Curlin, MDO, Scat Daddy lead Derby sires
As of early Monday, there had been no defections among the leading Derby qualifiers. This means that if the race were held this afternoon, the same 20 horses would be loaded into the starting gate as would have started after the running of the Arkansas Derby a week ago Saturday. A closer look at the most accomplished of these 20 qualifiers – say, the top dozen – shows that they have a couple of things in common.
First, most of them didn’t come cheap. The nine three-year-olds purchased at public auction averaged a hefty $787,777 apiece, a figure inflated by the $3 million coughed up for Mendelssohn and the $1 million for Good Magic. Even without these two, the average was still almost $450,000. This year’s best bargains are found far down the qualifying list: My Boy Jack ($20,000) and Promises Fulfilled ($37,000), both of whom figure to be longshots in the race.
A second thing this year’s top qualifiers have in common is that nearly all of them are by expensive proven stallions. The only exception among the top dozen is Noble Indy, a member of the first
crop of Take Charge Indy, who stood for an initial fee of $20,000 before being exported to South Korea. Even more surprising is the fact that eight of the top dozen qualifiers are sons of just three stallions: Curlin (3), Medaglia d’Oro (2) and the deceased Scat Daddy (3), each of whom has a different Derby history as a sire.
Curlin produced one Derby horse in each of his first five years at stud; Exaggerator, runner-up to Nyquist in 2016, turned in the best finish of the five. His three likely starters this year are reigning two-yearold champ Good Magic; Vino Rosso, recent winner of the Wood Memorial; and Solomini, who has yet to win a graded race but has hit the board in four Grade 1s.
Medaglia d’Oro went his first nine years at stud without producing a single Kentucky Derby starter; Grade 1 winner Violence came closest in 2013 but was retired after being injured in the Fountain of Youth. This year Medaglia d’Oro has two expected Derby runners in Bolt d’Oro and Enticed. Although both horses are exiting runner-up finishes in their final preps, both, especially Bolt d’Oro, figure to have their supporters on Derby day.
While Curlin has had at least one Derby starter in each of his six crops of three-year-olds, and Medaglia d’Oro hadn’t had any until this year, Scat Daddy’s record falls somewhere between the two. The grandson of Storm Cat (through Tale of the Cat) had three Derby starters in his first two crops; they finished 10th and 20th in 2012 and 16th in 2013. Between 2014 and 2017, however, he was unrepresented in the Derby.
This year, of course, Scat Daddy has bounced back in a big way with three probable Derby starters. Justify will almost certainly go off as the favorite, while Mendelssohn should also be among the top choices. Grade 3 winner Flameaway is the third starter.
Scat Daddy also has a good shot at ending the Storm Cat male line’s record of futility in the Kentucky Derby. Fifty tail-male descendants of the prominent sire have started in the race. Four have finished second – mostly recently Firing Line in 2015 – but none has crossed the finish line in first. Maybe this will be the year the drought ends.