The Matt Bernier Show | Ep. 104 | February 22, 2022

before we get going with this week's show a word from our friends at santa anita park and the santa anita park pick'em contest play for 500 each saturday sunday and holiday monday through april the 17th it's a free contest that combines popular sports and racing props for a fun competitive and free contest sign up for free at santa anita dot com slash pick em that's santa anita dot com slash pick em now on to episode 104 of the pod [Music] what's happening welcome to the map burning your show part of the in the money media network my name is matt bernier you can follow me on twitter at bernie your underscore matt today is tuesday february the 22nd 2022 this is episode 104 of the pod however you listen thank you for doing so you can find it apple podcast spotify soundcloud in the moneypodcast.com you can also watch and listen over on youtube search bar map burning your show you will get this episode along with the 103 prior few things hopefully this comes up in video but your guess is really as good as mine i'm going to send the files over to producer craig let him work his magic if the video works great if not and you're someone who typically is over on youtube you're probably just going to slate the title card along with the rest of the pod but i think we should be in decent enough shape um this is midday local time in the capital kingdom of saudi arabia riyadh i'm here for the saudi cup i am trying to acclimate as far as the time difference and things are concerned the longest flight i had ever been on prior to this trip out here i'm trying to think i it definitely wasn't my trip to scotland my wife and i went to scotland but then a few years prior we went to barcelona and germany and i think the flight to barcelona was like seven hours roughly i could be wrong out of boston this one coming out here to the middle east i went from boston to new york and then new york direct out here and that was 11 and a half and i know many of you travel for work and some folks travel all over the world there i can't stress and granted i had a good setup on the plane but boy you know a cross-country flight in the united states from one side to the other you're looking at roughly six but doubling it up is no joke it's a long long trip and then when you add in the difference in time i am eight hours ahead of east coast time on you know the east coast the united states um i needless to say my sleep is a little bit out of whack um i've gone through a couple cups of coffee here on tuesday just trying to shake the cobwebs out but truth be told i'm hopeful wednesday is going to be the day that i kind of get set here with the local time and things are moving all right i apologize for bouncing the screen all over the place as well and if it sounds like i'm whispering it's just i got neighbors next door and i don't want to disrupt anyone so i'm here in saudi arabia getting ready for the saudi cup coming up on saturday afternoon or saturday evening i should say local time as far as east coast and west coast in the united states you know roughly an eight hour difference from the east coast the big race i believe goes off local time around 8 30 20 to 9 which would put you about 12 40 12 45 somewhere thereabouts on the east coast on saturday i'll dive into the race a little bit later on do an early preview just in the thought that the field hasn't been drawn yet we don't know who officially is going to go we don't know where they're going to be breaking from but just sort of a view from 30 000 feet of not just the main players but some of the horses that look like they're a little bit over matched as well also get into the two big preps that happened at the fairgrounds this past weekend one for the derby one for the oaks with epicenter winning the risen star and turner loose winning the rachel alexandra get into more or less everything that happened in those two races along with conversation about speed figures because i thought that was a fascinating sort of development about certain numbers don't match up and don't jive with others and things like that so i'll just give you my two cents on that but let's start with the news i woke up about 2 30 this morning local time i fell asleep at 8 o'clock last night text my wife at 2 30 waking up to real life things happen happening you know don't get me wrong really important things in the world but also to the news that medina spirit has officially been disqualified as far as the kentucky derby is concerned and mandalone is now the winner of the 2021 run for the roses he will run on saturday evening here in riyadh in the saudi cup he will be among the favorites um again no wagering here in in the kingdom but many other areas around the world have wagering afforded to them and that's one of those things where he'll be one of the short prices if not the outright favor you know i assume it'll be either here mishra and again i'll dive into that a little bit later on but i i i don't know really what else there is to say other than it needed to be acknowledged that the official ruling has come down bafford has a 90-day suspension beginning i believe the first week in march it will go right through and up to the belmont i believe it'll end just short of the belmont stakes or somewhere there abouts the beginning of june but point being we already knew the derby was out because of the whole churchill situation but now his horses are ineligible or he is ineligible for the preakness so the only thing i'm