Bukowski at the Races
by Roger Lyons
There’s been some talk of introducing casino-style customer service to racing. The late Charles Bukowski, an inveterate raceplayer, would have had a good laugh over that idea, but, faced with the reality of it, his soul would puke–at first. Once he’d digested it as one more weird eventuality in the unfolding of the American dream, he might welcome it as further incentive to drink. Bukowski understood that racing is not for narcissists.
In the first place, people who actually play the races are not customers, and, for that reason, customer service would be completely wasted on them. Bukowski would offer no sympathy to those who complain that playing the races should be like shopping at the mall or going to Disneyland. He didn’t go to the racetrack to have a good time or to be a consumer of “the racing product.”
In life, it was always Bukowski against the throng. There was almost certainly no particular respect in which he aspired to be different from anyone else, but he knew what drove him to drink. He just wanted to be not like that, and he certainly didn’t want to be a customer. Consumer society’s intolerance of difference is such that the racetrack is one of the few places–maybe the only place–where being Charles Bukowski can actually be rewarded. At the racetrack, being at odds with the crowd gave him a fighting chance.
He understood that you can’t beat the crowd without a system. If Hank Chinaski, his fictional counterpart (alter-ego, Bukowski himself, whatever), is to be believed in the novel Hollywood (1989), Bukowski had as many as 20 different systems–all methods of betting against the crowd. He didn’t always bet longshots, but he hardly ever bet a favorite, especially at odds-on. One other thing. No matter how much everybody else drank, Bukowski drank more.
You’d never get Bukowski to join in a boycott over the takeout. It was just part of the risk of losing, without which the whole thing would be meaningless, and, besides, he was neither a joiner nor a crybaby. He wouldn’t have placed much stock in a boycott, anyway, judging from these lines of his poem “the world’s greatest loser”:
I guess nothing ever works for us. we’re fools, of course–
bucking the inside plus a 15 percent take,
but how are you going to tell a dreamer
there’s a 15 percent take on the
dream? he’ll just laugh and say,
is that all?
Nobody would mistake Bukowski for a dreamer, but most people are, and most of them dream the same dream, more or less. Bukowski orders another drink from his favorite waitress (who, he’s convinced, is only pretending she despises him) and goes for the alcohol-induced, but quite plausible, reality in which the six, at 10-1, ends up with a nose in front, and the waitress drives him home.
“Now that,” he laughs, “is what I call customer service.”
Posted by Roger Lyons on Wednesday, February 2, 2011 at 3:53 am.
Dixieland Band Delivers
by Roger Lyons
Dixieland Band ranked fifth among broodmare sires on 2010 earnings. Although that says a lot about the quality of his daughters, there’s a lot more to the story of his influence in the ancestries of producers. I can’t tell the whole story because, as anybody who reads this blog already knows, I’m not a horseman in any professional sense.
Sure, I love horses (who doesn’t?) and I’m around them every day, but that doesn’t qualify me to be an authority on exactly what it is Dixieland Band contributes through the dams of horses like Uncle Mo (Indian Charlie-Playa Maya, by Arch), whose second dam is by Dixieland Band. Yes, it’s mildly embarrassing that I’m just a numbers cruncher, but I can live with that as long as it enables me to report that something is happening, even if I can’t say exactly what it is.
So. It happens that Indian Charlie has sired foals out of only nine mares with Dixieland Band in their ancestries through his 2007 crop, and from those nine he got three superior runners, including Two Trail Sioux (G2), also out of a mare whose dam is by Dixieland Band. Uncle Mo (2008) is his fourth.
The bigger story is that Indian Charlie is not alone in having a very high strike rate with mares that have Dixieland Band in their ancestries. A survey of US sires for which I’ve kept comprehensive strike rates over the years turned up 29 that had sired foals out of at least 10 mares that had Dixieland Band in their ancestries, and 11 of those sires had superior-runner strike rates which, like that of Indian Charlie, significantly exceeded their overall records. Put another way, Dixieland Band has a 38% approval rating among contemporary sires.
But that’s not all. Dixieland Band’s disapproval rating is only 7% (55% having average strike rates). To put that in perspective, consider the record of Roberto, sire of Kris S., broodmare sire of Uncle Mo. Roberto has a 23% approval rating, which is still relatively high, but his disapproval rating is 24%. So, basically, if you pick a stallion at random, there’s a 23% chance that he’s going to manage Roberto’s influence quite favorably and a 24% chance that Roberto’s influence is going to be downright unfavorable. You can see by comparison with Roberto, then, that Dixieland Band’s influence through broodmares plays extremely well in the contemporary stallion population, with a very minimal downside risk.
