Show #15 — February 12, 2019 (NHC in Review)

***Please note this was done with AI and likely contains errors and inaccuracies. ***

Your listening to the, in the money players podcast. Hello, and welcome to the end. The money players podcast. This is show number 15. It is February 12th, 2019 Lincoln’s birthday. I believe back in the Brooklyn bunker. Wow. What a weekend out in Las Vegas for the national. HorsePlayers championship. We’re going to be talking about that on this show, going to be talking a little bit about the racing from last weekend as well.

We’ll have more NHC coverage coming up. Scott Coles was meant to be on the show today, a little bit of travel trouble, getting back to Chicago. And I figured, you know what, why don’t we wait, give him a few days of perspective and then we will bring him in. I’m a believer in several [00:01:00] broadcasting principles as a spouse, by one of my mentors in the field VIN scelsa in addition to my father, one of those, the old wew DJs.

And he would say at the beginning of his show all the time that you should respect your elders and embrace the new and what an opportunity we had to do that. At the NHC final table, great stories like that. Of Chris Littlemore bidding to become the first ever two time winner and making two final tables in a row.

Jim Meeks, trying to be the first one to win two proper majors. He’s already gotten a horseplayer world series win and he was going after the NHC title ends up running second and Oh, by the way, he had a heart attack on super bowl Sunday. Almost didn’t make it down to the NHC. That is the elders’ stories to tell.

And then as for embracing the new, how about Scott Coles? How about Matt? . [00:02:00] How about Marshall Graham? Low key, uh, Marshall Graham having as good a run and tournaments is anyone I can remember in recent memory with the fifth at the breeders’ cup contest coming right back and getting that. Right to the final table anyway, amazing stuff going on at the NHC and to talk about it all going to bring in my co-host.

He was competing in the event. You know him, you love him. Not only is he the people’s champion, he’s the most electrifying man in all of horseplaying, at least according to the TDN Jonathan kitchen. I use use the term participating in the NHC, uh, lightly. I didn’t do much participating. I was had a rough half out.

I had a rough run of it, uh, last week, uh, last weekend. So, uh, we’ll see. Maybe next year we’ll do a little bit better, but it’s a, it’s a hard contest and it’s a, it’s a frustrating contest and not do well in just because of, of, of the prestige of it and the opportunity [00:03:00] to have that big score and, and, uh, for whatever reason, just couldn’t get it.

Couldn’t get it. Rolling. Putting your personal story aside. I do not think it’s an exaggeration to call it the greatest NHC of all time for leaderboard changes at the final table. A great day of action. So many stories, and the end was just tremendous. I mean, despite the promise of the final table, let’s face it.

Pick a word JK to describe the first, uh, five or so runnings before this one. I think boring, you know, in all honesty, the, the first five final tables, a person going in to the lead one. Um, and so I think that there, there was no change. There, there was no shift. There was no excitement in, and those. You know what I mean?

Maybe a little bit of excitement, but not, not the level that we saw this year with all the changes and, and the, uh, people hitting horses. And, and like you said, the leaderboard changes happening and everyone going into that last race, uh, three guys were drawing [00:04:00] live to win $800,000 of the two horses that were under three to one or under four to one.

I think that that’s, uh, an exciting moment after, after 36, 46, 53 different races, you end up in this situation where. Uh, a three to one shock. And when you $800,000, and I think that that’s kind of. Uh, the excitement you’re looking for. And the final title reminded me of a long race in England, after miles at Cheltonham going up the Hill and you’ll see two or three horses separated by a half a length.

It was a bit like that. And the excitement level was palpable. It was great to be in the ballroom. And this was with the horrible luck. Maybe, I shouldn’t say horrible luck. So much as bad planning that led us to having a four horse race as our nightcap at the final table. But it almost didn’t matter because you did have it play out on the track.

With covered horses, doing all the running in that [00:05:00] race. Eventually Scott, Kohl’s getting it done. And I just have to take a minute to brag. How amazing to have at least finishers one, three, and nine, all be big fans of the, in the money players podcast. JK, did you get to talk to any of those guys about that?

I did. I did. I saw Scott actually yesterday morning. He was, he was having a rough go of it. He couldn’t find his, he had, he had been a couple of futures on himself. Oh, no, I couldn’t find the tickets. I told them that I didn’t think it would be an issue. If you went to the window, they’d be able to look up at all the cameras and, and probably give them the money.

I don’t think Tony would have a problem taking care of that. So hopefully he got that sorted out yesterday, but no, I did get a chance to talk to them, both. And, um, uh, and, uh, Scott and Matt, you mentioned the first and third players were, or younger, younger. When I say younger, I just say younger than the average yeah.

In the room. So no offense to anyone. I just think the 34. 35 and 36 are younger than the average age in the room. And so I did have a chance to talk to him a little bit about, uh, [00:06:00] kind of their involvement in racing and, and how they, uh, listen to the show and always, always flattering to hear that people take the time to listen to us.

Carry on. Younger by a couple of decades. I think JK, if you’re talking on average at 34 and 37, I could be wrong about that, but that’s certainly my sense of it from looking around the room. It was great to see them. And of course, a Marshall 10 strike racing. One of the first sponsors to come on board the show and a guy who’s obviously become a good friend.

Great to see those names up there on the list, bored. And I wonder. Is it randomness that we had guys younger than 40 in first and third. I mean, even when we were doing the world HorsePlayers tour, I was so proud of the fact that we had whatever it was six of the seven at the final table being under 40.

And I even pointed to the NHC as a bit of a counterpoint saying, you know, it’s going to be very rare that you get somebody. Younger than say 50, or maybe even 55 there this [00:07:00] year. Really put the lie to that with three people, at least in that no more. I mean, Steve-O also as horse racing young, you had a half the final table being in the younger demographics.

Is this something that’s changing or was this a bit of randomness?

