Watchmaker: Daily double play for Wednesday, Aug. 13

With the exception of a couple of days, weather has been a nonfactor at this Saratoga meet. But that, unfortunately, will not be the case Wednesday.

At this writing Tuesday, the National Weather Service is forecasting as much as three inches of rain for Saratoga Springs, N.Y., between Tuesday night and dinnertime Wednesday. But even half that much precipitation would wreak havoc with Wednesday’s card.

This daily feature of the Saratoga (and Del Mar) meet was primarily intended to be one that focused on pick four and pick five plays, and, to a lesser extent, pick three plays. But the forecast, and the structure of Wednesday’s Saratoga card, will force me to deviate from the program.

With the thought in mind that races will be off the turf and the composition of those races will be completely unknown until the anticipated plethora of late scratches are finally in, I looked at what the scheduled dirt races might enable me to cobble together, play-wise. But there are only two back-to-back dirt races Wednesday, and they are races 2 and 3.

That means the pick five, the early pick 4, and the late pick 4 all include two turf races that, when all is said and done, probably won’t bear any resemblance to what they were when they were drawn. And obviously there isn’t a pick three sequence anywhere that doesn’t involve at least one race scheduled for the turf.

So, as much as I would like to give out a pick four or pick five play, I can’t. It will have to be a double play, but not the obvious one linking races 2 and 3. Between Warrior’s Hero looking very hard to beat at a very short price in the second race and there being only a couple of contenders in the third, that double is just too chalky to discuss.

Instead, I’ll go with a late double play in races 9 and 10.

Yes, I know the ninth race is the Troy Stakes, scheduled for 5 1/2 furlongs on turf, but this is the rare race when I’d actually have a stronger opinion if it was rained off the grass. Everyone will be all over Dads Caps, the lone main-track entrant here and the upset winner of the Grade 1 Carter Handicap three starts back.

But here’s the thing about Dads Caps: He absolutely walked on the lead when he won the Carter, he’s not nearly as brave when he’s denied the early lead, and he’s not going to have the lead because of Spring to the Sky and, if he stays in, Bold Thunder.

I like Spring to the Sky, the winner of his last two starts, including the Lucky Coin Stakes early in the meet, in the two finest performances of his career. Spring to the Sky is faster early than Dads Caps if he wants to be but is tractable enough to rate and win if someone else goes nuts early. And I like the fact that Spring to the Sky ran well on wet tracks in two of his first three career starts, including a nearly 10-length romp in the mud at Belmont in his career debut.

I’m keying Spring to the Sky with four horses in the 10th race, and none of them is the Steve Asmussen-trained dropdown and potential favorite, Southern Blessing, who does nothing for me.

I’m using Perfect Disco, logical off a second in his most recent appearance; Cosmic Coincidence, whose trainer, David Jacobson, is 6 for 18 with 8 other in-the-money finishes at New York Racing Association tracks over the last five years (according to DRF Formulator) with horses dropping 50 percent in claiming price first off the claim like this one is; Beau Who, dropping to the level at which he was second two starts back; and Mister Popsicle, who I think will appreciate getting off the turf and back on the main track.