As far as Indian Charlie is concerned, Roberto’s influence is innocuous from a statistical point of view, with a strike rate of 4/40 (Uncle Mo is the fifth superior runner). Yes, there are effects, no doubt, but they don’t pay off all that frequently for Indian Charlie. The numbers say Dixieland Band is probably the major player in the pedigree context of Uncle Mo’s dam, and they also say that Dixieland Band routinely contributes traits that, although quite possibly waning in the stallion population, remain highly exploitable by it.
Posted by Roger Lyons on Saturday, January 29, 2011 at 10:16 am.
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Pedigree, Conformation, and Zenyatta
by Roger Lyons
My last post explains why a recent post by Frank Mitchell gave me second thoughts about the appropriateness of Giant’s Causeway as a mate for Zenyatta in spite of the sterling statistical profile he has with her ancestry. My underlying point is that what’s on paper can and must be interpreted in light of what’s on the ground–and vice versa. That point drew some thoughtful comments bearing substantively on the case and more generally on the relation between pedigree and conformation.
First, Frank elaborates his reasons for thinking Giant’s Causeway might not be quite right for her, and it has a lot to do with her broodmare sire, Kris S. Frank not only casts his gaze on a lot of horses, but he also measures them, so you can be sure that he’s not speaking from casual observation. When he casts his gaze on Zenyatta, he sees a lot of Kris S. and some Troy, the broodmare sire of her sire, Street Cry.
Then Michele shares the experience, as a breeder, of having tried both approaches–breeding largely on pedigree and, alternatively, breeding largely on conformation, concluding that neither approach seems to make much difference in the frequency of favorable outcomes. Michele’s experiment was not conducted in a lab. It unfolded at much cost and over many years of trying to breed the best horses possible, and, as you read the comment, you get the sense that it rings true.
In the last comment so far, Greg correctly concludes that the distinction between pedigree and conformation is nothing more than a matter of emphasis. After all, he explains, statistical analyses that assess how a given stallion has done with mares representing a given ancestor actually do capture conformation issues–although indirectly. If you read Frank’s “The Weekender Pedigree” (and who doesn’t?) at The Paulick Report, then you know how much he’s into pedigree even though his science is biomechanics. The opposition routinely invoked by the cliche “pedigree vs. conformation” exists only because we associate pedigree analysis with one broad category of facts and conformation with another.
Greg proposes marriage of the two approaches, and he’s right. When Frank says that Kris S. is the major player in Zenyatta’s conformation (note the implication that pedigree and conformation are inseparable), it relieves a lot of statistical pressure. Rather than assuming Zenyatta’s entire ancestry to be more or less uniformly relevant, the focus can shift to Kris S.
Here are the candidates, along with their numbers with mares representing Kris S.: A.P. Indy (2/6), Galileo (1/2 and Frank’s choice), Giant’s Causeway (3/10), Invincible Spirit (1/2), Lemon Drop Kid (1/3), Mineshaft (2/5), Oasis Dream (0/2 with Kris S., but 7/35 with Roberto and great supporting numbers), Speightstown (0/2 with Kris S., but 2/10 with Roberto and good supporting numbers). And, by the way, Songandaprayer is 2/4 with Kris S. and may be a better choice for Zenyatta than better stallions that have poor or questionable numbers with Kris S.
Posted by Roger Lyons on Sunday, January 23, 2011 at 2:00 pm.
Zenyatta Plus ?
by Roger Lyons
As an earnest reader of Frank Mitchell’s blog, I attended with interest to his remarks about a mate for Zenyatta, especially his misgivings about Giant’s Causeway as a possible match. Now, Frank is an expert in biomechanics, so I’m supposing that, when he says, “I don’t especially like him for this mare,” he means he sees a physical mismatch somewhere along the contours of the two individuals. When Frank speaks, I listen, but I don’t much like what I hear in this case.
That’s because on paper, which is where my life unfolds in this business most of the time, Giant’s Causeway is the best match out there among proven stallions. Don’t get me wrong. Frank’s choice is Galileo, and he also has a great profile on paper, but it’s not as factually confirmable as that of Giant’s Causeway–on paper.
Just for reference, Zenyatta is by Street Cry, by Machiavellian and out of Helen Street, by Troy, and her first, second, and third dams are by Kris S., Forli, and Hoist the Flag, respectively. Giant’s Causeway has had no opportunity with mares by Street Cry (hardly any stallion has), but he has a superior-runner strike rate of 2/7 with Machiavellian and 2/7 with Troy. He’s also 1/2 with Helen Street, the dam of Street Cry, because she’s also the second dam of four-time G1-winner Shamardal, by Giant’s Causeway.
On the other side of her pedigree, Giant’s Causeway has a strike rate of 3/10 with Kris S., 10/117 with Forli (a bit weak, admittedly), and 8/46 with Hoist the Flag. The way I add it up, Zenyatta’s ancestry scores in the 94th percentile of all mares that have been bred to Giant’s Causeway.
