Shutty: We didn't see the best in the Hopeful, Del Mar Futurity
Mike Shutty authors Horse Racing Nation's Super Screener handicapping system, a systematic, data-driven set of selections available each weekend on the country's biggest stakes races.
While Saratoga and Del Mar concluded their respective meets Monday with Grade 1 stakes for 2-year-olds, the Hopeful and Del Mar Futurity have proven to be a mixed bag as far as impact eight months later on the Kentucky Derby
Can you name the last horse that won the Hopeful and then went on to take down the Kentucky Derby? Well, it has been 43 years since Affirmed won the 1976 Hopeful and then not only won the 1977 Kentucky Derby but also captured the Triple Crown.
What about a Hopeful winner conquering one of the other Triple Crown races? Over the past 20 years, the only winner of the Hopeful that went on to win a Triple Crown race was Afleet Alex, who won both the Preakness and Belmont Stakes in 2005 (and suffered a terrible trip in the Kentucky Derby).
As we can safely conclude, the Hopeful Stakes has been quite unproductive as of late. Basin, a son of first crop sire Liam’s Map, will try to reverse the trend after running a solid race on the sloppy Saratoga surface. It was for sure a far better performance than put forth by the Del Mar Futurity winner later that day.
This colt is certainly worth watching. He is laying out energy the right way and will be a factor when it comes to the Breeders' Cup Juvenile. But as far as Basin being a threat to the Hopeful-Derby drought, remember that what might be the best 2-year-old stabled at Saratoga this summer, Green Light Go, scratched Monday due to sloppy conditions. A mistake? Probably not, but we’ll need to wait another month to see if Green Light Go moves forward off two impressive career starts.
Heading over to the other coast, the Del Mar Futurity has fared quite differently when it comes to producing Derby winners. Nyquist and Triple Crown winner American Pharoah did the double recently in consecutive seasons. Prior to that, you had horses like Silver Charm and Gato Del Sol achieve it. In addition, the Del Mar Futurity has accounted for numerous other Kentucky Derby Starters over the years.
But let's face it: As was the case with the Hopeful, we didn’t get to see what may have been the most gifted 2 year-old on the Del Mar grounds run in the Futurity. Well, sort of. Bob Baffert-trained Eight Rings was in the field and away running before taking a sharp left turn — which seems to happen too often at Del Mar due to the gap that can spook horses when going the seven-furlong distance — and collided with Storm the Court. Both horses lost their riders as well as any chance of winning.
Not taking away anything from the race winner, Nucky, but even his own connections don’t think of this as a Derby horse. He ran super fast early on a glib Del Mar surface, pressing the pace and breaking away as the clear winner. But with Eight Rings and Storm the Court out of the race, Nucky beat nothing, and he ran a slow final furlong.
Two days prior, Baffert’s top 2-year-old filly, Bast, won the Del Mar Debutante (G1) going away and did so running two full seconds faster than what Nucky posted going the same seven panels. In that Del Mar Debutante, by the way, the Super Screener picked the trifecta cold and the top longshot pick, Lazy Daisy, finished fourth at 41-1. The vulnerable favorite to fade, Leucothea, finished last at odds of 4-1.
It comes as no surprise, then, that as far as Derby horses go, clearly the best is yet to come.
Handicapping-wise, with the close of the Del Mar and Saratoga meets, the spotlight turns squarely on the horseplayer-friendly Kentucky Downs meet featuring gigantic fields loaded with high-value potential. You can count on the Super Screener to have it all covered for you this weekend.