SARATOGA SCORECARD

Final

This is the scorecard of winners picked by the twenty-six public handicappers covering the Saratoga race meet for the local dailies and the New York tabs. Below is the final tally for the 2005 season.

You can compare the standings at the halfway point at this link. These links provide results from past seasons: 2004 Scorecard... 2003 Scorecard.

We beat the meet! It's a three-peat!

In 2003 Merrow's win-bets returned $702.90 after 343 races. Last year, after the same 343 races, a $2 win bet on each Merrow top pick would have returned $731.90. This year the margin of profit was slim, a $2 win wager on each top pick throughout the meet (another 343 races) would have cost $686.00, and would have returned $686.80! Whew!

But in the woulda, coulda, shoulda category -- Best Bets will always lament the price we grabbed on City Attraction, the $23.80 winner we had on top in the 4th on Sept 1. Coming off of a debut effort where he ran tenth of eleven at 63-1 we were expecting much more value than the 10-1 we received. Earlier that same afternoon we ran second in the 2nd with 12-1 Market Force who looked like the real deal turning for home. Over the 36-day meet there were plenty of sob stories -- and usually they would be balanced out by a similar number of surprising wins, but this year it seemed like the scale tipped a little bit away from us. Still, we managed a profit and we'll walk away with that feather planted squarely in our cap -- for the third year in a row.

EXACTAS BEAT THE MEET TOO! Through the 343 races of the 2005 Saratoga season our top two picks ran 1-2 in exact order 31 times. Because scratches reduced one of those races to only three starters, only 30 of the 31 races offered exactas. A $2 exacta-wager using our top two picks in order on each of the 342 races that had such wagering would have cost $684.00 with the return being $843.00.

As far as numbers of winners on top -- we ended the season with 111, smack dab in the middle of our 112 from 2003 and 110 last year. Checking the mid-season scorecard shows that we made a sustained late-run (particularly through the last week) and moved up from 13th at that mid-meet mark to sixth at the end.

Ultimately though we have to tip our cap to Mark Cusano of the Daily Gazette and Capital OTB-TV who ended the season with an astonishing 133 winners tabbed on top. Truly remarkable. And in the Consistency Department -- going back two years, Mark Cusano and Tom Cunningham (Albany Times Union) have been in the top three in each of the three years we've tracked the scorecard (other names also seem at home towards the top of the list each year -- check prior season results for more info: 2004... 2003).

The 2005 Saratoga Scorecard

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