I’m not going to get in a fight with Frank over this because I know when to back down. The truth is–as much an embarrassment as it might be to those of us who specialize in pedigree–what’s on the ground has the right to veto what’s on paper. So, I’m going to defer to Frank on this and back Galileo although, in deference to what might actually happen, A.P. Indy has a very good profile, too. The Mr. Prospector-line stallions that have been suggested–not so much.
Posted by Roger Lyons on Tuesday, January 18, 2011 at 7:31 pm.
Quantity and Quality
My last post emphasized the importance of the class of runners representing a given breeding method, as opposed to a high strike rate from opportunity. A conflict between the two arises, for example, in the case of foals that are by Malibu Moon and inbred to Mr. Prospector, which has yielded some few runners of very high class representing a very low strike rate from opportunity. My purpose in bringing up that case was to suggest that class trumps strike rate, but what I didn’t say in that post and must add here, is that such cases, while not particularly rare, certainly are not the norm. Generally, high class and a high strike rate go hand in hand.
Insofar as Zenyatta’s celebrity has transcended her beeding, it’s something of a sacrilege to cite her as a case in point of pedigree, but I’m going to do it anyway because her pedigree context is instructive and, in fact, not entirely unique.
Her sire, Street Cry, has sired foals (through his 2007 crop) out of seven mares with both Hail to Reason and Hoist the Flag in their ancestries, to which in both instances Zenyatta is inbred 5×4. Among those seven foals are Zenyatta herself, Tomcito (Street Cry-Inside or Outside, by Eastern Echo), winner of the Classico Ricardo Ortiz de Zevallos (PER-G1) and the Classico Derby Nacional (PER-G1), and dual-listed SW Alice Belle (Street Cry-Camporese, by Sadler’s Wells). That’s a strike rate of 3/7, including two multiple-G1 winners.
Hail to Reason happens to be one of Street Cry’s favorite ancestors, assured only in part by his strike rate of 5/17 with Seattle Slew. His overall strike rate with Hail to Reason is 16/90, but the gross numbers, as good as they are, actually understate the effect of Hail to Reason. Among those 16 superior runners are five G1 winners, a G2 winner, and four G3 winners–a total of 10 graded/group SWs. Also included in my unofficial tally of probable superior runners is Temple Street (Street Cry-Northside Star by Pulpit), which ran second in the 2009 Humana Distaff H. (G1).
Street Cry’s record with Hoist the Flag stands at 3/18. That’s not a great strike rate, but it’s a good one as far as it has gone, and it’s buoyed by two G1 winners–Zenyatta and Tomcito.
There can be no doubt that Street Cry has a very special relation to Hail to Reason and probably, to a lesser degree, Hoist the Flag. Consider, though, how dubious those strike rates would seem if the class of the runners involved were below overall expectations of Street Cry, rather than above them.
Posted by Roger Lyons on Friday, December 17, 2010 at 11:22 am.
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The Class Distribution
by Roger Lyons
Of the well over 15,000 winners of unrestricted North American stakes and blacktype-qualifying foreign stakes from 2001 through 2009, about 45% won a graded/group stakes during their careers. G1 stakes were won by about 13% of those stakes winners, and about 26% were G1 or G2 winners. Those three numbers–13%, 26%, and 45%–should be kept in mind when assessing breeding methods. That’s why the online eCompuSire facility, which is available by subscription at eNicks.com (after you sign in to eNicks), allows users to select lists of G1 winners, G1-2 winners, G1-3 winners, or all stakes winners when researching breeding methods. I don’t mind promoting mentioning that program because I designed it and benefit from subscriptions, just so you know.
Any stallion whose record of graded/group stakes production corresponds with those percentages is going to be very busy come breeding season. Stallions whose stakes production exceeds those numbers will bring in a lot more revenue for the effort while stallions that fall short will bring in less.
That’s obvious, but, just as these percentages indirectly determine the value of a stallion, they can and should be used directly in the assessment of breeding methods. I’ll go so far as to say that knowing how much opportunity a given breeding method has had pales by comparison with the importance of knowing the proportion of graded/group production among total stakes winners resulting from that method.
For example, the stallion Malibu Moon has had three-year-olds and older from 149 mares with Mr. Prospector in their ancestries, and only six of those mares produced SWs for him. It happens, though, that those SWs include three G1 winners–Declan’s Moon, Malibu Prayer, and Devil May Care–along with G3 winner Odysseus. That’s 50% G1 winners, 50% G1-2 winners, and 75% G1-3 winners. Class trumps opportunity every time.