going to talk about we've talked about the derby itself and all the you know circumstances surrounding an ad nauseam there's nothing else to add to that other than finally we got some kind of clarity on what the call is going to be and by the way i say that i'm sure there's going to be appeals that go on for weeks and possibly months and years more importantly you're kind of at a crossroads now if you are an owner with a horse in bafford's barn because now assuming everything stays as is not only can your horse not earn points to the derby and run in the derby they're going to be ineligible for the preakness so i have a feeling we're going to start to see something change here i don't want to say sooner than later but it wouldn't stun me especially knowing that you've got the rebel coming up down at oakland park this coming saturday and newgrange looks like a prohibited favorite in that spot and he still doesn't have any points because he's in bafford's barn i'll be very curious to see if there's a move made i don't think it'll happen before the race on saturday but it's a 50-point derby prep if you want to run in a race like the derby you kind of unless you're gonna wait till the very end and then make the move but boy i i would hate to be in a position where it's run first or second or you got nothing in a race like this coming up on saturday in the rebel newgrange is going to be odds on and why would i pass up an opportunity to basically lock myself in the gate with a win because the horse is running under the name of a trainer who who is ineligible for the race so um it had to be at least acknowledged that finally we have a ruling from kentucky racing commission uh but in the big picture i mean there's really not much else to say other than the fact that this is all stuff that we already knew and the most fascinating thing at this point assuming you know again the appeals are gonna go on forever and a day i'm sure uh mandalone is now a dual grade one winner without ever having crossed the wire first in a grade one i if you can think of another horse that that scenario has presented itself for let me know beneath the video player on youtube or on twitter at bernie or underscore matt because it's slipping my mind i can't think of another horse who their grade one glory both instances has come via disqualification they've yet to cross the wire first in a grade one very very interesting circumstances and we'll find out how he handles a field like this on saturday night here uh in in saudi arabia but you know it it's it's nice to finally see what we all knew was going to happen it was a matter of time before medina's spirit was dq'd and then again i've gone on record saying i don't think it made a difference i think medina spirit was the best horse on that day but i'm not going to go back into all that sort of stuff it is what it is this is what we're dealing with the bigger picture piece is what do the owners who have baffert as their trainer choose to do now because now it sounds like not only is the derby out but the preakness is also out you really going to sit out the first two legs of the triple crown if you've got a horse that you think is potentially a contender in one or both like i said last week you know you've only got so many chances or so many opportunities to run in races of this stature gotta gotta at least think about it don't you let me know your thoughts beneath the video player on youtube or on twitter at bernie or underscore matt now let's talk about a derby prep that happened last saturday at the fairgrounds the risen star the first mile and an eighth prep here other than the the el camino so respect what respects do but the first one on dirt anyway epicenter goes out there and struts his stuff what does it mean what about the fig who do you like coming out of the race what about some of the rides let's talk about it a little bit all right let's talk about the risen star from the fairgrounds epicenter wins goes gate to wire sets i think very tepid fractions for a horse of his caliber goes off and wins by almost three lengths earns a big gaudy buyer's speed figure of 98. smile happy runs second with a 94 zanden third with a 93 pioneer of medina fourth with a 93. there were many people that brought up the figs and wondered how epicenter could earn one so much faster than cyberknife who ran very quick earlier in the card especially when you compare it to the older horses who ran in the mine shaft in their final time so many different ways to go through first things first let's talk about the race itself i'm going to try to be quick with these next few segments just because there's a bunch of other stuff going on but epicenter i think didn't get the respect he deserved going into this race on the heels of a loss where he was clearly the best horse if the fear was what did he run against i i can't dispute that but for him to just kind of i mean he did take quite a bit of late money he only paid nine dollars to win but for a long time he was floating up into the five six to one range compared to everyone else who was either making their first start of the season or was going to be at a tactical disadvantage epicenter made a lot of sense when you give him a a horse of that caliber when you give him that kind of lead it's gonna be very difficult to run down no matter who it is now having said that i thought smile happy got a peculiar ride for being as far back as he was um carrying some ground didn't really bother me and then again when you saw