Try to beat Belmont Stakes betting favorite

Can American Pharoah win the Belmont Stakes and become the first winner of the American Triple Crown since Affirmed in 1978? Of course he can, but he’s a very bad bet as the betting favorite at 3-5.

Broadly speaking, the parimutuel market on horse racing is efficient and rational. Favorites win more than second choices, who win more than third choices, and so on. Prices, shaped by tens or hundreds of thousands of individual speculators, generally end up being a pretty accurate reflection of horses’ actual chances. Then, once every few years, when a horse is going for the Triple Crown, the market loses its mind. The Derby and Preakness winner is routinely bet down under even-money for entirely emotional reasons: The horse is mythologized, and people bet on him because they want to see a Triple Crown happen. Bet on Belmont Stakes at Go Horse Betting now!

If you bet on American Pharoah at his morning-line odds of 3-5, you are accepting a proposition that would have to pay off five out of every eight times just to break even. The recent history of Triple Crown aspirants, however, is far from 5 of 8: It is 0 for 12 and counting. All 12 horses with a chance at the Triple Crown, from Spectacular Bid in 1979 to California Chrome last year, have gone down to defeat. (A 13th, I’ll Have Another in 2012, did not make it to the starting gate.)

Taking a short price on American Pharoah thus seems a bit like the proverbial definition of insanity – doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result. That doesn’t mean he isn’t a good horse or wouldn’t be a worthy addition to history. It just means that you’re not supposed to take a short price that the 13th time will be the charm. I’ll be trying to beat him with Materiality, the Florida Derby winner. I am obliged to do so after picking him to win the Derby and watching him pass 11 horses in the final quarter-mile to finish sixth. The problem is that everyone saw his terrible trip, and Materiality will be less than half his Derby price on Saturday. The other logical alternative to the favorite is Frosted, the Wood Memorial winner, who finished well in the Derby to be fourth. So, let’s call it Materiality, Frosted, American Pharoah, and Mubtaahij to round out the superfecta.

Misguided ticket policy - The Belmont will be the last of 10 straight stakes races, including six Grade 1s – the Ogden Phipps, Acorn, Just a Game, Met Mile, Manhattan, and Belmont – on a program that ranks second only to Breeders’ Cup Saturday among the best cards of the year in American racing. It’s too bad that more people won’t be able to see it in person. Belmont Park has not only capped attendance at 90,000 this year but also will turn away anyone who tries to buy a ticket at the door Saturday, even if there are thousands of tickets left. Track management says it is trying to prevent a repeat of last year’s fiasco, when a turnout of 102,199 led to a nightmarish day of broken rest rooms, empty food stands, and paralyzed public transportation. This was not the way to address last year’s problems. Thousands of fans, many from the area surrounding Belmont Park, are going to turn up Saturday with money in hand, as they have for decades, and be barred from buying a ticket and walking in. With this year’s Derby drawing a reported record 170,513 and the Preakness also setting a mark with 131,680 attendees, it hardly makes Belmont Park look particularly competent to bar the doors at 90,000 or fewer.

Then again, not much about New York racing looks good these days (other than Saturday’s card). Four days before the Belmont, Anthony Bonomo, the chairman of the New York Racing Association, took a “leave of absence” from a post he was appointed to just two months ago by Gov. Andrew Cuomo. Bonomo, a major Cuomo fundraiser, stepped aside after an indictment against a powerful state senator from Long Island last week alleged that Bonomo’s insurance company gave the senator’s son a no-show job. Cuomo’s takeover of New York racing has been a complete failure, a litany of broken promises and contracts by the state and its installation of racing amateurs and political operatives to do the governor’s bidding. Saturday should be a great day for the sport, but on Sunday, the future will start looking bleak again in these parts.