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Originally Posted by blackthroatedwind
Personally, and like you I don't play them very often, I think you have to think of them more situationally, in that how the horse fits the make-up of the race is much more relevent than what their actual chances of winning are. It is not a case of, say to be simple, horse A is 6-1 and Horse B is 12-1 so horse A is a 2-1 favorite. There was a match-up in the Derby, I believe, where Sinister Minister was only a short fav over Jazil even though he was roughly a third the price. While it was believed ( not by me ) that Sinister Minister had a more realistic chance of winning the race, he didn't have a normal distribution, say, of finish, in that he was also probably one of the favs to finish last. Jazil, on the other hand, was a great horse to finish in the top half of the field, as the only running he was going to do was at the end, he would not hurt himself early.
To me, Balletto and Pine Island are very similar entities in this particular race, and thus the chances of one beating the other is somewhat of a coin flip. Now, don't get me wrong, if they were both the same price TO WIN I would definitely take Pine island, as like you I like her chances, but situationally I can't seperate them. They run around the same numbers and have the same running style. To me this is a poor match-up choice as I am relying on a specific opinion of talent as opposed to taking advantage of a situation. I think you can do better playing the race parimutually if your opinion of Pine Island, or any horse, is what your's is.
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