My two cents contribution to this thread is that over the years, generally, the sheets lines
of Tim Ritchey's horses have had a tendency to zig-zag up and back. Bounce up, bounce down.
A goodie is followed by a lesser effort, which is then followed by a relative goodie again. Etc.
For example, take AFLEET ALEX's last few: An off-the-layoff orgasm [-0] is followed by a big
bounce disaster [11], which [obviously, after being injected] was followed by the terrific
Arkansas Derby smasher [-2], which was followed by the lesser Kentucky Derby run [2.5] ,
which was followed by the terrific Preakness top. Zig up, then zig down. Bounce up, then
bounce down. Last year, I asked Jerry for the sheets of most of Tim Ritchey's horses - like
50 of them? - for the purpose of getting a line on how they react in certain situations - second
-timers, layoffs, etc. - apart from just the stats. And, I think, the sheets of his horses bear this out.
Even MARCIANO, Ritchey's Preakness entry in 2001 has this zig-zaggy pattern to a great extent.

Big deal? All horses bounce, right? "You've just described The Bounce Theory 101.
What's profound about that?" Well, maybe nothing. But maybe the point is - duhh - that
each trainer's horses "react" to tops in a unique way that's tied to the way they train
their horses, and how their horses are vetted. For example, maybe Ritchey's horses
react in a certain way. But other trainer's horses react differently. For example,
see the NO-BOUNCE "steroid line" repeat of Rick Dutrow's WILLY OF THE VALLEY,
who won the sprint stake earlier last Saturday. To get a line on how each trainers
horses react, maybe you have to look at a large sampling of his work.

Anyway... AFLEET ALEX's zig-zaggy line is now obvious, and the key question of the
Belmont Satkes in two weeks is exactly how much he'll bounce up. Can he bounce
as high as a 0.5 and still win? Will he bounce higher? Your move.

JohnTChance