Yeah, I don’t think it’s necessarily a change in the guard. I still think that there’s always going to be more players participating in the NHC and these events that are over that, that quote unquote cut line of the average age in the room. I just think that there’s probably. Uh, just a little bit more youth coming to the party, uh, based on some of the things we’ve seen in the past that, you know, with, with, uh, with just, you know, the podcast and, and, um, you know, HorsePlayers show obviously that shows still is resonating and, and, uh, and, and kind of attractive to more of the youth.

So I don’t think it’s really, I don’t think it’s a, you know, the next final tables going to be all young guys and, and there’s never going to be another 67. And when [00:08:00] the NHC, I just think there’s probably a few more young guys participating than there has been in the last five. The 10 years you mentioned HorsePlayers and it definitely deserves credit.

Robert Gilbert, 68 years old, started playing in contests from seeing the horseplayer show. He made a deep run was in the lead for a very long time. Using a very unique strategy of essentially from what I heard pick and praying the deal, putting in the picks in the morning and then going off to do whatever he was going to do, presumably doing some more bedding, but doing it in a quiet, controlled environment.

I wonder if he used the same routine on the third day, he went cold. He still hung around and still ends up at the final table and cashing a nice check. But I wonder if I wonder if he used the same strategy. And do you think JK, if, what do you think he should have done? Yeah, we should have done whatever it got him to that point.

Um, I’ll tell you what, that’s a very challenging way to play that contest. And I [00:09:00] look not, not necessarily a bad way. I think a lot of times it’s the stress that comes in that contest is decision-making. And I think a lot of guys can always point to a good decision they made and they can always point to a bad decision they made, whether they won a weather or they, whether they got last.

And I think that if you were to just pop all your stuff in early in the day, Uh, you probably end up in the same position that you ended up with anyways, where you made a couple of good decisions, a couple of bad ones. So, um, I would think that that, that, it’s, it’s a, it’s a useful strategy for some, for some people I I’d rather keep it kind of open where I can see where some of the odds are going, but I can see how, how he could help out though, by just getting you on a horse, no matter what that you liked in the morning, regardless of the price.

I think it probably depends on what his normal playing style is, whether or not it’s a good. Idea to do what he did. Cause we also know that on these Sundays, it’s a little bit different in the semi-final round. You’re going to have so many people firing at long shots cause they have to get [00:10:00] up into contention.

I could make the point. That unless he’s somebody who’s typically finding those longer priced horses that he played so effectively on days one and two. I mean, personally, if he asked me for advice, I would have said, well, you definitely still have to play who you’ll like, and that shouldn’t eliminate reaching for higher prices, but you’re certainly in a position if you’re in that top five heading into the third day where you can reach way lower.

In my opinion, to just if the horse, if that’s the horse, you like to just keep accruing points. Absolutely. I think the, the, the tricky part at the end is, is you’ve you, you kind of have to change it up a little bit because you’ve put yourself in a position by playing a certain way. And like you mentioned, once you kind of get to that top five, you can really start to hone in on horses that are lower, lower prices to keep moving you up.

And it can be the difference between five, 10, 15, 20,000. Or, or considerably more if you’re talking about making it all the way to the final table, another word on Chris, a little more. How amazing was that JK to see somebody at the final [00:11:00] table, two years in a row, did you get a chance to talk to him? What did you think of that performance?

I got to shake his hand and just tell him congratulations. It’s it’s a, it’s a phenomenal, phenomenal accomplishment accomplishment to be able to. Uh, make it to the, you know, make it to the, make it, the cut two years in a row is impressive. Right. Uh, winning the event and then making the final table is another thing that’s even more impressive.

So definitely deserves a lot of credit for that. And it seems like we’ll probably be seeing his name. Uh, quite a bit more down the line. So, you know, you have this reputation for playing chalk at various times. Did you see Paul Sherman’s maneuver essentially of how he made the semifinals? It puts you to shame.

I didn’t actually notice what did he take? A bunch of chalk and one, not a bunch of chalk, but one in particular. We’d had this conversation before about. How short of a price would you take? And usually when we talk to people about that, we end up talking about how short would you take in a mandatory, but he noticed how tight the banding [00:12:00] was late in the contest as players were trying to get in that top 67 to make the semifinals and decided that the $4 and 40 cents or whatever it was from Bella Faena would be the difference in putting him over the top.

He played Bellfina in the NHC. Made me think of you. That’s impressive. Very impressive. There’s more to the story and it’s all going to be archived on Steve vik.com days worth of coverage of the event. I think there might be some digested coverage as well that you might want to check out. There are some sickos who will listen to all 20 plus hours and kudos to you if you’re one of them, but there are some really great moments.

I don’t. I feel bad, highlighting a few people because I’m leaving out others who were great, but especially Paul Matisse, especially Paul Sherman’s visits, great stuff from Bay. Chuck, great stuff from Chris Alarmy it was really just a ton of fun. [00:13:00] I can’t believe how close I came to not going based on what a great experience it was.

Not least of which was meeting other listeners. John Pender. Another, who comes to mind as somebody who is a real pleasure to meet in the treasure Island ballroom great run. He gave it to just fall short and another Texas horseplayer for you and Nick tomorrow to hang out with. Absolutely. I mean, anytime you could find another guy from Texas, it’s always an accomplishment.

So, um, I was happy to meet Johnny sat with us at the banquet at the, uh, Awards banquet. So hopefully we’ll get to spend a little extra time with him down the line of serum. Sure. He’ll probably start traveling a bit more and getting involved in some of these live money contest. So that’s a great double segue because we’re talking about people who are great on with me and big and talking about the awards banquet.

Got to talk about Dave. . I thought he played great after getting blanked on day one, just to get early in the day, one of his two entries up into contention [00:14:00] up to you ended up with about one 48. So he fell about 40 bucks short of making the cut line, but I thought it was a gutsy performance to not let that negative momentum, snow him under and to come back and make a run.

