Show #2: Friday, December 28, 2018

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

[00:00:00] Your listening to the, in the money players podcast. Hello and welcome to the, in the money players podcast. This is show number two. It is Friday, December 28th. As we record this, I am Peter Thomas.  back with you, but not in the Brooklyn bunker today, out at my father’s office. And no, I’m not talking about.

The hamburger joint in Santa Monica or wherever that is. I am talking about the actual office where my father used to work out in the house where I grew up on port Washington, long Island out here for the holidays. We’ve got a fun show for you today. Truncated show. It is the holidays. We’re taking it a little bit easy on ourselves.

We want to check in with you all and do about 30 minutes talking mainly about [00:01:00] opening day at Santa Anita and having a little bit of fun. And then we will be back early next week with a more serious show where we go in depth about the eclipse awards. But today we’re not going to do anything, all that serious.

And joining me by remote. A man who’s never all that serious. He is back from California only. Barely. It sounds like back on the planet, Texas. He’s the people’s champion. Jonathan Kenshin JK. How are you today? I am back. I am in, uh, I’m sitting on my couch here in Austin. Um, if I’m, if I’m not screaming it’s because my, my seven year old who was, uh, who was, uh, was a trooper yesterday when we were traveling.

Uh, it’s still sleeping. So I’m trying to keep him, uh, keep him getting some more rest so that he doesn’t, uh, he doesn’t wake up like a furious tornado, terrorize us all. We all know how that goes. JK and I was going to [00:02:00] accuse you of a low energy performance on today’s show, but that explanation gets you right off the hook, you know, just how to make it work.

Speaking of children in the holidays, have you ever played the game operation JK? I have, I have played the game. It used to make me nervous when I was a kid. Have you played it with Austin in the, in the last few years? No, I don’t think I have actually, I was just bringing it up because whoever invented the Charlie horse in the game of operation is on my list.

I’m going to start, you know, like. Uh, Nixon and my buddy, Chris Jericho started keeping a list and the guy who invented the Charlie horse and operation is on my list. I don’t think it’s possible to get the darn thing out of their JK without making the, uh, the machine buzz. And it’s, it’s making me a little crazy it’s to the point where I’m ready to play it when parent isn’t there, just so I can see if I could do it under quiet and normal circumstances.

So I can relate to you in terms of some of the frustration, it sounds like you’ve been going through. I do have to bring one other [00:03:00] thing up, uh, regarding your travel. Cause you just said something. I, the listeners just need to hear JK. Um, you know what I’m referring to? You can just repeat it or do I have to draw it out of you?

I’ll let you go. Okay. So I believe I clearly the equipment very, very fortunate. We’ve got our own setup now. Uh, our friend DJ on stable helped me get it set up, but it’s clearly not working because. What it sounded like you just said was that you weren’t, you were supposed to go to England, but you weren’t going to go to England unless you could get first-class.

Now I know, you know, in the past you had the private plane at some point you had to sell it due to a bad weekend at the track. These things happen. But I mean, this might be the, the snobby just first world problem that we’ve ever discussed on the, in the money players podcast, or the show that proceeded it.

This is going to be a longer explanation necessary, but for people who don’t know, [00:04:00] my mom retired from American airlines and I am her registered companion. So I get to like fly for free free note to sell future bingo square idea. I fly for free. Well, I’m always jumping from place to place because it’s free and standby though.

So although there’s a lot of, there’s a lot of perks to it. I can, you know, first-class is available. I’ll get first-class at no additional charge. But there’s also days like yesterday where I got to the airport at 9:00 AM and I did not walk into my house in Austin until 1145 at night. So for a couple of our flight, really?

So those are the negatives that come with it. So because those negatives come with it, I do debate in some things a certain time. I don’t have to, I don’t have to, to go to London. So if I don’t, if I’m not going to go, if I’m not going to get first-class, then. I’ll wait to go another time where I will, because to be honest, like it’s why going to London for four days makes sense.

If you can get first, cause you can sleep on the way there sleep on the way [00:05:00] back, you don’t really lose anything. So that’s the reason for my snobby room. All right. That’s fair. And I assume an MK show is on the agenda. If you get over there, I’m sure it’s sold out, but we do have a lot of. English listeners.