rounding the far turn and he's in and amongst horses lannery's got to wait to find a seam before he can cut him loose and he finishes really really well i had brought up on the late show last week the idea of if you think you're on the best horse just park them out in the clear i get it you're going to carry extra ground but don't get them stopped you don't have to wait or do any of that kind of stuff it didn't work for smile happy the trip i thought he ran really well if anything i actually like him more now coming out of this race than i did prior and i thought he was arguably the best three-year-old that there was as far as the males were concerned zanden effectively followed smile happy throughout and i thought he was the one who his trip as far as the the cleanliness of it was what i would have hoped for smile happy and because of the the difference in the two trips that almost made the difference between zandin finishing ahead of smile happy seeing that race and the way that it was run in my opinion despite the fact that zandin came from behind smile happy after breaking slowly i i believe smile happy is just a better horse now they're both lightly raced they can both continue to improve but i'm having i don't want to say a difficult time envisioning a scenario but for the most part i think smile happy is the best three-year-old period i love epicenter i think zanden's good pioneer medina i'm still not totally sold the reason i like smile happy is just for him to be able to overcome this sort of uh let's say an indecisive ride in his first start as a three-year-old with that long stretch at the fairgrounds and be able to finish the way that he did i think you got a lot to work with going forward i think he'll move forward i would hope he's going to be a little closer to the pace than he was and that would be my only concern about the second and third place finishers in this race granted zandin broke poorly but point being they were coming from a rather lengthy distance behind i would say a moderate pace now maybe the derby itself would have a moderate pace but i i think they're gonna have to be a little bit more handy than what we saw in that race on saturday and for a starting off a means to an end i think it's a good starting off point uh but i would like to see them both a little bit more forwardly placed in their neck starts wherever that may be epicenter the 98 buyer it's an interesting number because i figured i basically looked at his last two races and said he more or less paired up figs 87 and 88 buyers timeform us had them both the same i thought he would move forward but and 10 points isn't out of the realm of possibility but the bigger picture is i look at this and go how likely is it that the top five horses in the race ran far and away the best races of their lives with the trip that smile happy pulled with zanden rallying into rather tepid fractions pioneer of medina taking on winners for the first time i believe second time first time great at stake how likely is it that all five of them ran the best race of their life and i would say at least one of them if not two including epicenter clearly far and away the best race of their life you go through and look at some of the figs me personally when you compare the buyer number to the timeform us number and i'm not just saying i i am inclined to buy into the timeform us number a little bit more i think the buyer's probably four to five points high that would bring epicenter down to a 94 which would certain let's say it's four points which would certainly fit in with him improving he had everything worked to his advantage in the risen star and he's still it's still only february very respectable numbers smile happy take four away he basically ran back to his kentucky jockey club last year with a less than stellar ride totally plausible runs a 90. zanden runs an 89 bad start rallies from dead last doesn't have a ton of pace to run at totally plausible runs back to basically 89 90 what he ran last year in the remnant pioneer of medina had never run faster than an 80 before in his career if you take 4 off the 93 that he earns gets you to an 89 i think within the realm of possibility as far as a forward move in tawnyport goes from a 62 to a 71 to an 86 again not impossible but a 62 to a 71 to an 82 or an 81 that to me seems much more reasonable so i'm approaching this race as if it's a little bit on the quick side as far as the number is concerned i take four maybe five points off but that doesn't mean that i don't believe in the race i had said it was the most important prep coming into saturday coming out of it i'm going to make a statement here and it's not a groundbreaking statement but as far as you know raiding the preps is concerned uh the top three in this race i have little doubt are going to be key players assuming they stay healthy in the kentucky derby and for that reason i'm giving this prep race a 10. i think this at a mile and an eighth with a long stretch and the the combination of the top three two of them making their first start off the bench maybe being pace compromised epicenter taking that step forward and look he is a speed type but i don't think he's in need the lead type there's a difference between the two i think the top three are all arguably in the top i don't know six to seven of their generation right now i think this is going to be a very very critical prep race when all is said and done epicenter gets the job done gets back on the beam again following a race where he