What did you think of day’s performance? What did you think of his remarks at the NHC dinner? When you start off cold like that, like, and like I did as well. I think I ended the first day with 40 bucks, um, which is double zeros. Yeah, your 40 bucks is nothing compared to double zeros. No. Right. And that’s what I’m saying is that the, the mental effect of 40 took on me, I can only imagine what the zero took on him, you know?

And so that’s the part that, that I think is definitely needs to be commended. Like you mentioned, I just to stay the course and to come back the next day and to find a way to get it. You know, 140 bucks in one day, probably frustrating knowing that if he could have got a little, a little lucky on day one, what the day that he had on day two, he might’ve been right there in the mix, uh, to get to [00:15:00] that, to that cut line and make the semi-finals.

But, um, You know, it’s, it’s a lot of pressure and, and, and he, it obviously affected him in certain ways. Just it’s, it’s a lot of pressure. It’s a once in a lifetime opportunity, I get where he was coming from. As far as the speech, I thought it was, you know, I thought it was good. Like, you know, and he had Twitter admitted it like long, but he just had a lot of things he wanted to say.

And a lot of things that, that, uh, he’s passionate about. And, and he, and he, uh, took that opportunity to, to, um, To say some of those things. And so, um, you know, I, I thought for sure, no, whatever break my record for, Oh, you got flown out of the water. It was a secretariat, like margin compared to, I know, I think I, I think mine was like eight or nine minutes and I mean, I had it, I clocked it at about 18 it’s up there on I Periscoped it.

And I think I have, I put the setting on Periscope where it’s still there. I think if you want to go back and check it out through my Twitter, I really thought he got into some. Interesting ideas about this event, [00:16:00] the history of this event and where we go from here. I did not think I’d have to go back and listen, but I don’t think there were any low blows.

It really felt above board. And I think you can tell that this guy, despite what he’ll tell you sometimes really does still have some love for racing and for contests that he can’t, he can’t quite quite quit them. And he has tried, but he can’t quite quit them. And I just, I liked the idea of having him based on the ideas he gave out at the dinner.

Hopefully willing in one form or another, maybe through agents, such as ourselves JK, as opposed to dealing with any of the politics of the business, which if I were him, I would definitely be over some of the things that have happened to him as far as that goes. But I’m certainly somebody who is not opposed to the idea of taking some of his best ideas and trying to continue to fight the fight.

And with that in mind, looking at the NHC. Where do we go from here? JK, is it a case where, uh, someone like me [00:17:00] who’s been critical of the way the third day works before and is believed that maybe you need to do more to stimulate action and stimulate action at the final table, just because it worked out great this year, you know, does that mean I should be quiet and we shouldn’t fix this because it’s not really broken?

Or do you think there are things that can and should be done to take what’s a great event and make it better? Maybe considerably better. I think there’s definitely things you can do to, to, to enhance it and to kind of guarantee the excitement that was that we saw this year. And we haven’t seen in the years past not completely sure that a wholesale change will, will go over well.

Um, you know, there’s all these little ideas that, you know, you toss around with people or things that you could do and final table becomes live money. So now all of a sudden everybody’s back in it and you can. That those seven races with conviction rather than the mythical, $2, something like that. You know, those are conversations like that could be had.

One of the, one of the changes that I think that, that, uh, myself and [00:18:00] Paul Matisse and, and I think I talked to probably four other players that are on the players committee is on day two to move the mandatories up in the day. Because forcing players to look at races, they might not look at, and they mathematically pick 27 to one shots or 15 to one shots because they’re in a race.

They wouldn’t normally be in. It’s problematic to the outcome. Yes. And that happened this year. You had a long shot that got that long shot at Santa Anita. It was, I think the only capper in the race may be. So you had hundreds of people potentially playing that horse that had nothing to do with anything other than the number on the board.

So by moving the mandatories earlier in the day, you would prevent that from happening. You’d have, if you wanted to play that horse, you could, but you’d have to save a bullet to do it. That’s a very interesting idea. I never thought of. Right. And then also the race before that was a 27 to one at Oakland on that Calvin Burrell went on.

So, um, and it’s, it’s unfair for the people that love the horse. [00:19:00] I actually think the horse gets cheap in the model of the contest. That’s terrible. I mean, it’s great. Cause you hit it right. But like, if you love it, that’s a horse. You would have moved up. If it’s an optional race, you move up much closer to alone within the economy of the contest.

It’s just worth a lot more. It gets very cheap. The old. Those horses 20 to one on the board, two to one in the room, there is something to that. Right. I agree. And I also think that, you know, this is probably never going to change, but, and this is probably a more me thing than any, but I know a lot of people will agree is this idea that, that let’s find the most chaotic race that we possibly can and make it a mandatory it’s just to me, that’s not, it, that’s not a real representation of the game, what it is to make money in this game.

10 claimer from Oaklawn with nine horses coming off of the layoffs six, you know, off trainer changes. And it, you know, it just becomes like, almost like a guessing game [00:20:00] rather than a eight horse field where seven of them can win. I think I just find that to be. A much more attractive way to, to find out who the, you know, who the best handicapper in the three-day weekend is.

Um, but that’s just, you know, I guess that’s probably more me than, than anything else, but the, the, the, the idea about the mandatories, I think that we’ll, we’ll do our best to try to get that adjustment made for next year. What else have you heard? What other reactions have you heard from other players, whether on the players committee or just your fellow participants?

That was really one of the ones that, that, that I heard the most, you know, in talking to Paul and talking to some of the other guys, that’s pretty much it. I don’t think I, I don’t think we really had any other conversations. The other storylines from the event itself experiences, et cetera. We’ve been fortunate enough.

Someone from our tables has made it to the final table the last few years. And that’s always fun to have someone to root for. Um, you know, it’s always a bummer when you don’t make the semi-finals, it’s always a bummer when you don’t make the final table, but when you have a friend. Uh, or seatmate or [00:21:00] someone that you care about that’s doing it.

