Hersh: Belmont pick four play for Friday, June 9
Maybe you can find a solid single in the late pick four, races 8-11, on Friday at Belmont. I can’t. I almost got there with BY THE MOON (#9) in race 11, and she has wound up a lone A on this ticket, but she ran her very best last out, and it’s just reasonable not to expect her to run her very best two races in a row. She can win with something slightly less, but there are dangers.
:: See Marcus Hersh’s pick four play in DRF TicketMaker and bet it with DRF Bets
Here’s the whole sequence:
Race 8 – True North
Going with three A's – NO HOLDINBACKBEAR (#3), ROY H (#7) and favored WHITMORE (#8). Stallwalkin' Dude beat No Holdinbackbear last out, but Bear was too far back, probably needed the race, and as a 4-year-old surely has more upside than the Dude. Roy H’s really sharp last-out allowance win came in a race taken off the turf and will be generally dismissed as hollow. I think he might be for real – at least on the day – with exactly the same trip. Whitmore gets the right race flow again and might have struggled with the Pimlico track last time, when he won the Grade 3 Maryland Sprint on May 20. But given his price and the relatively short turnaround, I couldn’t hang everything on him.
Race 9 – New York
DACITA (#8) beat SEA CALISI (#6) in this race last year, but go watch the replay. I think Sea Calisi wins with a better trip, and that she just is the better mare, at least at 1 ¼ miles. She’s an A, as is SUFFUSED (#2), whose bad trip behind Sea Calisi last month in the Sheepshead Bay at Belmont has gotten plenty of attention, but who should still be a fair price. At one point she might have needed at least 1 3/8 miles to be considered against horses as good as these – I think she’s past that point. And what if QUIDURA (#1) is just a really good horse? She might be! And she could control a pokey pace. She is a second B to go with Dacita.
Race 10 – Belmont Gold Cup
Good luck. WICKLOW BRAVE (#12) probably will be favored, and has two big wins (one over jumps and one last fall on the flat) in his recent starts. But he pretty much stole both those races, and runner-up Order of St. George didn’t fire his best in one of them, the Irish St. Leger. I can’t lean too heavily on Wicklow Brave, especially if he wants to stay close to the pace, since there are several like that here. RED CARDINAL (#10) looks progressive and unexposed at two miles and up, and I like his chances at a higher price than his morning line. Mike Maker already has owned this race, and TAGHLEEB (#11) is 1 for 1 at two miles. Those three are the A’s. RENOWN (#2) has gotten better and better and might turn out to be well suited to races longer than 1 ½ miles. NOW WE CAN (#3) closed well for second in this race last year to Da Big Hoss and seems to be coming around at the right time.
Race 11 – Bed o’ Roses
The backups to By the Moon are QUEZON (#4), who can win if she runs back to her second in the Gallant Bloom last fall (and she does not need a wet track for her best – she just keeps getting them), and LIGHTSTREAM (#5), who on the face of things has been disappointing after a smashing start to her career, but might have a host of excuses, appears to be training well, and ran strongly on this track at a distance beyond her best.
Here’s the play:
RACE 8
A: 3, 7, 8
RACE 9
A: 2, 6
B: 1, 8
RACE 10
A: 10, 11, 12
B: 2, 3
RACE 11
A: 9
B: 4, 5
Using 50 cents as a base, but playing an all A ticket for $1, this costs $87