Big points theory: Kentucky Derby 2024 clinch scenarios

Conventional wisdom and recent history say 50 qualifying points are annually enough for a horse to clinch a berth in the Kentucky Derby.

Mathematically that is not true. Not this year. Not yet.

Realistically the cutoff has been anywhere from 40 points most years to merely breathing for the undersubscribed COVID renewal in 2020.

Current road to the Kentucky Derby leaderboard.

It has become part of the mid-March ritual since points from preps became the qualifying prism 11 years ago, replacing a system of graded-stakes earnings that threatened to exaggerate the power of the richest racing jurisdictions.

Sure, it is way too soon to think about who needs to do what in order to clinch a place in the big starting gate May 4 at Churchill Downs. It also feels too late on the calendar to have a weekend without Derby points preps.

This is a conundrum that deserves an idea.

With enough mathematical formulae to get Sheldon Cooper and Leonard Hofstadter excited, an invitation for readers to make like Barry Kripke and use the comments below to call out mistakes and an apology to “The Big Bang Theory” creator Chuck Lorre, cue the atomic animation.

The mathematical isolation paradigm.

Timberlake, who won the Grade 2 Rebel to top up his triumph in the Champagne (G1) and his fourth-place finish in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile, has 66 points, more than enough to be assured of a Derby invitation. As Tony Kornheiser says, that’s it. That’s the list.

With 60 points apiece, Dornoch and Domestic Product are like the baseball division leaders who have big leads but still have a magic number of one.

Sierra Leone and Track Phantom, who have 55 points each, and Deterministic, who has 50, are not in yet. It is only a matter of time, though, before they will be.

With the major preps starting next week, there are eight 100-point rewards for victories still out there and eight 50s for finishing second.

For the sake of this mathematical exercise, give the 100s to horses who have yet to earn any points. Think of Kingsbarns, last year’s Louisiana Derby (G2) winner, but multiply him by eight. Then take all the 50s and give them to horses just outside the top 18. Unlikely, right? But until it does not happen, the possibility must be respected arithmetically.

Put these 16 horses together with Timberlake, Dornoch and Domestic Product, and that makes 19 horses with at least 60 points.

If there are 20 places in the gate, then what is the problem?

The répondez s’il vous plaît paradox.

Remember, Japan and Europe have a maximum of one invitation each for the Derby. It is possible but not certain each will be accepted this year. Again, this is not about likelihood or lack of it. It is about waiting for the yeses and nos.

Japan-based Forever Young, whose win in the Saudi Derby (G3) did not carry any points, would get a normal invitation if he wins March 30 in the UAE Derby (G2), which, go figure, is part of the U.S. road to Kentucky. Even if he does not get in that way, the Japan invitation could fall to Forever Young thanks to his victory as a 2-year-old in the Nisai Yushun. That depends on what happens next weekend at Nakayama in the Fukuryu Stakes, the last and most valuable race on the separate Japan trail.

After fizzling as the favorite March 1 in the Patton in Ireland, Navy Seal was redirected by Coolmore off the Europe trail. He, too, will race in the UAE Derby, leaving the April 6 Cardinal Stakes at Chelmsford City to determine who could get the Europe invitation. That path has not produced a Derby starter in its six years. Gronkowski would have been entered in 2018 had he not been diagnosed with an infection before shipping to America.

If connections for one or two overseas horses take Churchill Downs up on its offer, then there could be 19 or even 18 spots left for qualifiers on the U.S. road to the Derby. If not, then Dornoch and Domestic Product clinch.

The cutline reduction corollary.

As the number of remaining preps dwindles, the magic number will continue to come down. But how far and how fast?

Trying to predict that number was complicated this season when Churchill Downs tinkered with the points system. Most notably it raised the value of second-place finishes by 25 percent. The major preps that had been worth 100-40-30-20-10 last year to the top five are worth 100-50-25-15-10 this year. Yes, third place was reduced by 17 percent and fourth by 25 percent.

Runner-up finishers in the springtime preps who might have had only 40 points a year ago will have 50 now. That could mean a logjam on that total if a bunch of new qualifiers end up getting place money. It is part of the reason Deterministic has not clinched yet.