ran too well to lose in that lecompte a little bit of redemption for him he gets the job done 98 buyer i think it's probably closer to a 93 or a 94. smile happy i thought he ran really well i think he's going to improve next out i'd like him to be a little bit closer to the pace and zanden only making his third lifetime start traveling down to new orleans rallying from last after a poor start i think he can certainly improve and as far as the rest of the field is concerned pioneer medina i'm not saying he can't run well i just wanted to show me a little bit more and the last horse i'll mention other than papa cap who just the two-year-old form it's just not stacking up compared to this year and the breeders kept juvenile continues to look like a dumpster fire but that's neither here nor there the only other cautionary tale i throw out there is slow down andy slow down andy i had mentioned it the possibility of we're going to glean some things not just from the horses in this race but the sort of interconnectedness of all these horses with other horses across the united states slow down andy was the horse that defeated messier i think many people in the low south futurity i think many people then saw messier come and run a hole in the wind and said well boy slow down andy's going to be you know an absolute monster i said the only thing that i want to stress about that messier run and some people just said a bias or no bias he was going to run run like that i'm not saying he's not a good horse but messier when he won the bob lewis had an absolutely perfect race track for him to run over it was a conveyor belt and usually you're going to get these exaggerated finishes which yield exaggerated times so that big gaudy buyer that messier earned in that race i i i had mentioned you know look at it with some caution i would say even more so now when we see slow down andy who in my opinion i know it was only his first start off the bench i just don't think he's really of the caliber of those top three at least not right now this juncture let me know your thoughts about the risen star in epicenter who has locked himself into the starting gate the first saturday in may with a victory he earns 50 points toward the derby but i think the top three are all legitimate legitimate kentucky derby kind of horses and triple crown horses this race gets a 10 for me on the derby prep scale the rachel alexandra it's much more fun to talk about the figs than the race itself turner loose who i was torn between this philly and divine huntress as far as the picks on the late pod i ended up going with divine huntress who you know obviously we see how the the finish ended and turner loose ends up winning earns an 81 buyer at odds of 17-1 for flo and brad cox now the big disappointment in here was hidden connection first things first lecrae unfortunately injured down the backside uh condylar fracture had surgery i believe i saw stone street tweeting it uh yesterday sounds like she should be okay which is a good thing when you take a look at this race there are figs that would suggest it's closer to a 75 compared to the 81 that turner loose earned um especially though when you compare it to the other mile and 16th races run on the day so let's let's look at a couple different things turn or loose i like that she showed a new dimension she didn't go right to the front she ended up sitting just off came with a run it may not have been visually the most impressive thing but i thought it was a solid effort and just solid at that same with goddess of fire didn't love her coming into it but i thought it was a solid effort the disappointments in the race were awake at midnight and hidden connection i'm not terribly surprised by the disappointment from awake at midnight because going into the race i maintained i thought she was a one turn horse and i still believe that i want them to turn her back i think she's a seven eights one turn miler i don't really think she's a router i understand they'll probably continue to try it for you know just given the time of year but i think her future is one turn hidden connection i thought was terrible and the only thing that i cautioned last week on the late show was she had the candy of candy trips in the pocahontas earned that 87. yeah she bowled out of the gate in the breeders cup but i didn't think she did any running after that and then in this spot here i thought she had a really really candy trip and she just didn't kick on and you have to wonder she earned a fast fig beating maidens at colonial she earned a fast fig for two-year-olds with an ideal trip at churchill and then she's thrown in a couple of clunkers do with what you will i mean the 75 buyer in theory that's kind of the highest it could be if it could actually be closer to a 70. if that's the case i just you know i it's too early to just say you know none of these horses will amount to anything but i think you got to start to wonder where this entire group stacks up um you know the la cret injury is obviously disappointing dreamlith there wasn't a ton of pace but she just didn't really pick her feet up none of these girls really were all that impressive and when you compare them to the other three-year-old phillies who have run much faster and have looked much better doing so it's hard to get super excited about anybody in this race from a fig standpoint now let's get into the weeds a little bit and really it has more to do with the other races than necessarily this one but part of the reason that