It’s always fun to have someone to cheer for. It makes the ending that much more exciting. And so we were obviously really happy for Marshall and the accomplishment that he had of, of, of making that final table. And so, um, that was fun. Uh, it’s never a dull moment, uh, with, with the Mattise crew they’ve been brought around, they brought along rich April who’s, uh, a character in his own, right.

He was on with us. He was on with me and Vic for a while. Yeah. He was full of jokes the entire weekend. He was just, he was, uh, making fun of me for drinking Modelo telling me I was drinking the expensive beer.

That’s pretty funny from a guy whose nickname is Richie rich. Richie Richard kept making fun of me for not coming to play craps with him. After one night, I told him on my life I’ll be there, but I ended up in the room and I passed out. He was wearing me out for that. So those were exciting moments downstairs.

I want to talk to you about Frank drew for a second, because he’s also connected with the Matisse crew because he is [00:22:00] Tony’s stepfather. Was he sitting with you guys? He was, he was sitting, uh, we had like four tables. It was a, you know, my, they know me, Nick Marshall, that group. And then there was, you know, Nick, Nate newbie and, and, and some, some people that kind of came and went and James Henry, and then there was a Duke and Paul had two tables and, and, and, uh, Frank was sitting in kinda like the second table with John Nichols and Frank McGaughey that group.

Speaking of Frank McGaughey, we’re going to have him as a guest on Friday to look at this loaded fairgrounds card. Production meeting in the middle of the show. I thought that would be a lot of fun. And then you mentioned James Henry, you had an anecdote about him. Yeah, the jazz man. He, he, uh, he had, uh, Luke came into town, so he, I think he drug James out a little, a little late one night.

So James kind of punished himself and like found this like little nook over to the side and like made himself sit back there. And so like sitting dark over there to find them he had a good run didn’t he end up in the semi-finals and other [00:23:00] guy, there were several players who’ve won the horseplayer world series.

Who were bidding to make history? We mentioned Jim Meeks, there was James Henry, and I think there was one other dude, but I don’t really remember it. Yeah. I don’t either. Let’s move on to talk about the racing this weekend. J K and we’ll start off with the Derby prep of the bunch. It was the Sam Davis at Tampa Bay, little bit of a surprising result.

Have you had a chance to rewatch it or reflect on this one at all? Um, no, I hadn’t. I mean, I, I didn’t rewatch it. Um, I, I watched it, you know, the first time, obviously the horse made a little sense was interesting in the Breeder’s cup. Juvenile is a little bit of a longer press thing. Mike Smith rode the horse in that race.

I was on Kentucky Wildcat. I thought Kentucky Wildcat was going to run big in the race. Um, I built a lot of my, um, uh, little plays, uh, in that moment around Kentucky Wildcat is a horse I wanted to play in the contest, but going off at five to two, made it a little bit more [00:24:00] challenging. Um, ended up getting a band off and is injured.

Apparently. Did you hear that? I did hear that. I heard that, uh, dolphin and had some, some sort of I to say, look at maybe a knee injury or something. Do you remember what it was? Exactly. Knee sounds right. Oh, I’d have to check, uh, the articles it’s, uh, hopefully sounds like it is not life-threatening, but presumably career threatening and certainly Derby threatening and that horse ran pretty well.

Absolutely. Yeah. And I thought he ran a really the big race back in December. And that was kind of the race that, that led me to wanting to consider him. And obviously the, the, the breeding was there with, with that horse. And I just don’t, I, it just felt like one that could kind of continue to progress. Um, but, uh, he, you know, well-defined kind of freaked on the day, a little bit finding the Marty McGee article here.

Condel our fracture off the Derby trail, the winner who we never named. Well-defined for Kathleen O’Connell with Pablo Miralis up stone hedge, [00:25:00] LLC. The buyer came back pretty strong, a 93, but I do wonder if this isn’t one who gets brave on the lead and might have a little bit of trouble as we progress down the Derby trail.

What do you think. He’s definitely one. When you have speed, that’s always something you got to consider. It’s a, it’s a weapon that, that, uh, I think is very useful in these races when these horses are trying to stretch out and, and, and being forward in those situations can usually help you find a way to get it done.

And I think well-defined is, is the type of horse who could continue to progress it and be a problem for people. I don’t think he’s, uh, the type that I’m going to run downstairs in the wind sports book and see if I can’t get a future bet on. But, uh, he’s definitely one that, uh, you want to keep an eye on just based on his, his tactics and automatically we’ll see him back in the Tampa Bay Derby.

That’s some breaking news. The, when, uh, in the post Avello era is back doing Derby futures. I had heard they were not, no, I’m just joking. They’re not, but I’m just, I was. You were being cheeky, you’re being something. Any other thoughts coming out of that race? [00:26:00] Nick’s go. Who I expected at least to be best of speed.

Did not, was not at least not in that spot. No coming off of a little bit of a break. I mean, obviously the type of horse that has shown some promise earlier in his, you know, his two year old or late in this two year old year had the little bit of a break first race back over a new racetrack. I’ll forgive them a little bit.

Let’s see if he shows up somewhere else. Uh, and his training training. Well, he didn’t run well then. But, uh, there’s excuses that he could have for that. No, you make some good points and should be back as a much longer price when next scene, after over-performing as a long shot, a couple of times last year.

So some good notes on that one, as far as the Derby trail goes, a lot of chatter about global campaign who had that big maiden win. Back on January 5th at Gulf stream, the buyer came back strong. Some figure makers had it even higher, and it just was a very stylish, visually impressive performance comes [00:27:00] back in the AI other than wins pretty easily.

But this time, at least the buyer figure did not like the race so much. It looked great. I was surprised to see the figure come back as low as it was. And we’ve also seen the form of the first race franked because the Chad Brown trained second place finisher in there came back to win. I think it was on Sunday.