Contrary to prevailing impressions, most methods of relatively close inbreeding yield graded/group distributions that fall well below the population norms of class. According to eCompuSire, 42 stakes winners to date have been inbred to Seattle Slew, including two G1 winners (Hollywood Starlet S. winner Turbulent Descent, by Congrats, the most recent), six G1-2 winners, and 12 G1-3 winners. That’s 4.8%, 14.0%, 28.6%–far below the 13%, 26%, 45% distribution in the stakes population as a whole. Does that mean inbreeding to Seattle Slew is a bad thing?
There are no absolutes. If you sort the list by “Pedigree” and look at individual sires, you’ll see that Tiznow accounts for four SWs inbred to Seattle Slew, two of them out of the same mare, including a G1 winner and two G2 winners. Hence, Tiznow’s class distribution is 25%, 75%, 75%. That’s very competitive with the 21%, 55%, 66% proportions for his overall stakes record, and Tiznow’s overall class distribution happens to be very close to that of Unbridled (29%, 46%, 61%), remembered as the consummate big-horse sire. That Tiznow can make a method of inbreeding look good doesn’t mean any stallion can.
Frankly, almost any breeding method you can think of will appear not very effective when assessed with indifference to the variety of pedigree contexts in which it has been applied; but, for almost all plausible breeding methods, conditions of possible effectiveness can be found. The norms of class I have described here provide a measure you can use, along with eCompuSire, to discover those conditions.
Posted by Roger Lyons on Monday, December 13, 2010 at 8:48 am.
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The New Gilded Age
by Roger Lyons
Switched on the TV one night during BC week for The News Hour in time to catch the last segment of the Nightly Business Report, which was an upbeat piece on the bright outlook for luxury retail sales–$20,000 handbags, $85,000 watches, and the like. One Madison Avenue retailer explained that they’d made a mistake last year when they advertised on-sale prices. It had the unexpected consequence of cheapening those items. It turns out that the top priority when buying luxury items is to spend as lavishly as possible.
Obviously, the luxury retailers hadn’t read their Thorstein Veblen. Neither had the business press, otherwise they wouldn’t have been so upbeat. I thought I’d entered a time warp into the 1890s, which Mark Twain called “the gilded age.”
Even if Veblen had written his Theory of the Leisure Class in 1999 instead of a century before, he would still have put those $85,000 watches down to “conspicuous consumption,” but he would have to revise what he said about buying racehorses. Back then, owning a racehorse was a mark of social rank, which, as Theodore Dreiser shows in his novels of the time, was the prime fetish of the gilded age. What owning a racehorse has become would have to fall under Veblen’s less-known Theory of Business Enterprise, published in 1904. How far thoroughbred breeding and racing have been drawn into the business-industrial vortex is a particularly discrete measure of historical change, but it will do.
To commercial breeders–the primary producers–money spent on racing and breeding stock at the sales in Lexington recently goes down on the balance sheets as something like effective demand. That’s what those sales feel like when commercial breeders pay their bills. But, in fact, that investment only masquerades as effective demand. As I’ve previously pointed out, it’s actually a secondary supply function, which is why it’s called investment.
To find the racehorse production and investment industry’s demand side, you must cast your gaze across America’s widening socio-economic divide.
On BC Friday I made the one-hour drive down to Newkirk, Ok, where there’s a Kaw Nation casino with OTB, to buy three BC superfectas. It’s an incentive program for my company’s employees–that is to say, Jackie and me. I couldn’t do it locally because, although I love Kansas, I have to admit Thomas Frank is right about what’s wrong with it. The South Wind Casino in Newkirk was filled almost to capacity with retirees, people who have time on their hands and enough retirement income to enjoy some simple pleasures.
To me, that scene was the spitting image of racing’s tenuous relation to its effective demand. By contrast with American retirees, unemployed Americans of working age are no longer relevant to the thoroughbred industry because they have no purchasing power. People with work are working more than ever before–and for lower wages–just to make ends meet. They’re becoming increasingly irrelevant to the thoroughbred industry because they don’t have the time.
The first segment on The News Hour turned out to be a report on the conclusions of the President’s national deficit-reduction commission. It’s clear the deals that are about to be made will have the predictable effect of deepening the demand slump we’re now stuck in–oh, except for those $85,000 watches.
What does this have to do with the thoroughbred industry? Everything, because now we know for sure that the health of racing is not about Wall Street, conspicuous consumption, or the supply side. It’s about broadly shared economic prosperity. The thoroughbred production and investment industry is losing its effective demand as more and more ordinary people fall victim to our country’s pernicious supply-side economic policies.
Jackie and I did our part for the demand side on BC weekend, but it was supposed to be a lesson in how to deal with failure after investing the time and effort required to pick the best three supers out of a two-day BC card. That plan backfired when we hit both the Juvenile Fillies and the Classic. The good side is that I think Jackie is hooked, and racing needs all the new players it can find.
Posted by Roger Lyons on Monday, November 22, 2010 at 10:17 am.
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