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Deeper in debt to Smarty Jones Tuesday, Feb 19, 2008 By Harry King HOT SPRINGS - Four years removed from foolish, I'm getting deeper in the hole with Smarty Jones. In 2004, I was a wiseacre when it came to handicapping the Kentucky Derby and ignored the colt's romp through Oaklawn Park. When Smarty finished almost three lengths in front of Lion Heart at Louisville, I was the only Arkansas horseplayer at Oaklawn Park who did not have to stand in line to cash a ticket - $2 win returned $10.20, a friend recalled with relish. On Monday, Smarty Jones was the enabler, the legitimate reason to take a sabbatical from a basketball overload. Instead of tall athletes, I watched short ones. Until Smarty kicked off his Oaklawn trifecta with the Southwest, the race was dotted with forgettable winners. From 1989 until Smarty, not one Southwest winner went on to cause a ripple in a Triple Crown race. Those results, or lack thereof, led to the conviction that the one-mile Southwest was nothing more than a sprint, and that the short stretch worked against true Triple Crown competitors. That thinking was reinforced after Big Sur beat Pine Bluff and Lil E. Tee in 1992. Those two went on to finish one-two in the Arkansas Derby and then split the Kentucky Derby and Preakness. Thanks in part to Smarty's near miss in the Triple Crown, the Southwest is now viewed as a logical first step in the progression of 3-year-old races at Oaklawn. In turn, the American Graded Stakes Committee decided the Southwest deserved status for the first time. Unrealistic about refusing to bump the Arkansas Derby to Grade I, the committee gave in on the Southwest and handed out a Grade III. Whether it's a I, II, or III, graded earnings decide who's in and who's out when the field is full for the Kentucky Derby and first-place on Monday was worth $150,000. That fact was not lost on horsemen, who shipped in from Florida, Louisiana, California, and Canada and brought their jocks with them. Julien Leparoux, Kent Desormeaux, Robby Albarado, and Joe Bravo have national reputations; the horses they rode are working on the same. Denis of Cork, ridden by Albarado, took the big step forward, finishing better than two lengths in front of Sierra Sunset in a time only two-fifths slower than Smarty recorded. The colt, who has been on at least one Kentucky Derby watch list since winning his first race at Churchill Downs in late November, was taking on stakes company for the first time and is now perfect in three starts. Albarado called the victory "exactly what you're looking for at this time of the year." "It is nice to have a chance to be on the Kentucky Derby trail," said trainer David Carroll. He's on the trail twofold, with the Southwest winner and Blackberry Road, a close-up and troubled fifth in New Orleans in a Derby prep barely a week ago. He said Denis of Cork will head South and then return to Oaklawn to participate in the sorting-out process known as the Rebel on March 15. That way, he can run Blackberry Road in the Louisiana Derby and keep his two hopefuls separated until a face-off is unavoidable. The Rebel is supposed to be the 2008 debut of Golden Yank, another with some notoriety. Unbeaten in his first three races, Golden Yank was a troubled third in a $1 million race in south Louisiana last December. The Rebel is a sixteenth of a mile longer than the Southwest and that extra 110 yards can make a difference, although the way Denis of Cork ran away from the others on Monday raises the question of whether he will use the extra distance to increase his margin. On Saturday, Sebastian County is to make his first start of the year in the Mountain Valley at six furlongs. Normally, I'd dismiss a 3-year-old on such a path, but Afleet Alex took that route in 2005 on his way to the Arkansas Derby, the Preakness, and the Belmont. Monday's glimpse of the unfolding 3-year-old picture at Oaklawn will have to suffice. Tall guys in red will prohibit an in-person look at the Mountain Valley or the Rebel. Arkansas is at Kentucky on Saturday and will be in the Southeastern Conference tournament in Atlanta three weeks hence. ---- Harry King is sports columnist for Stephens Media's Arkansas News Bureau. His e-mail address is hking@arkansasnews.com. |