That was growth engine. What was your thought about global campaign and how do you reconcile the impressive looking performance with potentially at least on the buyer scale? The lower figure? I agree. It was visually impressive and he’s the type of horse that will, we’ll always kind of garner. Attention at this point, he’s kind of had the two wins and he’s a half the bull Doro.

And so there’s, there’s so many things about that that will continue to, to get him attention. And like you said, the visual impressive one this weekend, but he’ll be a bet against for me moving forward based on the figures, just not being that strong. Um, if you’re, if you’re going to be a person who believes in [00:28:00] figures, these are the types of opportunities you’re looking for a horse that’s going to be.

A bet more than they should be based on the performance that’s likely to happen. And based on the figures, he feels like he’ll be up against it when he goes in a greatest stakes company and his next start and face some of these other monsters that are now to clarify. Have you seen other figures than the buyer?

I would. I would reserve judgment. I wouldn’t, I agree with what you’re saying in principle, if the figures across the board come back weak, but we have seen instances where time form will have it one way our figure, making friends we’ll have it one way. And buyer, has it another way, or have you seen more info on this?

Well, the time form had one Oh seven, um, for the Saturday’s performance one Oh nine for the maiden wins. So that’s stronger than the buyer right there. Right. Pretty close. Um, but. You know, the it’s tricky because the horses behind him made big jumps on their figures. You know, you had a horse go from 81 Oh one Oh four at 91 to a hundred.

94 to eight 99, 60 to a 98, [00:29:00] a couple of them matched a little bit. So, uh, it, it, obviously it was a tough number to make when there’s, there’s such a big gap in between buyer and time form. So we’ll have to see what comes back out of the race. I’d imagine. That some of these were run back before global campaign does.

Um, I would think global campaign might take a little bit of a break here and point for something like the Florida Derby, or maybe they’ll try to get cute and take him to the Tampa Bay Derby. But I don’t think we’ll see, we’ll see some of these other horses run back, get a better idea. How good the figure was.

I no longer have it in front of me, but the. Buyer was I believe 75, 77, something like that. So a significant, if you do the conversion of just minus 20 on the time format, that’s a pretty big difference right there. So something to keep an eye on something to pay attention to going forward. I think we’re both.

A L a hair skeptical. I agree with JK when it comes between trusting the eyes and looking at the numbers, I’m going to probably default to the numbers. At least when it comes to a horse, that’s going to [00:30:00] presumably take a lot of money where he next shows up, but we’ll take a look. The son of Curlin. And certainly a talented runner and that first race against so impressive.

And that was so strong on the clock. And to have that Frank with the Brown horse winning certainly one who is going to be appearing on lists for those who make lists. Did I tell you I’m writing? It’s not a list, but I am writing a series of articles for my friends at, at the racist.com about the Derby this year.

Did I even tell you about that yet? And you didn’t. I think, I think maybe you mentioned something about it, but we hadn’t gotten to detail. So fill me in well, been fun. It’s basically just not unlike what we do on the show reviews and previews of the races relevant to the triple crown. So I’ll just go a little bit more into depth than what we’re able to do typically on the podcast, put it in writing and really put it through the prism of.

What’s of interest to the UK punter looking to follow along on the Derby trail, sky sports racing, where I’m the [00:31:00] USA correspondent covering the Derby and Preakness and Belmont, and many of the prep races leading up to it. So it’s just a chance to give them a way in. And then if I see something interesting in terms of a betting opportunity coming into the weekend, I’ll try to point those out as well.

We’ll have an usually have access to the prices. On Thursday or Friday. And that leads me to a very good question. I got last night about value. This is a question really geared towards folks who are in the UK, but I think that the lesson of it applies to folks no matter where they’re betting in the world.

So I think we’ll do it here. And the question was, if there’s a horse that is a much bigger price that you can get your fixed odds from a bookie the day before or the morning of, or even right before the race. Is that something you always want to gravitate towards? Even if there might be a question about the horse and the example was maybe it’s a horse, a lot of steam, supposedly good [00:32:00] workouts, six to one on the tote.

The book he has at 14 to one is that. A good bet. And the answer as with so many things in gambling is it depends in this hypothetical example that the guy mentioned, maybe the horse has a history of breaking slowly. All right. Well, in that specific example, if Clockers had like seen a new gate work or something, and it seemed like all systems go, that’s all positive information.

And the 14 to one on the horse, that’s six to one of the tote is probably value the six to one. That’s a number created. From real money being bet the 14 to one, that’s a bookie making up a number. That number is much more likely to be wrong than the crowd who is actually very, very wise. There is a ton of signal when you’re looking at tote markets, all that said.

Value should be more about what price do you think the horse should be an is the price longer [00:33:00] than that? I can’t look at it any other way. I respect the wisdom of the crowds, but I can’t defer to them completely to me. And I’ll do this sometimes at a big race, all make a hundred percent odds line on every horse folks in the UK.

This is a great thing to be able to do when you can get the fish price. You’re going to want to look to bet the horses that are bigger than that line, who cares if the horse is heavily, heavily bet on the tote, if you didn’t like it anyway. In that same example, you had the 14 to one at 20 to one. I don’t care that the tote says it’s six to one.

That’s not value because in my estimation, the horse should have been the price that makes it not value based on the available opportunity. Your thoughts on value JK and how it factors into your. Analysis. I know you’re more of a selection oriented player. You’ve said you try to create value through your bedding, but just in terms of your handicapping, surely there’s [00:34:00] some relationship to it.

Or one of the things what’s tricky about this weekend, you know, the UNHC itself is it changes the way that I play on a daily basis. Right? It’s like I’m looking for courses that I think provide value based on my ability to build tickets solely around them. When other people are using multiples, other multiples in the race, or they’re betting the multiple inefficiently, then there’s an opportunity for value there.