you can sort of project that this buyer might be a little bit on the high side these girls stop the clock in 44 and 1 going a mile on the 16th in the mine shaft they stop the clock in 42 flat these are older horses seasoned veterans quality horses olympiad wins that race here is a 102 buyer and then in the eighth race of the day cyberknife stops the clock in 42 and 2. cyberknife earns an 87 stopping the clock in 42-2 you have turner loose earning an 81 stopping the clock in 44 and one so roughly an eight length difference and only a six point difference on the buyer scale the other thing that's not worthy about this as far as the buyer team is concerned the variant maintained for the route race is on dirt so it's not as though the track got quicker or slower according to the variant which then makes you wonder well how could one have run so much faster than the other and have the figs be so comparable or relatively close the key is the mine shaft the 42 flat final time where olympiad earns a 102 when compared to cyberknife who only runs two-fifths slower and earns a buyer 15 points less that seems a little tough for me but i think it has more to do to me in my opinion anyway it's just my opinion i actually think the cyberknife number is the accurate one and that's the one i'm going to base most much of this off of my sort of projections going forward cyberknife earned an 87 stop and clock in 42 and 2. what does that mean if you want to use roughly 1.7 points per length for a mile and 16th kind of race that effectively means there's a two length difference more or less between this race and the older horses i think the older horses are closer to let's say a mid 90 as opposed to the 102 that they earned and the girls are closer to a 75 or a 74 than they are to the 81 that turner loose earned so basically my hypothesis my theory is that the cyberknife number is accurate the other two are both too high and i get it a lot of people will say well if it's just by the letter of the law the letter of the law there there is an element of subjectivity there always will be if it was just purely the numbers the number you know i look i i appreciate that idea as well but having looked at this stuff long enough you understand that there has to be an element of subjectivity to it and saying well does it seem likely that everybody did this i look at these this three-year-old group the the optional claimers that cyberknife defeated the 87 kapuna earns an 82 strava back-to-back 78s gunfighter 79 last out 77 here yono 64 last time out 65 here i think all the numbers check out the girls they're all i don't say all high but oh no excuse me they're most of them are on the lower side but turner loose improved goddess of fire improved you know i think i think they're a little bit on the high side i think they should come down and then as far as the older horses are concerned olympiad yeah it's possible that he ran that number and some of these other ones it's not impossible to say that all these numbers jive i'm telling you what i believe that i think olympiad's probably closer to a 98 instead of that 102 i think silver prospect probably closer to a uh let's say 94 instead of a 98 miles d closer to 93 than the 97 that he earned again just the way i'm approaching the race you do with it what you will and let me know what your thoughts are about this and specifically the rachel alexandra as far as an oaks prep i'm giving it a 4. i have a very hard time looking at that race saying any of those girls are going to be competitive with some of the better phillies that we've seen across the country but again i'm curious your thoughts beneath the video player on youtube or on twitter at bernier underscore matt let's wrap up this week's show with a quick look ahead to saturday night's race the saudi cup 20 million dollars i think it's a fantastic field and again this is kind of a you know an overview look knowing that the draw is coming up i'm recording this on tuesday it'll come up tomorrow we'll see maybe there are some horses that don't end up going or do whatever the case may be i'm basing this off of many of the names that we have seen and heard are expected to go you know as far as the americans are concerned to me it's very clearly mandalone and then everybody else i don't mean that as a you know a knock against midnight bourbon but those two have gone head to head a few different times and more often than not mandalon comes out on top art collector is interesting in the fact that he's proven himself going a one-turn mile and an eighth he did it at belmont park in the woodward you know i don't think it's impossible for him to get involved in this thing here on saturday night i just i think against the best of the best he may come up a little bit wanting but that's purely you know my feeling at this point maybe some things will change over the next few days country grammar is a wild card in here for baffert because i like that horse last year in both of his big races um he's proven that he'll run well off a layoff it's just this is a really lengthy layoff against a really solid group of horses and tactically where is he going to be positioned because he was close in those races out in southern california but when you've got midnight bourbon in here and you've got other horses like secret ambition who figures to be forwardly placed you've got art collector you know i'm just i'm very curious to see where how close to the front is he going to be because i i don't view him as a burner but he's