A lot of MK fans. Listen, I saw, I was just curious what, which of the is didn’t you say he’s playing all around the country on a, on new year’s Eve eight plays, London, London, uh, new year’s Eve night at 1230, I think, or no at like 1130. So he plays through the, you know, the ball dropping or whatever, and then he is out.

I’m not going with him on this, but he’s out the back door. To, uh, I don’t know exactly what airport to fly to literally take a private jet from London, from London to Manchester. And he plays at three 30 in the morning. There. And then, uh, but I’m skipping that one. That’s pretty cool. That would be fun. And, uh, to get some legitimate, private plane experience, at some point, we’re going to do this show from apply private plane.

It’s a, it’s a [00:06:00] dream of mine that will have to come true. Hey, one other little bit of business before we start talking about racing the numbers from the first show J K RN and. They were spectacular. And I just wanted to thank the listeners for sticking with us, even though we weren’t on iTunes, we barely missed a blip.

Now I don’t mean to be unappreciative of the previous show sponsor, because like we said, we give them a lot of credit for help getting us up and running and believing in us at the beginning. But it’s pretty clear to me that, that, uh, assessment we made that we were ready to fly on our own. Is absolutely true.

We haven’t missed a beat and I just want to thank the listeners so much for that makes life so much easier. Next week when we actually get an, a non holiday week and it’s time to go out and start wrangling some sponsors to be able to show that that we haven’t missed a thing. Were you surprised at all to hear how strong surprise might not be the right word?

I was [00:07:00] relieved. Uh, just, uh, I, I kind of expected it. I mean, I, you know, Like we said before, we were fortunate enough to get a lot of good feedback. So I felt like people, you know, like and listened to the show. I guess my biggest thing was is that we pretty much ripped away every way that people normally listened to.

So the, the numbers that we got, people had to go out of their way and that’s, that was, that was probably the part I was the most. Uh, thankful for and impressed with, and that’s why the thing thanks to the listeners are in order. It wasn’t as simple as, Oh, it pops up in your feed and you have to listen.

You had to go out of your way. And we thank you for doing that. Speaking of going out of your way, you did hit Santa Anita for opening day. We’re going to talk about some of the specifics of racing. Actually. Let’s do that. We’ve we’ve done enough. Bantering among ourselves. Let’s start with McKinsey. JK. I saw the tweet you put out about, uh, tabbing him as your choice already for the 2019 breeders’ cup classic.

I was a little more in [00:08:00] line with the camp who was thinking, uh, this was, uh, a performance that suggested the 2019 mile winner. How good was McKinsey on this day? Well, I thought he was really impressive, you know, he circled the field and just, you know, it was all, you know, it was all elbows for Mike at that point.

Um, once he kind of went clear, I thought he was really impressive. And, and, and for a horse that, in my opinion, uh, it’s weird. Like why people are like thinking he’s like a one turn horse. I saw some, a moron. That’s what I said on. He was trying to, who was trying to, uh, Who’s who, who just needs so badly to be acknowledged that he, he wants to get into it.

He’s it? I didn’t see this. I didn’t see the one you were talking about, which, which I’m feeling I’m feeling bad about. It’s uh, it sounds like it could have some fun here. No, it’s very annoying. She’s trying to like, literally honestly, poking the bear. It isn’t what it was. Are you the bear in this analogy?

I’m always the bear speaking of a [00:09:00] bear. Okay. So let me finish the McKinsey. And then I had to tell you about a story I forgot to tell you about, and it’s going to be great to tell you live. I, cause I literally did forget. I thought he was really impressive. And look, he, he he’s won two turn races, big ones.

He won the Pennsylvania Derby ran well. He ran so bad in the classic. That was not a, I can’t go a mile and a quarter bad performance. That was a, something’s not right. I didn’t run well performance and it’s not like he wasn’t involved in a, in a pace that was pretty quick. And it wasn’t like the ask of getting him ready for the classic.

Wasn’t a lot anyways. I think with time and maturity and a full campaign, and really being able to get some, some, some races underneath Isabel, I don’t see why he can’t get a mile and a quarter. So especially at Santa Anita at his home track, so on and so forth. So yeah, I do. I think he’s probably the most talented, um, horse we, we have in training.

