Re: Mendelssohn Beyer (1093 Views)
Posted by:
mjellish (IP Logged)
Date: April 06, 2018 10:36AM
IMO this is a game of percentages. The horse racing landscape is littered with examples like Mendelssohn where a horse runs off the screen and produces a huge fig relative to what they have historically run, arguably aided by the racing conditions. We generally only talk about them when they occur by big names in big races (see Frosted, Dreaming of Julia, Quality Road, et al). But this type of stuff happens in claiming races too. These horses [u]almost never[/u] reproduce that big fig in their next effort. They usually back up. And I would argue that on an absolute scale, huge negative numbers on huge jump ups are even less likely to repeat (yes that is an assertion but I am pretty sure I could support it with data).
So from a pure sheets point of view, regardless of how this colt looks, I would say you have to play Mendel to regress. Sight unseen, right here, right now I would put those percentages at about 90% or maybe even better. The question is [b]how much[/b] will he regress, where will that put him relative to the field he will face in the KY Derby (if he even makes it to the race), and what type of odds are you getting associated with that unknown risk. At 30-1 this would be a no brainer to still use the colt. But we aren't likely going to see that. So at what odds would you take him as a win candidate. 12-1? 8-1? 6-1? 4-1?
And if you like a different horse to win the Derby that is one of the favorites, would you use Mendel underneath, as a saver, or would you just let him beat you? What about if you like a bomber?
Those are all things to consider IMO. Some other things to consider are that he is impeccably bred, he is handled by an ace, he has already shipped over here and won, dirt may be his preferred surface, etc.
Probably too soon for most of this.