In the unlikely event there were 16 winners and runners-up collecting their first Derby points in the big preps, that would mean no fewer than 22 horses would have at least 50 points. The cutline then would be determined by the first tiebreaker, namely earnings in non-restricted graded stakes.

However, if four horses currently in the top 18 finish first or second in a major prep in the next month, then all the 50-pluses will have mathematically clinched.

Here is a side note. If the 2024 points system had been in place last year, Major Dude probably would have been entered for the Derby. His second-place finish in the Jeff Ruby Steaks (G3) would have made him 17th in qualifying rather than 24th. Not wanting to wait for the inevitable dropouts, trainer Todd Pletcher diverted Major Dude into the American Turf (G2), where he finished third.

The Baffert evaporation polarization.

Horses trained by Bob Baffert, who is still under indefinite suspension by Churchill Downs Inc., have eaten up 150 points this prep season. They are bound to devour more.

Every time a Baffert horse finishes in the top five of a Derby prep, the points are vacated and the cutline is lowered. Baffert almost certainly will have at least one or two entrants in the Santa Anita Derby (G1) on April 6. Baffert has won that race nine times. It would be 10 if Taiba had not been on loan to Tim Yakteen to make the colt eligible for the 2022 Derby.

Baffert also has been a frequent visitor to the Arkansas Derby (G1), which he has won four times since 2012. Reincarnate moved from Baffert to Yakteen for a third-place result last year.

The Florida Derby (G1), which literally was a longtime non-starter for Baffert, has turned into a waystation for him lately. Spielberg finished eighth in 2021, and Fort Bragg was fifth last year in Yakteen’s name. Both horses wore the colors of the SF Racing partnership.

Baffert has two wins in the Wood Memorial (G2), but he has not run a horse there since 2018. He has one victory in the Blue Grass (G1) but has had no presence there since 2012.

It is reasonable to think Baffert could finish in the top two in the Santa Anita Derby with the likes of Imagination and Wine Me Up, his exacta finishers in the San Felipe (G2). Another one of his horses, say, Muth, might show up for, say, the Arkansas Derby. Is it far-fetched to think Baffert in the next month could swallow three top-two finishes that would have come with golden tickets to Louisville?

By the way, if the Baffert horses had been eligible for the Derby, Imagination would be sixth in the standings now with 50 points, Wine Me Up ninth with 42, Muth 13th with 25 and Nysos 19th with 20.

The attrition contraction.

The moment the Lexington Stakes (G3) is run for its 20-10-6-4-2 points April 13, the Kentucky Derby field will be set. In pencil.

As Horse Racing Nation’s Ed DeRosa said, “It’s like overbooking a flight.” Horses just below the cutline may not have mathematical assurance, but they have a lot of history on their side.

Jace’s Road in 21st, Cyclone Mischief in 23rd, Mandarin Hero in 25th and King Russell in 26th were on the outside looking in last year, but the dropouts of Blazing Sevens, Practical Move, Lord Miles and Continuar drew them into the field.

Not counting the September 2020 Derby, there have been at least one and as many as four defections from the 20-horse field that was showing right after the final prep race each year in the points era. The exits may happen at the 11th hour, but that was just fine for Rich Strike, who was 24th in 2022 before he wrote his 80-1 fairytale.

The moral to this story is that the math is a perfectly good tool for seeing who is definitely in the race. It is not an indication of who is definitely out.

The vanity card.

All this gesticulating with the math and scenarios and magic numbers and ifs and if nots aside, what happens if a horse runs twice more? Kenny McPeek did that last year with Sun Thunder. The Risen Star runner-up finished fifth in the Louisiana Derby and earned 10 points to bring his total to 34. Even with dropouts, that was not enough. Sun Thunder was run back two weeks later by McPeek in the Blue Grass, and he came in fourth. Those 20 points got him into the Kentucky Derby, where he finished 11th. OK, so he did not race again for eight months, but at age 4, he still is going, hitting the board three times this year in Oaklawn allowances. To take this “Big Bang Theory” acclamation one final step, just imagine one of the nerdy physicists realizing McPeek could do this again this spring with Shimmering Allure or Sistina Chapel or Thorpedo Anna, not once but twice. Then there will be a run across the hall. Knock, knock, knock. “Kenny.” Knock, knock, knock. “Kenny.” Knock, knock, knock. “Kenny.”