Obviously accelerate, but still, you know, from that point. So [00:10:00] I think he’s, I think he was really good. I thought it was really impressive. And winning that race against those horses, there were some good horses in there. Yeah. Is accelerate done after the Pegasus? Is that why you, uh, I would think, I would think so.

Maybe I feel bad that I haven’t actually, I don’t have to feel bad about saying that I didn’t read the article

fair point. Sure. It’s there. I’m sure that, that, you know, one of the great writers there is. Put something together about accelerates plan. I just haven’t seen it, but I would imagine he’ll be done after the Pegasus. What more, what more? I mean, he’s got a stallion career from that point moving forward. So I would imagine that that will be his last year.

The way you phrase that statement about McKinsey and in training, I was assuming that you were, that you had with new definitively. About the other horse, because obviously that would be a strange statement to make if they were both, if you consider accelerates still in training, that’s a trickier statement to make, but you’re projecting into the future.

You’re talking about, uh, you’re talking about moving forward and from that point of view, I [00:11:00] absolutely, uh, get what you’re talking about. I just thought that. Some horses, it was one of those efforts visually. Um, to be honest, I haven’t looked at what the figures came back yet, which I probably should have done before the show.

It’s about been a little disoriented out here, you know, how it is when you’re, when you’re, uh, traveling and it’s the holidays and you’re doing relatives things and, and, uh, not maybe as prepared as I should be, but that not withstanding the visual impression was such that it was a. It was to me a tour to for performance.

I don’t want to say regardless of what the clock says, but I’m just pretty darn sure it’s going to come out well on the clock, just because of how well it looks when you’re just sorta you’re running in the race and then you’re everyone else is still in that race you were running in and you’re running in your own race.

It was one of those. And I don’t know, it just gave such a, I’m not saying that you are wrong, that he couldn’t be a major contender for the classic, but it’s just, my first thought was, wow. That just looked like a ma mile type. Yeah, [00:12:00] effort, you know, uh, that’s why, that’s why my head went there. Not that I was disagreeing with you, just that I had some thoughts in my head that appeared before that one.

I wouldn’t, I don’t have a problem with them winning both races. Right. I mean, you know, you run say he runs in the Pegasus, then they give him some time and, you know, give him some time off and then he shows back up. You know, running in the met mile. And then he runs in some of the summer stuff, whether it’s the Pacific classic or if he decides to take the mile and an eighth route and go to Saratoga, there’s those options as well.

And then, then he comes back and he can still run in the cloud. I mean, you could do both of those races. I mean, let’s remember like mind your biscuits did and didn’t work out well for him. Um, but, but he did, you know, he, he made the double there at least. Yes. He made, he made a tomato to the gate, uh, made it to the gate, looking to the likes of us, like he had a strong chance.

So that is something let’s talk about. Prices. You mentioned about wanting to make this bat. I saw one outlier price of 25 to one. I [00:13:00] don’t know how real it is. If you could get 25 to one McKinsey for the classic, that’s a straight up buy for you. No, no. I mean, I I’d have to say no because our, our, uh, a friend of ours, ed DeRosa actually messaged me on Twitter and offered me 25 to one.

Um, I guess I was hoping for a little bit more wise guy than that. I mean, I guess like in my brain, I was thinking there was somewhere where people wouldn’t believe in a horse that just won the Malibu’s going to win the classic. And I could get 50 to one because he’s obviously had issues and we’re like 340 days away from it.

Um, interesting. See, I thought that was a, I thought that was a, if it was something you were interested in to me, that would be an excellent price. And I figured the real price would be half of that, which is what it seems like. It is looking around to a few other shops and seeing, and seeing tens and twelves.

So yeah, it’s, it’s just a sell for me than it. It’s just definite sell it 10 and 12. Gotcha. More in the whole range at [00:14:00] 25. Yeah, exactly. Speaking of buy, sell hold. Now I’m going to put out a, we’re going to put out a warning here. If you haven’t gotten through all seven seasons of game of Thrones, you might want to skip over this a little bit.

I just don’t know how spoiler-y the conversation is going to go. It might end up not being terribly spoiler-y, but anyway, if you’re like nuts about spoilers and you’re not through season seven, You know, hit that little fast forward button three or four times and see what we’re talking about after that buy, sell, hold JK on who will rule the iron throne at the end of season eight, currently installed as the favorite, just under three to one, we have a Denaris target Aryan, and then we have a line of contenders in behind her, including Sansa and John Stark at three to one.

