Spectacular Bid VS Seattle Slew

[blackthroatedwind]

Originally Posted by The Indomitable DrugS

I know Dr. Patches was very good. You don't run down a loose on the lead Seattle Slew as a 4-year-old if you're anything short of being very good.

The Swaps was the one and only time in Seattle Slew's career where he was rated off of the lead ... perhaps it doesn't point to him being a one-dimensional speed horse... and maybe he would have put in the same non-effort had he not been rated.

I get what you're saying about him, theoretically, failing badly the one time he didn't have the early lead, but you have to take a lot of other factors into account, and that race ( the Swaps ) simply can't be used as a fair barometer.

The thing is, he's not your run-of-the-mill speed horse that needs everything his own way. He showed pretty definitively in the Jockey Club Gold Cup that he is fast enough to outrun pretty much anyone while also being able to carry that speed a very long way. You just don't see horses like that. Hell, as great as Dr. Fager was, and there is no doubt he is on the very short list of greatest horses ever, he got trounced at 1 1/4 when severely pressured by a rabbit. Slew dusted off two, at 1 1/2 miles, when one of them was also a Triple Crown winner, and stilled missed by a slim nose to a damn good horse in Exceller. He was not your ordinary need the lead type and shouldn't be suggested as such.