Hear the Ghost, who was scratched from Saturday’s $750,000 Santa Anita Derby on Thursday because of an injury detected in a knee, will be rested for four months before he returns to training, trainer and co-owner Jerry Hollendorfer said Friday.
Undefeated Verrazano gets tested for class and distance in Saturday’s Grade 1 Wood Memorial, a refrain not unique to him by any means, but every bit the key question of the weekend as the likely Kentucky Derby favorite if successful. The Santa Anita Derby appears to be a best in show contest amongst an eclectic trio of Baffert stablemates, with Flashback an odds-on favorite.
The decision to bet with or against Verrazano as the 4-5 favorite in the Wood Memorial Saturday is less of a pure handicapping choice than an internal struggle between two voices that emerge in many a horseplayer’s mind this time of year.
After a disappointing effort in the Rebel Stakes, Super Ninety Nine can't afford a bad showing in the Santa Anita Derby and is the value play in that Grade 1 test.
The twists and turns on the Kentucky Derby trail took another hairpin curve on Thursday afternoon when it was announced that Hear the Ghost, the San Felipe Stakes winner, would miss the Grade 1, $750,000 Santa Anita Derby on Saturday because of an injury.
Salutos Amigos was much the best winning his second Santa Anita start, a performance that was flattered when soundly beaten runner up Zee Bros came back to win his next start with a 102 Beyer.
If one or more of the 3-year-olds at Aqueduct have designs on being in Louisville, Ky., on the first Saturday in May, they will have to navigate the 1 1/8 miles of Saturday’s $1 million Wood Memorial against Verrazano, an imposing figure with an unblemished record and, to this point, an unmatched turn of foot.
When War Front retired to the Hancock family’s Claiborne Farm in late 2006, his prospects for a successful stud career looked promising despite the fact that he topped out as a Grade 2 winner on the racetrack and could not break through at the Grade 1 level in his final three starts. A son of legendary Claiborne stallion Danzig who was foaled and raised at the Paris, Ky., farm, War Front began his stud career in 2007 at a fee of $12,500, covering his first mares a little more than a year after Danzig was euthanized due to the infirmities of old age at 29.
Ted Aroney, the co-owner of Hear the Ghost, likes to think he’s learned the secret of winning the Kentucky Derby, although it’s not much of a secret. More like fortune-cookie wisdom, so obvious that to deny its truth is nothing more than a waste of time: Anybody can win.
Lines of Battle, winner of the United Arab Emirates Derby, is one of three additions to this week's Derby Watch top 20.