Brand Starks six to one, Aria seven to one the night King himself at eight to one teary and attends Searcy, a twenties gingery at 25, along with Jamie and then a verus is sort of the wiseguy [00:15:00] contender in there at 75 to one, any, uh, any fancies looking over that odd sport. Uh, you know, I think Danny’s a good favor.

I think that, I think that daddy’s a good favorite. Is she a little too obvious? Is she a little too obvious as my only is my only concern there to take such a short price. When though, I guess you could argue. So the way her arc progressed through, through last season, maybe it was to after season six, she looked nailed on, she looked long odds on and they’ve sort of backed out of that maybe as a way to bring her in though.

So you’re probably right. That’s the, that is the right favorite. Tough. I think John, snow’s probably a little wise guy, you know, a little dressed up, maybe loose, loose on the lead last time on a good rail. Yeah. He seems like he should, but I feel like it’s probably too obvious. I’m going to go. I’m going to take a, I’m going to take the seventh on Aria.

I liked that. I like that. I think [00:16:00] there’s a little bit of value there. When you look at the name of the whole thing from the beginning, you have to figure, you know, song of ice and fire. Well, which two characters does that seem to represent? And the fact that it’s not it just now where we sit after seven seasons, it feels too obvious to me to go Denaris or to go.

Or, or to go John and I like where you’re going with that. Do you have a plucky fan, favorite character? Who’s been on this amazing journey. I like where you’re going. Perhaps you could, you could Dutch them too. You can bet like three, three stark Dutch. You can get an even, you could probably get an even money return.

If you take Danny Johnson million already, the math guys are going to be all over us. All right. Spoiler portion over. If you’ve been scrubbing through to get past the spoilers, we will not talk about game of Thrones anymore. Well, I did say weeks ago we were going to do a game of Thrones buy, sell hold. So I had to make sure that we, uh, that we got that in there.

How did things work out [00:17:00] betting wise for you on opening day at Santa Anita? Um, miss the early pig five with that horse, that Jose rode the one horse, uh, in like the third race. Miss that one was, was lucky enough to hear about the pipe he maiden in the fifth. Uh, last second, uh, we, the chappy chappy came through and gave us some advice there on that one.

Um, he was eight to one, so, you know, whatever. And then in the late pick five, I missed, uh, what did I miss Sadler off? Chad Brown. Yes. Yes. I miss a gift box that he caused me to pick six, two gift boxes. So, um, yeah, it is what it is. Angle there. Interesting angle there. If you don’t mind, do you mind me interjecting for a second?

No, no, no. Of course something that Mike Maloney mentioned to me long ago. Sometimes when you see horses move a couple of horses move from one barn to another. Whatever the first horse does often, if the first [00:18:00] horse runs above or below, what would be expected, it will typically, it can typically be a pointer that the other horses going that way might follow a similar trajectory, which I just thought was kind of interesting.

Now that we’ve seen two horses go from Brown to Sadler and both run really well. I just thought that was something Mike mentioned during the book, we had no way of squeezing it in the book, but it sort of stuck with me as something I look for because you do see that pattern sometimes with horses. So that was all I had to, to mention about that.

But you go ahead. Yeah. It makes a ton of sense. It, so it was that, but it was also that. I believe it was Andy Harrington, one of the workout reports that he was doing. Okay. The other one said he was doing like C plus C plus. So, so when you have a narrative like that anyways, you know, off Chad Brown, and then you see C plus D plus it’s an easy, it’s an easy one to try to run away from.

And obviously it was a mistake. So let’s, let me ask you that. When you see workout reports [00:19:00] contradict each other, how do you determine what to do. And it’s just a wash for me. Usually I just, I go with my handicapping, you know, I just consider it a wash and just go with the handicap or I’ll read them and actually read what the, you know, how it, what the definition was of the work, the description, you know, cause sometimes what will happen in those situations is like, you know, this isn’t what happened with gift box.

But just as an example, gift box we’ll work with accelerate and accelerate. We’ll dust them. And one guy will give them a C plus. But the other guy will grade the work, understanding that he was working against the greatest horse, uh, and, and, and the world right now. And so, you know, on a curve, essentially, it’s like grading a test on a curve and, and to me, that’s what you would have to do.

