Quote:
Originally Posted by parsixfarms
The amazing part is the 3YO second season is about to start. Despite the quantity and supposed quality of the horses given to him, unless I am missing something, there are only two horses that started with him that may be factors in any of these races: Disposablepleasure and Gemologist. The "program" is chewing up a lot of horses.
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Owners want a guy like Pletcher who looks and acts like a CEO.
Imagine for one second that Jeff Mulllins wasn't a fruitcake. Imagine he doesn't wear a terrible mullet. Imagine he never went into bodybuilding and made a bigger joke of himself. Imagine other trainers haven't tried to stamp him as a cheater...something they rarely do with other suspicious guys. Imagine he didn't have all of the violations and he didn't call bettors "idiots" and he doesn't make a fool of himself whenever he tries to talk.
Mullins has basically been, in my opinion, no doubt about it the best horse trainer in this country over the last 15 years ... and he literally gets no stock. He's taken about five horses to the Kentucky Derby, he's won 3 Santa Anita Derbys and a Wood Memorial ... and each time he pulled the horse right out of his ass.
He's gone entire years without a single six figure 2yo. Without a single six figure yearling. Without any nicely bred homebreds. He claims horses out of maiden claiming races and gets them to beat Pleasantly Perfect at Del Mar the same year and run 3rd in the Dubai World Cup.
Since 1995, he's started more than 5,000 horses and has a profitable ROI... yet people bet his horses blind on his name and still his ROI remains positive.
Jeff Mullins is a better trainer than Pletcher ... but he gets nothing and probably because horse owners don't want a guy with his image training horses for them.
I'm not saying Pletcher can't train -- he's Mullins like at Gulfstream every year -- but it's all about image and fashion.