uh he's certainly not going to be coming from 15 out of it mandalon and mishrif i think have very similar running styles mischief won this race last year i think you have to look at him as arguably the horse to beat in here i know in many of the overseas markets he is the favorite slight favorite over mandalone [Music] you you you would think a repeat of last year's race puts him close i think this is a better race top to bottom but a replica of last year's race at least gives him a puncher's chance against the mandalon now mandalune's numbers from a buyer's standpoint you're looking at mid to high 100 at this point in his career based on his louisiana will he do that or be capable of producing that race at a mile and an eighth going one turn that's an unknown for me so purely and again the weight wagering is is illegal over here in in saudi so i i'm gonna be on the broadcast i'll be alluding to ideas and thoughts about how the race will be how it'll play out and sort of a pecking order but i won't be alluding to odds or anything like that my fear is that mandalone if you're purely from a betting standpoint my fear is that he's an underlay in this race whatever his odds end up being when all is said and done i'll be very curious to see where he's positioned beneath beneath florent giroux and also some of the things that i've noticed watching tape from king king abdulaziz here wide sweeping moves do very well and it that's what i keep coming back to t.o keynes teo keynes won the champions cup at the very end of last year in japan he blew the doors off a very good field the form of that field has come back and basically flattered his performance someone i respect and know that makes figs for japanese racing i won't name him but many of you know him very well he's been on this show before he said the number was roughly a 104 if you were translating it to a buyer for t.o keynes that puts him right there maybe a hair slow but who's to say he doesn't take a step forward here i i think t.o keynes is very sneaky in here i really do and he has a running style where he's not going to be among the leaders early on so let's say midnight bourbon goes let's say secret ambition goes let's say you know country grammar is their art collector is there they're all aggressive from there i can see mishrif and mandolin taking up the stalking trip and then just in behind them you've got t.o keynes who could be making that four or five wide sweeping move around in the far turn now again against runners of this caliber can you make that kind of wide sweeping move we'll find out but it wouldn't surprise me at all if the main charge from japan and i don't mean this is a knock against march lorraine who won the breeders cup dis staff but i thought everything worked ideally for her in that spot i think this is just a much much better group of horses than she ran against in the dis staff at del mar i i think t.o.k is very live in this race still have some things still have some people to chat with and you know firm up some some opinions but t.o kane's i think there's a lot to like about this horse in this race on saturday evening seal away i haven't mentioned him you have to wonder at least i am wondering anyway did was it more a matter of him handling the going in the champions stakes than mishra or adayar who they just didn't get over the the bog and he did it's kind of where i'm leaning right now i could be wrong if i am wrong and he just improved and put it all together he's got a chance if he handles the main track i i think that last run in october may have been more circumstantial than anything it's a hypothesis again still have some folks to chat with but in the big picture i think this is a great race i think it'll be a lot of fun and again this is a sort of an overview uh we'll be we'll be going through the race considerably more in depth uh night of the event which all of you can watch back home in the states or anywhere that you listen to this pod wherever you're listening you're going to be able to find the world feed somewhere so looking forward to it and uh let me know your thoughts about the race the 20 million dollar saudi cup mishrif tries to repeat mandalore probably the most likely winner from the united states but it's a truly an international affair you've got horses from all around the world and it should be a really really really intriguing race on saturday evening here that's going to do it for me however you listen to this thing thank you for doing so you can find the pod apple podcast spotify soundcloudthemoneypodcast.com you can also watch on youtube search bar matt bernier show you get this episode along with the 103 prior however you listen please rate review subscribe bell icon if you're over on tw on twitter on uh youtube needs to be lit up so you get notified whenever new content is uploaded to the in the money media channel um and that's gonna do it i'm going to be leaving here on sunday morning early i will not record on monday i'm going to probably need a day to shake the cobwebs out when i get back home but i'll record next tuesday we'll talk about saudi cup and some of the other races involved we'll also talk about some prep races coming up this weekend back home specifically the rebel down at oaklawn park best of luck this weekend however you play whatever you play wherever you play it's been episode 104 of the matt bernier show [Music]

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Length: 36min 6sec (2166 seconds)

Published: Tue Feb 22 2022