Dick Jerardi's Wise Dan soapbox
 

http://www.drf.com/news/dick-jerardi...m-shortsighted

Thoughts?

He might want to crack a history book or read some old racing forms.

The pressure to campaign top horses in a most challenging fashion was ALWAYS much, much, much, much, much greater in the past.

And the criticism would always come colorfully and heavily from the best turf writers.

Other than Pat Cummings, I don't know a single person (myself included) who has criticized Wise Dan's campaign, now or anytime before that.

Has anyone here?

Has anyone on Twitter? ... where I suppose I must not be reading enough tweets?

I guess Dick Jerardi is nostalgic for the syrupy drivel of the late 1960's, 1970's, and most of the 1980's ...

Mr. Morton Fink's remarkable gelding Wise Dan and his intrepid trainer Charles LoPresti choose to brave the weather and spotted Brobdingnagian weight spreads ranging from 11 pounds (to Mr. Adele B. Dilschneider's Lea, a recent winner of an Optional Claiming race) to 13 pounds (to Mr. Roger Braugh Jr.'s gelding Ol Army, a recent winner of an allowance race at 14/1 odds at Indiana Downs) to his four ferocious challengers.

Other than Pat Cummings, no one really cares where Wise Dan is campaigned. We know his trainer is as cautious and judicious as they come. Even though he's a gelding... no one is expecting him to be campaigned like Kelso, Forego, or John Henry.

Just as no one should expect Wise Dan to be revered like they were.

Jerardi was obviously fond of the worst period of horse racing coverage in America. Great horses and great racing happened in that era, great writers as well, but the way those great writers went about covering that great racing was dull, boring, lame, and often lacking strongly in opinion, insight, or gossip.

I was thinking the same thing. Where are all these Wise Dan critics?

Someone had to break it to Pat Cummings on Twitter that Wise Dan was a gelding. He made some comment about a G1 on dirt maybe helping his stud career.

Lisa Danielle's 5 colts have all been gelded. I'm sure there was a reason, and it's not like they had super commercial pedigrees, but maybe they'll try to keep the next colt intact. She's no spring chicken. She's in foal to More Than Ready though and any colt by him would have to deal with competing with both MTR and Verrazano for mares. Probably best if this one's a filly.

Ha. I was just told about this.

If anyone seriously thought that I didn't know Wise Dan was a gelding...

This was too much of a gem to let slide...

"I don’t want to do anything to devalue him"

The gelding, Wise Dan...devaluing a gelding...I didn't say it, or think it...

http://www.drf.com/news/wise-dans-ow...icism-campaign

Probably with all those east coasters who think that west coast horses are inferior simply because they are based in the west coast.

Well...

Look, if you were being sarcastic, nobody else got it since at least two other people corrected you, and you never clarified it if you knew he was a gelding. Whatever. Claire Novak accidentally forgot Flat Out wasn't a gelding in the last month or so. It's an easy mistake to make with older horses since some stallions are racing later.

Wow, that's...an interesting reason to keep him undefeated this year. :zz: Mares or stallions trying not to lose, I may not like but I get. A gelding? Bizarre. He's not even undefeated, it's just this season we're talking about, and it's not like that's enough to get him HOY. Other people come to the dances and one of the viable HOY contenders wins the Classic, they get the big trophy.

I get what he is saying and it sounds like he wants to protect him more than anything else and enjoy him at his very best for as long as they can.

Personally, I don't see that as such a bad thing and I'm sure many of the people who are critics of this campaign would likely do the same thing after 40 years in the game and probably countless horses that didn't make it this far or got injured before they could. Heck, I would have scratched him out of his last race, but they still ran.

For anyone who didn't see his much talked about work:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CsYIsbO4kVE

I know this isn't the same, but i can remember watching the like s of Skip Away and Cigars win Masscaps when owners did the right thing and brought their hosses to the people. These hosses love to run, it's why they are who they are. Wise Dan should be running all over the place in big races at local tracks. That's how interest is stirred. It's huge for the game, especially when you have 3 fans dying a day but only getting 1 new fan to replace them. The boss here does so much to help the game it's a shame more owners didn't see the big picture.

The guy is one day away from dying. He gets kidney treatments every other day or something drastic like that and he, like most people in the 80's, have good and bad days.

I personally have learned a ton from him from probably the 20+ conversations I have had over the past year in a half that I have been around him on Saturdays at Trackside.

And Pat, I think you took the 'devalue' word the wrong way. It isn't about money at all with Fink, the guy has more money then God

God doesn't have as much money as she used to have

He didn't say anything about devaluing the horse, Lopresti did.

I know, I think he took it the wrong way from LoPresti. Devalue doesn't have to mean financial.

Racing was a better game when people didn't think that losses devalued their horses. Seriously, if Wise Dan was in the Whitney today and he lost, would it really devalue him?

It is sad that this horse is following the same path as last year.

Ding, ding, ding, we have a winner!

de·val·ue [dee-val-yoo] verb, de·val·ued, de·val·u·ing.
verb (used with object)
1. to deprive of value; reduce the value of.
2. to fix a lower value on (a currency).

val·ue [val-yoo] noun, verb, val·ued, val·u·ing.
noun
1. relative worth, merit, or importance: the value of a college education; the value of a queen in chess.
2. monetary or material worth, as in commerce or trade: This piece of land has greatly increased in value.
3. the worth of something in terms of the amount of other things for which it can be exchanged or in terms of some medium of exchange.
4. equivalent worth or return in money, material, services, etc.: to give value for value received.
5. estimated or assigned worth; valuation: a painting with a current value of $500,000.

Even if you used definition #1 of "value" - to suggest it has nothing to do with financials - that's fine...you can't suggest that running and winning against lackluster competition in the Firecracker isn't devaluing in its own right.

And if Fink is that sick, surely it's a shame and I wish him nothing but the best...but why not even try to go a furlong longer than the Woodford and try him in his home town of Chicago for the Arlington Million?

As I've long held, Wise Dan can ONLY improve his legacy with big race performances (win or lose) - he's a likely Hall of Famer anyway, so why dull his form with blah races...if he just does the same old same old and just reconfirms what we already know (basically, Zenyatta's races outside of the Breeders' Cup Classic runs), he does nothing.

Can you gain respect and add to your legacy without winning? I gained more respect for Zenyatta in losing the BC Classic at CD.

For all those who say money is no issue...then what is the harm in trying the top company and a few new challenges?

I guess it's all in the way you look at life.

If I was as old as Wise Dan's owner and owned the horse, I'd certainly run him in new spots and try to silence all the doubters with big route wins on dirt. There is only so much time on this earth. I wouldn't want to live with the regret of knowing I could have proved something but did not.