Frankel

[King Glorious]

Originally Posted by PatCummings

Canford Cliffs beat Goldikova by 3/4 of a length...and FWIW, Peslier was a pound over. Hardly a whipping. Cape Blanco comes back to run well, then wins a G1 in America.

Now onto more topics, and in defense of Calzone Lord...

I can sit back and, with absolutely no worry, enjoy that performance and the race itself. It was a beauty...............

But I am completely, overwhelmingly, UNWILLING to hand out superlatives like the rest of the 21st century yahoos who, in this 24-7 media world, always need to find some degree of how one particular entity (horse, race, ride...in racing parlance, or anything else in the world of sport) is a crowning achievement, the best of the best, etc. Hell, five hours after the call was made, SportsCenter was anointing that home plate play in the 19th inning of the Pirates/Braves game as possibly the worst call EVER! EVER!!!!!!! That's a lot of flippin history of dunce umpiring, not to mention this call was made at 2am.

When I see comments from people that they were crying about this win (as I saw on Facebook), and that some thought they'd never see anything like it again when Goldikova won 3 BC Miles, and suddenly, seven months later they are spewing forth with another round of superlatives for a horse whose career has spanned eight races in 11 months.

Henry Cecil has the right to call Frankel the best horse he's ever laid eyes on, presuming (he's trained many champions, and he has that right) you expect him to know his own stock. But in terms of the rest of us hacks, trying to put perspective on a performance...how about we all use the best modifier for lending perspective...TIME.

Let TIME go by before we declare some of these horses, through eight freakin races, truly great, the best of all time, the supreme champion.

You know why we have to wait? Cause the jolly criers are going to be all aflutter when the next amazing horse of a lifetime crops up next year, or this year, or hasn't debuted yet, or two years from now, etc, etc, etc. A year ago, no one ever heard of Frankel the horse...TIME will tell, and pardon me if happiness in my racing mind isn't sated with another overwhelming superlative. I'll enjoy it for what it was, but reserve personal judgment and superlatives for the passage of time and more experience. It's sensible, rational, and just makes the most damn sense. Those lobbing the ridiculous praise...I'll keep shaking my head and paying no attention to them.

I understand what you are saying and for the most part, I agree with you. But sometimes, something becomes so obviously clear that time is not needed and anyone that's got some experience in watching things can know what they've seen. I go back to Lammtarra in 1994-95. He only raced four times in his career but after winning a 7f maiden race as a 2yo in October, he didn't return again until the Epsom Derby and won that while setting a course record. Then he won the King George and finished it off with the Arc. Any horse that can do that is a great horse. I don't care if it was only four races.

If I watch Kyrie Irving come out this year and average 35 points and 14 assists and see him hanging triple-doubles in Rose and Williams and Rondo, he could retire after one year and I'd know that he had all-time great talent.

I am not saying that Frankel should or shouldn't be annointed now. Personally, I think he's made his way into the conversation of best horses I've seen since I started watching races in 1986 but I couldn't argue with anyone that doesn't think he deserves that just yet.