As trainers, like them or don't, that's a different issue. As far as buying power, I can't speak to the Baffert aspect specifically, but by his own admittance he lost a lot of buying power between Lewis, Sanan and Zayat (to whatever extent you would consider that). Lukas hasn't had carte blanche for quite some time. Does he still have power to buy a big ticket horse? Two? Sure. But that is far from carte blanche, say for example, like Pletcher had the last X number of years. At this point, I think Lukas may get more "homebred" babies than purchases, and in that world -- you play the cards your dealt.
Zito is another story. For many years his buying power was mostly in the $300k and below range. He was also getting "homebreds" -- like the Whintey horses. There would always be the odd expensive buyback from LaPenta, or an odd expensive purchase from Live Oak, but they were very few and far between. His purchasing power in recent years has increased, and LaPenta is playing the game in a bigger way, and he has bought back more horses (and more expensive ones); but for years Zito produced without having anywhere near carte blanche.
Don't get me wrong -- there's no doubt these guys have strong buying power. Being able to buy just one million dollar baby is more than 99% of the trainers in the game, so they start out with big dollars.
I think Pletcher had a run where he had carte blanche.
Eric
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