2008 Belmont Stakes Wagering - Belmont Stakes, And the Winner Is…

[Shame About Ray]

Okay, so I’ve gone over this race about a hundred times already and guess what? I didn’t pick Big Brown to win. There are a few reasons for that.

First, I’m not convinced about the hoof. Sure, I understand that Ian McKinlay, the super-doc who makes Gregory House look like an intern, says that Big Brown should have no issue with his hoof and that this is the same guy who got River Keen ready to win a graded race for Bob Baffert some years ago, but let’s be honest.

A cracked hoof, no matter what any super-vet says, is not that easy to fix. If it were, there would be a lot of horses still on the track these days. The bottom line is that nobody except Big Brown knows how big of an issue the hoof is. And since Big Brown doesn’t have the ability to speak, at least Richard Dutrow hasn’t said so yet, I have to take the hoof into account when handicapping this race.

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