i listened to the discussion on steves show about the eclipse voting, it was pretty amusing to say the least.

perhaps some changes are in order on who gets to vote. maybe those in the sport: owners, trainers, jocks, etc should be the ones voting-not 'turfwriters' who had no idea that ginger punch had a stellar year in '07, noy '08. or who vote for a horse because they cashed a ticket on a horse....
i thought having transparency on who voted for what horse/breeder, etc was a good idea-that way mayyou don't have someone voting for tale of ekati because he/she wouldn't want to have to explain.

It's not all turf writers. How about racing secretaries at Magna tracks who probably but Stronach over the top for Leading Owner and Breeder. Stronach didn't own or breed a champion but gets both honors? Stonerside bred Midshipman and Raven's Pass (not a champion but the winner of the BCC and a Euro G1) and gets nothing. Maybe it's because they sold out to Sh. Mohammed?
IEAH (who I'm not crazy about) campaigned 2 champions, won the Derby and Preakness, had the #2 juvie filly and a leading turfer (Kip) and got nothing.

but it doesn't come down to who won the big ones, adena is a perennial leader on the breeding side. i can see an argument for stonerside-altho i don't think the part about giving it to them because they're now out of business was a compelling reason. a horse shouldn't win year end awards based on one big race, neither should an owner or breeder. i can see making an argument for ieah, but i don't think adena was necessarily a bad choice.

I'm sure your scientific formula to make this absurd statement is qualified.

Just another anti-Big Brown comment. His record speaks for itself. Big Brown was the best 3 year old in 2008.

I was hoping that you would get over it in 2009 but apparently not. It's silly to say that a vote in favor of another is being anti-Big Brown. There can be more than one good or deserving horse in a category, you know? Do I accuse you of being anti-Raven's Pass because you disagree with me? Evolve my friend.

Adena/Stronach are perennial leaders and I don't think they were bad choices, but not the best choices. I know they bred and raced alot of leading horses as they always do but IEAH doesn't have that many horses and they earned 2 Eclipses and campaigned several other G1 type horses like Laragh and Kip Deville and Court Vision. It's rare that I defend these guys but I'd have voted for them here.
On the breeding side McNair may have been overlooked because he sold out but he did breed to BC winners, a Juvie champ and a horse who was a serious G1 miler in Europe that won the Classic here. What Raven's Pass accomplished was something that Giant's Causeway and Sahkee couldn't, and that's saying alot. Also, it's not fair to withhold a vote for Stonerside because he sold out. He bred those 2 BC winners and at least at the start of their careers, he raced them. Commercial breeders are eligible to get the Eclipse so why should Stonerside be.

This is off-topic a little bit but I really hate reading comments like this. It's not what Giant's Causeway and Sakhee COULDN'T do is what they DIDN'T do. Both of those horses ran winning races, perhaps both of them were better efforts than Raven's Pass but they happened to face a better horse than Raven's Pass did and they didn't win their races.

So in theory if Giant's Causeway and Sahkee had run against easier company (no Tiznow) they'd have won? True, but... Champions are not supposed to seek easier company.

Maybe "didn't" would have been a better term. In fact, GC was probably a better horse than Raven, but Raven never had to beat Giant. What Raven's Pass DID do is something that (IMO) should have when coupled with Midshipman's efforts, earned his breeder the Eclipse.

I agree with you on the Eclipse award. I also don't think it was your intent to say that Raven's Pass was better or more special than those other horses were. It's just a sore point with me. It's like how some people think Charismatic and War Emblem are special because they won 2/3 of the TC while a horse like Easy Goer "couldn't". Circumstances often get overlooked and horses get their values thrown out of whack because people just look at the end results instead of what led to those results.