And that’s what I look for when I’m normally looking. But then when you play in a contest, like the NHC value is different in that situation. You, you you’re limited the plays, your limited to pressing your opinion. So you want to try to find horses that, that offer more value in the, in the terms of like, you know, 10 to one, 12 to one, when they should be five to one, six to one, finding those horses or horses that are 20 to one that should be eight to one or whatever that is.

Or, or even just a 20 to one that should be 20 to one that you think has a live shot. And 20 to one is worth a lot of money in that contest. It’s, it’s a very [00:35:00] valuable. Thing to have. So for me, value is, is always been whether it’s sports betting or horses or anything is, is, am I getting paid more than, than I should if I’m right, based on the odds of it actually happening.

And, and, and that can just be a mental thing. It can be a feel thing. It could be a purely math thing. Where are you going to lay it all out on paper? Usually it’s a field for me. Um, and like I said, by trying to build around a horse that could be four to five and a multi race bet where I’m going to have a $20.

Pick three or whatever it might be, um, that that’s one way to go about it, but there’s other ways to go about it as well. So just finding value is, is ultimately the most important thing. If you’re going to play this game or any other gambling game day in, day out, I think we’ve described value very well.

Contests change it. They change it a whole lot, especially live band contest, and we’ll get to that in a minute, but even in mythical money contests, I think the best players are probably using [00:36:00] some element of fantasy sports strategy at this point. And this is a topic I want to have Garrett schema on here to discuss.

And it relates a little bit to the point we were making before about how a horse is a price on the board, but within the environment of the contest can be a different price. And this goes in both directions, right? There’s the example of the cap horse that everybody has. So is de facto worth less. And then there’s the example.

Of the horse who’s worth more than whatever his price is simply because some people won’t play the horse. Now, Scott Coles made a great example of this by having, I can’t remember if it was a 20 to one shot in a seven horse field or something now. On the show with Steve Beck, I talked to Dave Goodfried about those type of horses and I was theorizing very much like Scott ended up doing that.

They’d be worth more because so many fewer people in the contest would have him. Dave’s point was I don’t even look at six and seven horse fields because half the money you bet in a contest like the [00:37:00] NHC. Is to place. And you know, you’re going to get chiseled on your place price in the short field favorites, going to be so likely to run second, even if it’s not the favorite.

If the price can only be so big in that field, but I still think overall you’re better off just like fantasy players are looking for under owned players to get more bang for the buck that maybe you’re getting more bang for your buck. And it’s like the old Jeff Saltman quote, which we put into the winning contest player.

Short field long price. That’s the way. Yeah. I’m looking at it a little bit more these days though. Certainly by the math Dave’s point is correct of those two ideas. Which one are you more simpatico with? Oh, I’m actually sitting here thinking about it. They both make sense. I think that there’s, you know, I kind of agree with both if that’s possible.

I think that Scott’s point that, uh, finding a, you know, a 20 to one shot in a small field that people, other people probably aren’t playing is worth more than that in a contest like the NHC. To Dave’s point as well as like, I think that makes [00:38:00] sense too. I never thought about it in half. The money you’re betting in a contest at the NAC is to place.

So there’s actually, there’s some value. There might just be two or three bucks, but two or three bucks that matter in the long run. So I think both points make a lot of sense. Let’s return to Bella feena for a minute. JK, not exactly the stylish performance, one hopes for when they bet a one to nine shot, but the figure didn’t come back too bad.

One 10 times from us one 10 time from us. So roughly a 99 and an argument Steve  made that I think makes a lot of sense. There might be something to the idea of getting a little bit battle tested, given what she’s going to be facing when she gets to the Kentucky Oaks. What did you think of Bella Faena?

Did the performance make you more or less likely to want to back her? For the Oaks? Her price remained steady at four to one in the future book. She’s had enough questionable races that I think I can see myself trying to beat her, [00:39:00] uh, when, when, when she becomes a, you know, a first or second choice in a really big race, um, you know, definitely don’t want to knock or the performance she ran.

Well, she was game like, uh, like you described and she got into a little bit of fight. Yeah, she was one to nine, but. But I still think she ran well enough in that spot. I’m going to look to try to beat her moving forward with, with some other talented horses that, that might present a little bit more value, kind of like we discussed earlier.

I think she’ll probably be over bet moving forward and hopefully she’ll keep winning until the Kentucky Oaks. And then. Oh, we’ll really be able to play against her. Then it’s hard to know. Yeah. Inclination is more to just hope she wins next time and probably not going to be betting her, but perhaps the closeness of the margin of victory means she won’t be as smashed in.

As you might think again, it’s all going to depend who shows up. It’s probably going to be against over-matched rivals in California, but I think my gut is sit on the hands next time. Route for the route and then maybe have one, depending on what happens going into the first [00:40:00] Friday in may, but potentially get on the bandwagon of trying to oppose there.

And I mentioned that I’d imagine the next time they’re going to run against that. She’ll run. She’ll run against that floor. Delamar for, for Bob Baffert of course. Yeah. Santa Nita know the Santa Anita Oaks, right? Yeah, I would imagine that’ll probably be the next time that Bellfina hits the racetrack.

She’ll probably hook up with, with, with that Philly, unless she shows up in a different spot earlier than that. But, uh, unimagined, at some point we’ll get them on the same race track, and that’ll be fun. What’s your gut of who you’d prefer in that match up thinking about it now. Yeah, I think my lean would be to floor Delamar just based on the fact that her figure wasn’t crazy fast last time, but she also wasn’t.

Crazy ass last time. I think they’ll obviously going to be a lot of improvement to be made there. Um, lightly raced facing against, uh, facing affiliate like Bellfina if, and when they run against each other, that’s, you know, one grade stakes and it was great. And six tested and was the favorite in the Breeder’s cup, juvenile fillies, all of these different, different things that I think.

