This goes as race 8 on the Santa Anita card and can be watched on NBC
#1 MELLENCAMP is the other-other Baffert here and he’s still just a maiden. The last race was actually pretty interesting. The winner, Baeza, is a sleeper contender for the Santa Anita Derby And it was good from a paceline perspective: fast early, measured middle, fast again late.. That type of line often indicates a forward move but he’s clearly third on the depth chart for Team White Hair.
#2 JOURNALISM looked exceptional in the Los Al Futurity, steam rolling home in a race that didn’t figure to set up for him on paper. You could say the same here as you know team tactics will be in effect amongst the Baffert trio. This is likely just a starting point and I’d imagine connections would be more than happy with a hard charging second and in fact, he is VERY likely to get second at least. If he’s good enough to win again without a setup, he might just win the Kentucky Derby.
#3 BARNES is clearly a special horse as his purchase price, choice of name (Jimmy Barnes is BB’s right-hand man who has shepherded so many of his great ones), and accomplishments thus far. He shapes in his races like more ground will be his friend but he has to prove that. It’s my belief that he’ll just be allowed to roll on the front end and that’s going to make Journalism’s task that much more difficult in this short field comeback race for him. I don’t know if Jimmy plays basketball but for me it’s Barnes to the hoop.
#4 RODRIGUEZ may still be an interesting horse going forward, but the jury is at least a little out. Baeza, mentioned before, was in his wake in the big fig maiden win, but Rod was definitely aided by a track bias there. Last time I didn’t think he was given his best chance to win as his stablemate was allowed to go out unchecked on the lead – and that’s the exact same scenario I see happening this time.
#5 SMOOTH CRUSEIN’s first race back in October saw him beat both Mellencamp and Journalism. But that was then and this is now. He’s still a big longshot because he looked outclassed at graded level in his last start. Florida bred goes long for the first time and has it all to prove.
#6 BERLIN WALL is another maiden. On the show JK made a case for him to come running in for a minor piece but I’m not really seeing it. His last race is better than it looks perhaps because the track seemed to favor speed that day. Maybe he’s a sneaky candidate on the stretchout to take on Barnes early and make this pace at least even? We shall see.
VERDICT
This feels like a pretty cold #3 Barnes-#2 Journalism exacta to me. I suppose #4 Rodrigues could spoil that party so I might have a 3-4-2 tri as well.
