Quote:
Originally Posted by RHT2004
Nyquist has never been above average, he is OK. He was OK winning the Juvy and OK in the Derby. And then fell apart. Comparing him to a horse like Animal Kingdom is unfair to AK.
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I'd add Animal Kingdom to the "poorly managed" list.
(1) He was only entered in the Spiral Stakes as a back up when another Team Valor horse didn't make the field. The connections had no aspirations of racing him on dirt at that point.
(2) His Derby win was his first dirt race. While this might be mythologized as evidence of his greatness, in reality it just shows his connections were basically clueless with regards to his abilities.
(3) After he was injured in the Belmont with a fracture, Barry Irwin immediately mapped out a plan to make the 2012 Dubai World Cup, prior to surgery if I recall correctly. When you fit the horse to the racing calendar as opposed to fitting the calendar to the horse, you usually set yourself up for a disaster. Animal Kingdom started in a grass allowance and promptly fractured his pelvis soon thereafter. Back to the sidelines.
(4) His comeback race was the BC Mile on grass against Wise Dan. The horse finished second. Congrats. I guess his connections were taking a page out of Michael Dickinson's book. You know, where the horse runs once a year (or two). What was the purpose of that race? True, he demonstrated top class, but he didn't start again for 3 months. It served no purpose other than to add another notch on Wise Dan's post really.
(5) Returns in a Grade 1 on the grass without the benefit of a prep and gets beat by major Grade 1 turf horse Point of Entry.
(6) After his great Dubai win on Tapeta, where he defeated the ill-fated 7yo Red Cadeaux and the ill-fated Dullahan and the synthetic-hating Royal Delta, Irwin's master plan is to run at Royal Ascot, taking a page from Ken McPeek's book (which is in the independent reader section of your local bookstore). He is unceremoniously crushed by the unheralded Declaration of War who I think was coming off a Group 3 win on an all-weather track. Given his subsequent BC Classic effort, maybe Declaration of War should have been in the Dubai World Cup.
(7) The final nail in the coffin that proves the case is that despite his absolute smasher in the Kentucky Derby, Animal Kingdom never again started on the dirt following the Belmont, despite repeated comeback races.
And Irwin had the gall to write a book about this mess of a career.