Kentucky Derby: Joseph back a year after being banned during investigation

LOUISVILLE, Ky. – A year after he experienced the worst week of his professional life, trainer Saffie Joseph Jr. is back at Churchill Downs with a longshot chance in the Kentucky Derby.

Joseph is here with Catalytic, who earned his way into the Kentucky Derby by finishing second, albeit beaten 13 1/2 lengths by Fierceness, in the Grade 1 Florida Derby.

Even a last-place finish in the Derby would be better for Joseph than what he experienced in 2023.

Last year, when he was here with Derby longshot Lord Miles and a handful of others, including White Abarrio, Joseph was forced to scratch all of his horses entered Derby week owing to the unexplained sudden deaths of two of his horses in races run the first two nights of the Churchill meet.

An investigation by the Kentucky Horse Racing Commission found no wrongdoing on Joseph’s part, but the impact of what happened and the length of time it took to release the findings of the investigation cost him personally and professionally.

“It was a week that I wouldn’t wish on anybody,” Joseph said Sunday standing outside Churchill’s Barn 3. “I experienced it. It made me stronger in my faith, and stronger in life. I wouldn’t ever want to go through it again, but I don’t regret going through it.”

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Two days before last year’s Kentucky Derby, Churchill suspended Joseph, requiring him to scratch all of his runners entered in races on the Oaks and Derby cards, including Lord Miles from the Derby and White Abarrio from the Churchill Downs Stakes. Further, Joseph was denied stalls at Churchill.

Until it had more clarity on what was going on, the New York Racing Association also prohibited Joseph from entering or stabling at its tracks. The owners of White Abarrio wanted to run in the Grade 1 Metropolitan Handicap and moved the horse to Rick Dutrow. White Abarrio finished third in the Met Mile, then won the Grade 1 Whitney at Saratoga and the $6 million Breeders’ Cup Classic.

“Even when White Abarrio won the Whitney I turned to my wife and I said, ‘Don’t feel bad, this is part of God’s way of putting it together,’ ” Joseph said.

Nineteen days after White Abarrio won the Whitney, Joseph won the $1 million Charles Town Classic with Skippylongstocking. While Skippylongstocking was pulled up in the $3 million Pegasus World Cup at Gulfstream Park in January – suffering from heat exhaustion – he has since come back to win the Challenger Stakes at Tampa Bay and, most recently, the Grade 2, $1.25 million Oaklawn Handicap, a race for which he earned a 107 Beyer Speed Figure.

“That was his best race by far in his life,” said Joseph, who is eyeing the Grade 2 Stephen Foster on June 29 at Churchill for Skippylongstocking.

Joseph said that because of what happened last year he didn’t get as many 2-year-olds as usual. Still, he finished the year with a career-best $10,661,528 in earnings and his 183 wins were the second most of his career.

He does feel he has recaptured some of his lost business. Catalytic, owned by Tami Bobo, Julie Davies, and George Isaacs will be Joseph’s third Derby starter in the last five years.

“People were responsive to the way I handled it and the way I went about it and I think that helped in general, but it’s not something I wish on the worst enemy,” Joseph said.

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Catalytic, a son of Catalina Cruiser, won his debut sprinting at Gulfstream last October. He didn’t race again until March 8, when he finished second in a first-level allowance race at six furlongs. He came back 22 days later, stretching out to 1 1/8 miles in the Florida Derby. While he was well-beaten by Fierceness, he finished 2 1/2 lengths clear of Grand Mo the First.

“He’s 13 lengths back, that’s an enormous amount of distance to make up, but it’s the Derby, it runs weird some years,” Joseph said. “He is improving and he’s unexposed, that’s the thing that gives you a bit of hope. If he had run seven or eight times, you’d say he’s not going to have any chance to make that up. He has to go forward a lot, but he acts like he’s going forward.”

Catalytic, it seems, has taken a cue from his trainer.

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