We’ll take a lot of [00:41:00] money going towards Bella and leave maybe a little bit of an opportunity on floor Delamar. We probably wouldn’t have talked about, but for who ran second inspector Linley, getting the job done in a turf steak at Tampa. But how about your old buddy Divisadero making a bold run? Did you back and what did you think of the race?

He always shows up. Does any of that game thing where he is? Um, you know, I didn’t play the race in the contest. I was thinking about playing in the caucus. I didn’t like anything around it. Uh, to play anything, multi race, I just didn’t have a strong opinion. Um, I figured one of those three horses that ran one, two, three was going to win.

Whoever got the best trip. I wasn’t gonna be able to determine that whether it was inspector Lindley, Divisadero, or turbine and inspector Lindley got that trip up the rail and got the job done. Uh, it’s a great race first back for Divisadero, since, you know, since being off since December. I think that you can go ahead and Mark him down as the winner of the, of the, uh, Churchill turf classic [00:42:00] he’s he’s the mile and an eighth on that, on that turf course is obviously something he likes very, very much that turf course in general.

I think he’ll be, he’ll be extremely tough traveling in the same direction. It looks like he’ll, he’s been traveling in the past and improving, and I think he’ll be hard to beat in that race. Over that course we’ll have to look for a future book for that one. I don’t know that it exists, but it would be a lot of fun to get some money down early on our old buddy to visit Dara.

We’ve been talking about him for years on this show and it was good to see him put in another nice effort. I have a listener email I want to get to, and I have a confession to make. So I’ve gotten a lot of good questions in the last couple of months since the new show started. And I have not done a good job at all, keeping track of them.

So help me out here. JK production meeting in the middle of a show. What do you think is the best way to keep questions organized? We could do it via [00:43:00] hashtag. I could create a special email. See we no longer have the dedicated podcast email, like we used to have. And that was one way that I dealt with it.

Then what comes to your mind? Cause I know I’ve said to six people, that’s a great question. We’ll do it on the show. We’ll try to get to it on the show. And then when it comes time, like now where we actually have a minute to do it on the show, I have no idea of. Finding those things because my brain is so scattered trying to get this new show up and running, talking to sponsors, doing all this stuff.

And you know, not to mention 20 hours of broadcasting in Vegas. Anyway, before you break out the world’s smallest violin for me, love and everything that’s happening, but I do want to get more organized. I want the listeners to be able to contribute more to the show. You know, when I thank everybody at the end, it’s very sincere and I want to do more to make us into a little bit of a tight knit community here.

Any ideas. I think the Twitter Jack is a great idea. I think if you can, if you can, uh, someone asks a question and you can just encourage them to follow that question up with, with, with a tweet, with a [00:44:00] hashtag that we can always kind of look through to find it also kind of gets a conversation going about it.

Uh, via Twitter. If someone asks the question and they see it, we respond to it. Uh, there can be a kind of a pre-conversation to be had prior to us addressing it on the show. So I think that could be a lot of fun in general. So even when someone emails, maybe Pete, I would just say really appreciate the email, but let’s get some conversations started about this.

Do you mind tweeting the question and using this hashtag. And that way we can, uh, we can, we can, it’s a good place to keep them keeping, keep them, uh, lined up, but also a way to, to kind of add to the, to the depth of the conversation that we can have. When we finally talk about it on show, I like this producer, JK, this is a good hat for you to wear and.

With tweets able to be longer now and the ability to do more than one tweet in a row, people shouldn’t really miss out. Right. I mean, you could probably get across almost any idea in a series of two or three tweets. Absolutely. Absolutely. I think that it shouldn’t be a problem at all, uh, to [00:45:00] be able to, uh, to get your thought out and get your question out and I, and a couple of, uh, and a couple of tweets, if not, uh, if not just one, so.

That makes the obvious question. What’s the hashtag I wrote something down here while we’re talking, but you’re good at this game usually. And what do you think it should be? Well, we can keep it clean and just make it like ITM podcast or we could do hashtag just in the money. Um, or if you want to be a little bit more specific, you can do like ask.

You know, ITM or in the money or whatever kind of fun. I like, I like that let’s do that. I had written down ITM pod, but I like ask ITM. Let’s do that. Help us out. Come up with a question. We’ll get to them soon. Not sure about Friday. We got so many races to talk about, but next Tuesday should be a pretty good day to do that.

Use the hashtag ask ITM and also. Do not feel bad at all. If you’ve asked me a question recently, whether or not I even responded to you, but especially if I said, Oh, we’ll try to get to that and [00:46:00] go ahead and re-ask it there. Then when I’m on the show, I can just pull up a hashtag. I can see everything in one place and you’ll be doing me a real favor.

Good ideas. Both JK. So that’s what I’m here for. And I want to read an email. We’ll do a little bit more of this now, the easiest way to get me longer form stuff, especially if it’s not a question. I like the idea of trying to do the questions on Twitter, but there is a contact screen over at, in the money podcast.com.

And we got this from listener Jake, which I just enjoyed the story. I’ll read it to you JK and you can give your. Reaction to it just wanted to share a quick story that proved to me how degenerates are made in this game. Basically new to handicapping. I initially played a lot of chalk, but since have changed my ways due to discussions on the podcast and seeing how important value is, and he references you saying you want to try to turn a four to one into a 14 to one.

Well, I’m experimenting with a few strategies. And I got down to the last two bucks [00:47:00] in my ADW account, decided it was pretty much over at that point and decided to do a last $2 box exact, I guess he means $1 box exactly. In the sixth race at Santa Anita on Thursday, ditching the PPS because of how bad I was doing that day.

I saw a value pick in the Baffert horse being 26 to one, and the one being along price. Even though she’d won in her last start, I boxed them and planned to go back to the drawing board and not deposit more until Derby day. Well, that didn’t happen because the five led the entire way and turned the favorite away in the stretch, which allowed the one to get up for place at the last second, my $1 box paid two Oh five 40 and I learned at that moment.

