Weekend GamePlan: Picks for Blame, Eclipse, Honeymoon

For Weekend GamePlan purposes, disliking short prices isn’t enough. For instance, the Shawnee at Churchill, where all three favorites – Xigera, Wet Paint, and Scylla – can be opposed. That alone can be useful in multi-race wagers, but it’s hard to flesh out an alternative winner, and Weekend GamePlan is all about looking for winners. Here’s one idea to get the day started: A longshot named Voyage springing a surprise in the Derby at Epsom.

Blame

This is a prep for the Grade 1 Stephen Foster, and the connections of morning-line favorite Highland Falls, Godolphin and trainer Brad Cox, already have the Foster favorite, First Mission. I doubt they’d run Highland Falls against First Mission, and Cox has another horse, Hit Show, for the Prairie Meadows Cornhusker, so I suppose one might imagine the Blame is the target race for Highland Falls. Not so sure.

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This colt was 9-1 facing seven foes in his debut, a huge price for a first-timer from these connections. Highland Falls took the public by surprise, and I wonder what sort of internal expectations there were for him. In any case, Highland Falls has done nothing but come forward since that August debut – and I think he’s hit his ceiling. The Santa Anita Handicap represented a plateau, and while Highland Falls’s Oaklawn Handicap marked another step forward, the guess is he finally goes backward.

Tapit Trice is a much more confident play-against. Personally, I thought this colt was overrated all through his 3-year-old season. He’s taken forever to make it back to the starting gate, his comeback delayed in early May by a foot issue. No, thank you.

Cagliostro has been a personal favorite, and it was good to see him win at Keeneland, but for the Blame, I’ll side with the colt who ran just behind him last out, Dreamlike.

Tapit Trice’s Todd Pletcher-trained stablemate possesses far more upside than Tapit Trice. Dreamlike went in and out through his 3-year-old campaign. He required four starts to win a race of any sort, and after finally clearing the maiden ranks, ran totally flat in a Saratoga first-level allowance. Blinkers came off and Pletcher thought enough of the colt to put him in the Pennsylvania Derby – which Dreamlike nearly won. The Breeders’ Cup Classic was decidedly not the right spot, and Dreamlike was about to catch Cagliostro going a half-furlong shorter than this at Keeneland. He’s primed for a breakthrough.

Eclipse

Palazzi looked after the fall of 2022 and the ensuing winter like a horse bound for the claiming ranks. In fact, he ran for $50,000 in March 2023. Then Palazzi showed up at Woodbine and his trajectory did a 180-degree turn. He won three in a row, culminating with a victory in the Grade 2 Singspiel, and I’m looking for a similar form reversal in the Eclipse. Palazzi did have compromising trouble two back, though he was just bad in the Muniz Memorial. Maybe that race shows 6-year-old Palazzi has definitively slipped, but at his price here, I’m willing to bet otherwise. He won last summer over the Woodbine Tapeta, and this race seems very likely to shape for a deep closer like Palazzi. Perhaps his last run will be the best run in the Eclipse.

Honeymoon

Unsure how low the price dips on Shiloh’s Mistress in the Honeymoon but am very bullish on the filly Saturday.

Shiloh’s Mistress began her career in the Kentucky wing of the Michael McCarthy operation before earning a trip back to Southern California. Her stakes debut in the Santa Ysabel, where she hooked two very fast ones, was fine. Her grass debut April 20 in the Providencia showed that this is a turf horse.

Shiloh’s Mistress pulled harder than ideal during the early stages when she wound up on the lead last time, but it wasn’t a runaway-train sort of pull; just a young horse eager to run and still figuring things out. Medoro, the 1-5 favorite, tracked Shiloh’s Mistress from second, attacked coming into the stretch, and took a half-length lead before Shiloh’s Mistress fought back gamely, the favorite perhaps saved by the wire.

I see two options, both favorable, for the filly’s second turf start. It would be great if a horse inside her leads and provides Shiloh’s Mistress a target. If not, the feeling is she’ll relax better on the lead this time – and they won’t catch her.

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