Close but Not Quite

[Cannon Shell]

Originally Posted by King Glorious

Alysheba. Had he gotten his nose in front of Ferdinand in the 1987 BC Classic, he would have been a two-time winner.

Ferdinand would also be on this list. The nose losses to Snow Chief and Broad Brush in the 1987 Strub and Big Cap and the close losses to Alysheba in the 1988 Big Cap and San Bernardino.

Alysheba and Ferdinand are classic winners. And I hope you arent saying that they were merely good

[King Glorious]

Originally Posted by Cannon Shell

Alysheba and Ferdinand are classic winners. And I hope you arent saying that they were merely good

Of course not. I'm saying that a couple of noses or heads in another direction and both could be in the convo of top 10 horses of the past 25 years. Imagine Ferdinand having two Big Caps and a Strub (back when that race meant something) added to his record. Or imagine Alysheba with a second Classic and a Haskell. As it is Alysheba is probably already in the convo but Ferdinand certainly isn't.

[Cannon Shell]

Originally Posted by King Glorious

Of course not. I'm saying that a couple of noses or heads in another direction and both could be in the convo of top 10 horses of the past 25 years. Imagine Ferdinand having two Big Caps and a Strub (back when that race meant something) added to his record. Or imagine Alysheba with a second Classic and a Haskell. As it is Alysheba is probably already in the convo but Ferdinand certainly isn't.

Depends on who is having the conversation. On the top of his game there is no horse in the last 25 years that either couldnt beat on a regular basis at 1 1/4. Despite the attitude that prevails now, close losses to fellow great horses does not show weakness. The problem now is that horses get nice clean records but they never beat ( or lose to) anyone truly great because those horses simply dont exist any longer.

[King Glorious]

Originally Posted by Cannon Shell

Depends on who is having the conversation. On the top of his game there is no horse in the last 25 years that either couldnt beat on a regular basis at 1 1/4. Despite the attitude that prevails now, close losses to fellow great horses does not show weakness. The problem now is that horses get nice clean records but they never beat ( or lose to) anyone truly great because those horses simply dont exist any longer.

None of that do I disagree with. But I do think that as far as public perception goes, if you asked everyone on this board that's been around 20+ years to name the top 25 horses of that period, Ferdinand's name won't come up that often.

Speaking of losses to other top horses, in another place, I'm having a debate on the merits of one Medaglia d'Oro and his abilities at 10f. It's my position that the knock people have on him saying he couldn't do it couldn't be further from the truth. Losing to Candy Ride and that 2003 BC Classic effort.....those were absolutely winning efforts but just so happened to come against better horses or horses that got better circumstances. They didn't show weakness on his part simply because he lost.

[Cannon Shell]

Originally Posted by King Glorious

None of that do I disagree with. But I do think that as far as public perception goes, if you asked everyone on this board that's been around 20+ years to name the top 25 horses of that period, Ferdinand's name won't come up that often.

Speaking of losses to other top horses, in another place, I'm having a debate on the merits of one Medaglia d'Oro and his abilities at 10f. It's my position that the knock people have on him saying he couldn't do it couldn't be further from the truth. Losing to Candy Ride and that 2003 BC Classic effort.....those were absolutely winning efforts but just so happened to come against better horses or horses that got better circumstances. They didn't show weakness on his part simply because he lost.

You could make that case however he was not nearly on the level of Alysheba or Ferdinand nor were the horses he lost to. I think that sometimes in the cases of horses like Alysheba and Ferninand people who either arent old enough or didnt follow close enough let these horses lack of success as stallions taint their records somehow. I was having a discussion with a guy who was comparing Curlin to some great horses and I said that I wasnt sure that he would beat Skip Away more times than he wouldnt and he made the comment about Skip Away being a bad sire, like that has anything to do with a horse's racing standing.

[King Glorious]

Originally Posted by Cannon Shell

You could make that case however he was not nearly on the level of Alysheba or Ferdinand nor were the horses he lost to. I think that sometimes in the cases of horses like Alysheba and Ferninand people who either arent old enough or didnt follow close enough let these horses lack of success as stallions taint their records somehow. I was having a discussion with a guy who was comparing Curlin to some great horses and I said that I wasnt sure that he would beat Skip Away more times than he wouldnt and he made the comment about Skip Away being a bad sire, like that has anything to do with a horse's racing standing.

I don't put him in the class of Alysheba or Ferdinand or any of the top 25 runners of the past 20 years. Not at all. I do think that Candy Ride is in that class though.

Curlin couldn't hold Skip Away's jock. Big Brown couldn't hold Medaglia's. The game today has changed so much. It's sad what's considered great. People are calling Zenyatta great too. It's gotten out of hand.

[Cannon Shell]

Originally Posted by King Glorious

I don't put him in the class of Alysheba or Ferdinand or any of the top 25 runners of the past 20 years. Not at all. I do think that Candy Ride is in that class though.

Curlin couldn't hold Skip Away's jock. Big Brown couldn't hold Medaglia's. The game today has changed so much. It's sad what's considered great. People are calling Zenyatta great too. It's gotten out of hand.

Candy Ride simply didnt do enough for me to put him in that league. He may have but he didnt.

[Indian Charlie]

Originally Posted by Cannon Shell

Depends on who is having the conversation. On the top of his game there is no horse in the last 25 years that either couldnt beat on a regular basis at 1 1/4. Despite the attitude that prevails now, close losses to fellow great horses does not show weakness. The problem now is that horses get nice clean records but they never beat ( or lose to) anyone truly great because those horses simply dont exist any longer.

Alysheba is pretty easily a top 10 horse of the last 25 years. At least going 10f on dirt anyways. When Ferdinand finally got good, he was awesome too.

I always thought Precisionist and Greinton would hand most of these horses running these days their asses on a platter too.

The fickle Gentlemen, when he was feeling good, was as good as just about anything I've seen run.

There are a bunch of horses that were spectacular but had abbreviated careers, such as the aforementioned Candy Ride and Indian Charlie.

One horse from the 70's (before my time) that has intrigued me was Believe It.

He ran third in both the Derby and Preakness to Affirmed and Alydar. Interestingly enough, he also sired the most memorable (to me) horse with three starts that nobody has ever heard of, Swear, who won all three of his races by daylight.

[Danzig]

congaree lost a few close ones-altho he got a lot of respect in his narrow loss to the repeating milwaukee brew in the big cap. why he gave weight to MB that day i don't know...