Can Big Brown Avoid the Fate of Smarty Jones?

It’s been four years since we clung to the idea that Smarty Jones would take the Triple Crown in 2004. Four years since we last confronted the exciting possibility that we were about to end the drought since Affirmed, 30 years ago. I was certain Smarty would take it. Ron Turcotte, who rode Secretariat in the most smashing Belmont victory anyone will every see, promised us that Smarty would win the race by 25 lengths. Everyone was around the bend. We were a nation in love. A friend of mine dropped thousands of dollars for two good seats at the race and flew in from California to watch it. Down by the rail on the grandstand side, I stood with kids from Ohio and Virginia and Wisconsin. There were people there who go to the races all the time, and people who had never been to a race before, and all of them were there waving blue and white Smarty fans in the air; all of them were there to grab a look at what we were sure was about to be a moment in horse racing history. The horse had never lost a race, why would he lose this one? He’d already beaten all the best horses in the business, who was going to come out of the woodwork and beat him now?When they came onto the stretch, Smarty had the lead, and Belmont Park came apart. One hundred and fifty thousand people were jumping up and down and screaming with joy; it shook the earth, it was one of the best moments of my life.We all know how that story ends. Birdstone caught him. Edgar Prado apologized in the winner’s circle.Instead of crowning a new king, we shrugged our shoulders and added an entry to the other list, the list of near-misses. I remember the surreal scene back at the barns, everyone kicking around in a funk, a light rain falling in the dusk. We were worn out, defeated. I shook the hand of John Servis, the trainer of Smarty Jones, and congratulated him — it’d been a hell of a run. The dream was over.We’ve got another live one, another Big Horse. Big Brown hasn’t lost a race. Big Brown has beaten all of the best of his generation (save one). Big Brown is going to shake the earth at Belmont Park next Saturday.Are we primed for another disappointment? Or is this going to be the one?Forty-six horses have won two legs of the Triple Crown. A handful of them didn’t start in the third, including the greatest horse of all time, Man o’ War. He would have won the Kentucky Derby if his owner hadn’t thought that Kentucky was too far west to travel for racing. There are a few that make you shake your head and mutter that that was the horse, that was the one that should have won it. Shoulda, coulda, woulda doesn’t work in horse racing, of course, just ask anyone who isn’t smiling when the results become official.It goes without saying that all 46 of these horses were good racehorses — no matter what anyone says, you do not win two of the most prestigious races in America with a plater. Some of the horses had their talent augmented by luck (Funny Cide comes to mind) and others had their talent diminished the same way, like Spectacular Bid.Horse races are short, but there are a lot of ways to lose one, and it doesn’t matter which one you choose.The Belmont Stakes, specifically, is a tough race to win. There are some classic ways to lose it.Because the park is so big and the race is so long, jockeys can get their timing wrong. They think there’s only three furlongs to go, and they flip the switch and turn their horse on. They find out, too late, that there was another six furlongs left to run, and their horse can’t make it to the wire. This is what happened to Spectacular Bid — even if he stepped on a safety pin, he would have made it to the wire if Ronnie Franklin hadn’t gunned him too early.This will not happen to Big Brown. Kent Desormeaux has a cool head, and he’s proven that he can wait, and that he can hold Big Brown back. What’s more, Desormeaux was atop Real Quiet in 1998, having won the Kentucky Derby and the Preakness Stakes. He lost the Triple Crown by a nose to Victory Gallop. A jockey with a second chance to win the Triple Crown is not going to make a mistake.Once you get to Belmont, the horse with the trophies for the Kentucky Derby and the Preakness Stakes has picked up another, less flattering, accoutrement: He’s got a target on him. Everyone out on the track doesn’t just want to win, they want to beat Big Brown. This is what really happened to Smarty Jones. We’d thought that he, too, had got a bad ride, but he hadn’t. He’d been pushed into a dash in the middle of the race by Jerry Bailey and Alex Solis.This will not happen to Big Brown, for the simple reason that with his tactical speed, and his incredible reserves, and his whopping turn of foot, no one is going to be able to push him into anything.The Belmont is long, the third easiest way to lose the race is simply not to have the distance.This will not happen to Big Brown. Big Brown has lots left; he didn’t even run a race winning the Preakness, he jogged it.There is one more way: horrible luck, and there’s nothing to do about that. Charismatic broke his leg in final strides (he was saved by the dramatic actions of his jockey Chris Antley). War Emblem stumbled out of the gate and worked so hard to get back in the race that he didn’t have anything left. It’s hard to imagine Big Brown running out of gas but, so was it hard to imagine War Emblem flagging?Luck is always out there, you can’t play on it, you can’t figure it, you can’t prepare for it. Bad luck is just that. Forget about it. None of the ways in which a horse can lose a race are going to happen to Big Brown, because Big Brown is not going to lose.He’s not going to be no. 47, he’s going to be no. 12.mwatman@nysun.com

Can Big Brown Avoid the Fate of Smarty Jones?

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