Right. But, you know, from some of the guys who did their opinions vary, so you have to, you have to kind of read the, the, the, the paragraph about the horse, about the work, which is something that I try to do more than just looking at the grade anymore. [00:20:00] It’s tough man, but because it is so subjective, I mean, I breeders’ cup week now I’m no expert, but I’ve spent enough mornings in the company of Sean Clancy, watching horses work that I feel like there’s a tiny little bit of it’s rubbed off, uh, by osmosis.

I certainly wouldn’t put my looks opinion against anybody. Clocking professionally, but I still have an opinion that I think there is some signal in, and I’ve seen horses work to my mind. Great. That other Clockers had things they, they, they were crabbing about. Usually I don’t see the physical, I don’t see little.

Physical things the same way somebody who’s trained would ever do. I’m looking at more of a, more of a general picture and much more from a betting perspective than anything really in the weeds. Now at the breeders’ cup. In that instance, I was right there. Sure. There’s plenty of instances where I’m wrong, but it just underlines how it can be very subjective.

And it’s not crazy even without the, in the company angle that [00:21:00] one person’s. B plus, um, I almost feel like one person’s B plus, or at least B could very easily be somebody else’s C does that match your experience? Sure. Different opinions give you different. That’s why I like to see both because, you know, obviously if you get a double B plus now, you know, that you’re, you know, everyone agrees the horses working amazing.

Um, but then you can also get the double C. Is is even better where, you know, now, you know, there’s two different people who said the horse didn’t work well. So I like, you know, but it’s the same reason that I use, you know, time form us and buyer time form us and other figures. I like to see, I want to, I need to opinions cause they’re, they are, you know, figures are very scientific.

However, there is a. Dash and a sprinkle of, of opinion, maybe even a little bit more than that. Maybe definitely even to two parts, you know, maybe it’s two parts, uh, opinion, but a lot of it’s science as well. So I want to see, I want to see both, um, when I came to me, it’s a [00:22:00] data, the, the data behind figure making, it’s a, uh, a beautiful blend of art and science, whereas workouts to me, much more, much more in the line of art.

Now, what you. Said, they’re very interesting to me. It sounds like you find more signal in the negative workout stuff than in the positive workout stuff. Is that accurate? Yes. I, I, I like nothing makes me happier than a horse. Who’s four or five, six to one. Who has see workouts and you can toss. There’s so much value there.

If you can, if those, if those situations work and obviously there’s not value that anti evaluation gift box runs a huge race and beat you, it’s not magic. You’re you’re you know what I mean? It’s it’s we always talk about this with successful horseplayer successful gamblers of Annie Stripe. It’s not magic.

It’s like being a card counter in a casino. All you’re trying to do over time is turn that edge in your favor. Just because you get bit [00:23:00] by gift box doesn’t mean your methodology is wrong or should change. It means it didn’t work out that time. You have to evaluate the process. You have to evaluate the decisions.

You cannot get too stuck in on the outcome, or you’ll just be lost going from thing to thing to thing and be donating money. Here’s when it was magic and the fifth, the maiden race, where a piping one, uh, Baffert had two in there, uh, six to five and then had a half the plum pretty who obviously no one liked was 16 to one.

Those two horses had bad workouts and were out of the super high five. I mean, I don’t, I think scalper was six to five and ran six. I believe. So there is magic there when you can find those situations. Um, it doesn’t happen too often, obviously, but when you can find them, it does work out. Well, a few other things to follow up on, you sent me a text that I was very confused about.

You were alive, even with the third choice, winning the first race you had a $25 [00:24:00] ticket that would have hit if it wasn’t for gift box. Oh, that pick five. Yeah. Yes. Oh my God. How did you, how did you come up with that? You come up with that. I get it. If you’re making a Dutch type play all the way through, but when you have a big price winning, well, not that big, but when you have a third choice winning the first leg, who wasn’t your top pick, I didn’t understand how you could have that big of a combination going forward.

I had spice professionals. My second choice, no third, a third, but I didn’t, um, I didn’t give a dream tree very much credit. I had, I kinda like faded her a little bit. So it helped. Yeah. You must have faded her a lot to have that kind of combination going forward. That that’s, that is wild stuff. All right.

