Better than Big Red
At least, on the Sheets, reports John Scheinman:
When Ragozin’s company calculated the performance by Big Brown on May 3 in the Kentucky Derby, it made a startling discovery: the 3-year-old colt had recorded a -3/4 , the lowest number in the modern history of the race.
“This is by a quarter of a point better than any other,” said Len Friedman, 66, a hardcore Sheets player from Brooklyn and head handicapper at Ragozin’s company. “Secretariat ran a 1/2 .”
I would like to believe that Big Brown is a once-in-a-lifetime horse and cheer him on to a Triple Crown, but what holds me back isn’t just a snobbish distaste for his connections, it’s the unresolvable question both Patrick, in his post “Big Brown Bonds,” and Jeremy Plonk, in his column “Derby Drugs,” have written about recently — how much of the immense talent displayed so far by Big Brown is natural and how much is assisted? The horse is blameless, but there’s an asterisk next to his name regardless.
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