Causal Factors, David. Really. (1480 Views)
Posted by:
Mall (IP Logged)
Date: June 03, 2002 11:05PM
It is unfortunate that some handicappers don't understand sample sizes & misuse or misread statistics, but these are certainly not arguments in favor of not providing any statistics, any more than relating what "seemed" to happen to a single individual when he was hanging out with his pals at Suf. Depending on the individual race, training & breeding info may or may not trump the nos., & may or may not cause one to make or not make a bet, but it's an important part of the picture whether figure purists believe it or not. At this point, are there still people who don't think that Baffert's & Lukas' charges should be upgraded in TC events? And your last post acknowledges, appropriately, that one of the factors which should be considered in the 3d leg is the horses' breeding. On Sat,TG users will have access to such info, including the best dam side breeding info available, while all you'll have is the names. Lastly & perhaps most importantly, TG users can look at the race summaries & have a reasonable idea how the nos. were earned. Using the Mass Cap as an example, the reason Macho was an on-top only key wasn't entirely because he had better nos., 3 of which were earned in races where he went wide & lost. Given his post position & the pace scenario, Macho figured to save more ground than usual, so his better nos. resulted in a trip to the winners' circle. Tell me how you could possibly know that from the nos. alone, which is one of the reasons I made the switch 2 yrs. ago. A lot of Raggies don't seem to understand that the mutuel clerks pay those with tickets on the winning horse, not those with tickets on the horse which ran the best no.