You had a story to tell me that you said you haven’t told me yet from Santa Anita opening day. And then I heard some gossip I wanted to [00:25:00] ask you about maybe it’s maybe this is the same thing. It probably is. I won’t tell you the name of the person. And does it look TQ a Nadir? Probably like what it was.

Wait, what is a w what is he telling the story for? I’ve been the Eddie Logan a lot in my life, probably more than a hundred times. I’ve never seen it very classy. This is the story. This is the story I heard about that. I was going to ask you very classy establishment. However, there is a queen. And, and that establishment, there is one part, there is the boss and he, and Keith TQ.

It might seem like he’s the boss, but he will explain to you very quickly who the boss is. It is, it is Arcadia someone, whether it was true or not was getting a little testy with Arcadia, being a little bit choppy based on the, the, the, the time it took for some food to come or something. And in the meantime of that happening a regular of the Eddie Logan, Made a comment just to kind of a take it [00:26:00] easy comment.

And then there was a comment back and then it turned into like a bar situation where there, it was like people were holding each other back. Richard came, uh, ish, ish. Like it, you know, it was one of those. Yeah, you got, we’ve all seen it. Right. Um, the, the, the everyone’s holding each other back and there there’s some wild arms, but nothing really accomplishing.

Being accomplished like you at Churchill downs. J K. When I described as two dogs on leash barking at each other, is that what we’re that we’re dealing with here? Similar very similar. But, uh, anyways, it was, it was, uh, it was definitely entertaining that’s for sure. Nothing, nothing major happened. No chairs got flipped over or anything like that.

Just no drinks thrown in faces, just tempers, tempers, and tempers. That, that, that can flare when a few, few drinks are probably in the mix. Well, I’ll tell you what, I mean, it sounds to me pretty straightforward. Like you had some. Outside person being a jerk and somebody [00:27:00] being disrespectful to our kitty who works her butt off, she works so hard in there.

And I’ll tell you what, I would have been full on team guide, defending Workiva. Had I been in the mix? I mean, you know, maybe it, maybe it escalated a little too quickly, but, uh, it sounds to me from the way you’ve told the story, like there is a right and wrong party in here though, I guess, you know, keeping tempers under control and having a, uh, A broader palette of conflict resolution skills, as we say, isn’t, as I try to teach parents, isn’t the worst idea.

But, uh, I do think that the regulars heart was clearly in the right place. Yeah. Yes I do. I do. I think so. But, uh, like you said, probably got to find a different way to, to accomplish it. It says you, the guy who gets into, into skirmishes at a, at Churchill downs, It wasn’t quite a skirt.

Wasn’t quiet quite as good. I don’t know what you want to call it. Any other thoughts from this weekend at, uh, at Santa Anita? [00:28:00] Um, no, I, now that you mentioned that I do think spice profession ran really well. Good for her as a, as a Cal bread, winning that grade one and river Boyne is pretty good. Uh, I, you know, I I’d love to see river born.

Get on a plane next year, uh, and run against some of the East coast types. I mean, I, like I said, I’m not sure that he’s good enough, but he’s he is being, he’s becoming fairly dominant or. At least, uh, you know, he’s there and every race in California, it was a performance by river Boyne. To me that really did exude class in a way that not all the graded stakes wins in California, turf races, dude, I sound kind of flaky, I think, but a deep, do you know what I mean?

It didn’t seem like everything was going his way and it just seemed like. Found a way to get it done and, and appear in position at the right time and finish and just look better than the other horses in that race. Absolutely great. He grounded out, [00:29:00] um, and that’s in that spot. So I thought he ran really well.

All right. So we’ve talked about the steaks from Santa Anita. We’ve done a little bit of nonsense. I think in the spirit of going easy on ourselves, we’re going to leave it there for this edition of the, in the money players podcast. We are going to be back sooner rather than later with our eclipse awards show.

But I want to thank Jonathan kitchen more than usual. I want to thank all of you for listening and downloading. Keep it up. We’re on iTunes. Check us out there. Check us out wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, I’ll tell you what, if you really want to help leave us a review on iTunes. You’ll help us get our numbers back up to where they once were.

Um, very easy to do in this day and age helps other people find the show and we really appreciate it. We will be back on Monday. I’m Peter Thomas foreign, a towel [00:30:00] that you win all your bets.