Why people turn into degenerates playing this game, LOL, sorry for the long story, but just wanted to share with you that you’re badgering of JKS. Love of chalk played a crucial role in my hitting the most hilarious bed of my life. Keep doing what you’re doing, guys. Uh, you’ve been one of the reasons why my interest in horse racing has grown and listening to the show is one of my [00:48:00] favorite parts of the week.

Thank you, Jake. Very much for that. Your thoughts JK. Hey, man, look, when you can do those types of things and you can find those types of horses, that’s a great opportunity to make some money. And at times there’s times where it happens for me as well. It’s just the way my brain works in that, in that, in that different way where I like to see the ball go through the hoop and I just don’t have the, the mental.

Stamina to handle getting beat over the head by horses that are harder to get home. So congratulations. I’m glad that my suffering is your reward. This reminds me, I didn’t get to another point I wanted to make about how value changes in contests. Some of these chalk plays you famously made JK these favorite to favorite doubles.

They’re not bets you’d ever make in real life. They don’t make sense in real life. In fact, You probably go so far as to say they’re bad bets in real life, but when you’re playing them in a contest and hitting that super high strike rate bet, get ready for the [00:49:00] familiar refrain that no one else is doing within the context of the contest puts you in a position to take money out of the prize pool.

And in that way, You can turn an even money outcome into three to one, four to one, sometimes 10 to one, just depending on how much you’re risking to get into the contest and in that wager and how much you’re able to pull out of the contest via the prize pool. So when I say it’s bad, bad in real life, doesn’t mean it’s not a great bet in the context of the contest, how much does that play into some of the chock stuff you’ve become famous for?

No, it’s it’s, that’s the only reason I, I, like you said, it’s not something I do in a normal setting in real life, but it is something that you can do in a contest where the added money from the prize pool makes the two to one property position that you’re on the racetrack six to one seven Oh one. And if you, you know, like I tell people all the time, if, if you’re betting two [00:50:00] to ones that are paying 71, uh, you’ll make money in this game.

And that’s kind of the only reason that I’ve kind of gone that path. It’s it works well for my brain. It works well for the types of horses that I feel like I can identify. And, uh, it, it’s an easy way to, to, to limit the amount of plays that I’m making, because we talk about it all the time. You’re going to be wrong more than you’re.

Right. And so if I. Put myself in a position where I’m making seven bets in a day, uh, only one or two are going to be right. I prefer just make one or two bats and hope that those are the, actually the two that I was going to get. Right. Anyways. And, uh, and, and avoid the losing. Is it really correct to say you’ve never done that outside the context of a contest?

No, not, I mean, not, you know, famously the Del Mar one, right? That was like the big of 10, 12, $15,000 double that I played in Roadster, unique Bella, in that situation. Know, no, I’ve never done anything crazy like that in real life. Um, Maybe like a thousand dollars double in real life is like the, [00:51:00] just, just for no reason, that’s the biggest I’ve ever done, but, um, never, never liked that.

All right. I think we’ve done about enough for this edition of the show. We’ll keep it a little short. I’m a little talked out after 20 plus hours this week, and again, not expecting any sympathy, it was a blast, but we’re going to save the vocal chords. We’re going to get to some of the other work that is sitting on the docket right now.

Do you have a final thought JK for this NHC wrap-up edition of. The, in the money players podcast. I almost said the letters. Uh, it’s always fun if you’ve never participated in it and you should make it, uh, make it a point to, to get out here. Um, and enjoy this, the, you know, what, uh, what many call, the greatest horseplayer convention it’s available to the staff of the entire?

I do a great job to make sure it’s a special experience experience for, for all the players. And then just the people that you get to meet. You know, I guess if you, like you look back at my first NHC, I had one, two friends and racing, um, and now I’ve got, uh, hundreds and, and, and [00:52:00] met a couple more. New ones this weekend.

So it doesn’t stop. No matter how many years you’ve been here, you continue to meet new people that can kind of help you expand your role in this game and, and become a better player. And to make this hobby one that is financial benefit to you. And, and so, uh, The NHC does a great job of, of kind of setting that up for people.

We’re getting all of J K’s greatest hits. You’re going to lose more than you win. I had one friend now I have a hundred. We, I don’t know. We talked about Divisadero. We really is the, the JK greatest dance dancer. Oh my goodness. I will just reiterate what you said about what a fantastic event it is. They do such a good job putting it on Michelle, Raven craft key Chamblin and the rest of the crew always have a good time out there.

And when we offer, uh, critiques and ask for maybe a little more transparency or some format tweaks, it’s not because we don’t like the event. It’s because we love it so much. And we just want to see it continue to not only survive, but thrive as we go [00:53:00] forward. And with that, we’re going to close this edition of the, in the money players podcast.

Remember for those questions, hashtag I T M pod, couple other notes. I am launching a, just giving page for this race I’m doing at the end of March in London for the UK, make a wish foundation going to have a fun contest associated with it. I will either announce that. On Friday or next Tuesday, I’ll put something up in the blog, be on the lookout for that also might be doing another listener survey soon, but don’t worry about that.

Basically all these things you can check out. If you look in the blog in the money podcast.com, I want to thank Jonathan kitchen. I want to thank our friends at the thoroughbred retirement foundation and 10 strike racing, especially Marshall Graham for his fantastic achievement. The. Big finishes at both the BCBC and the [00:54:00] NHC.

There are not too many. Who’ve done that before. There are some others, but there are not too many. Most of all, I want to thank all of you. The listeners you make the show so much fun to do. I talked about it on the appearance I did with Jason beam on his show. This week, you might want to check that out.

JK was on there too last week. Maybe I’ll pop links to both of those in the blog post as well. We will be back on Friday. I’m Peter Thomas foreign, a towel. May you win all your photos?

In the sixth race at Santa Anita on third. Let’s try that again.