mathematical or stat question [Archive] - Horse Racing Forum - PaceAdvantage.Com

JPinMaryland

05-07-2007, 11:02 AM

It's not at all clear. I would say 0-15 since he was shooting at only one derby on Sat. If he had won it, he would have won IT. He was not shooting at four derbies.

Really some of these so called "problems" in math or whatever or not really problems in logic but rather problems in semantics. So when we see Pletcher is "0 for X" what are we really saying? Are we saying he is O for so many derbies or so many of his horses have not won. Seems to me more of a semantic question that a true math. conundrum.

Pletcher himself seemed to make reference to this conunudrum. Did you catch it? When he said on friday, "If there's a dead heat will I get credit for winning two derbies?" [paraphrasing]

rastajenk

05-07-2007, 11:10 AM

Since he hasn't started in 15 different Derbies, 0-15 wouldn't be correct either.

05-07-2007, 11:12 AM

True. Now what if Pletcher saddled 25 starters the last 5 races, 5 in each, and I saddled 1 starter in each race. If you say we are both 0 for 5, you are greatly understating Pletcher's woes.

rastajenk

05-07-2007, 11:14 AM

And greatly understating your success! :cool:

OTM Al

05-07-2007, 11:19 AM

0-7 in races he's trained and 19-0-2-0 would be a pretty good representation of his runners.

SMOO

05-07-2007, 11:27 AM

0-19 WITHOUT THE JUICE.

badcompany

05-07-2007, 12:05 PM

I think a baseball analogy could apply here.

If a team loses a games using five pitchers in the process, it still only counts as one loss.

Greyfox

05-07-2007, 12:52 PM

0-19 WITHOUT THE JUICE.

I'm wondering about that too.
Maybe he'll have to have 20 entrants to get his first.:lol:

chickenhead

05-07-2007, 02:52 PM

pretty obvious none of his horses are near as good as the top two. Any Given Saturday ran a respectable race. I don't think their performance reflects poorly on him, you can't teach talent.

ryesteve

05-07-2007, 03:01 PM

I think a baseball analogy could apply here.

If a team loses a games using five pitchers in the process, it still only counts as one loss.
That's a pretty lousy analogy, since using 5 pitchers in one game doesn't increase the team's chances of winning by a factor of 5

JPinMaryland

05-07-2007, 04:22 PM

But it still comes down to a semantic issue. Pletcher is 0 for the derby. He had 5 entries. Asmussen is 0 for the derby he had 2. Fair? no. But it does make sense, semantically. So it still comes down to a semantic question.

OTM Al

05-07-2007, 04:29 PM

The real question here is how many people think he will never win one. As many horses as he trains you know he will eventually. The fact that he got 5 there was tremendous though. Just another silly arguement really.

Greyfox

05-07-2007, 04:29 PM

The vast majority of trainers never get 1 chance to win the Derby.
Their horses don't get in.
Some trainers get 1 chance to win it once in their life.
Some trainers get more than one chance.
Pletcher has had 19 chances to win the Derby. Full stop.

Bruddah

05-07-2007, 04:47 PM

Todd Pletcher is 0 for 19 with Ky Derby starters. :jump: Why? There are many theories. The prevailing reason among those at the betting windows is, he is unable to use his little Black Bag of Vodoo tricks. :kiss: :jump: :kiss:

PaceAdvantage

05-07-2007, 07:05 PM

Yeah, like Churchill Downs is some bastion of drug enforcement. Just ask Jimmy Croll.

CD may have become a bit more stringent in the last year or so, but seriously, you guys act as if CD has been such a hard place to finagle a horse over the years!

Give me a break. All the wild stories concerning Doc Harthill and the Derby! All the accusations that Holy Bull was drugged and THEN given the fact they NEVER tested him post-race! Imagine that....a beaten HEAVY favorite in the Kentucky Derby NOT tested post-race. Who would have thunk that would ever happen, even back in 1994? But it did. I believe CD stated that they simply "forgot" to test him....:lol:

You're telling me CD is the one place Pletcher was never able to use his ALLEGED bag of ALLEGED voodoo tricks?

Again, I remind all that Pletcher not only didn't have the FAVORITE in this year's Derby despite his 5 runners, he didn't even train the SECOND CHOICE. Two of his FIVE horses were contenders, nothing more and nothing less.

No need to conjure the nefarious in order to explain Saturday's results.

badcompany

05-08-2007, 12:18 AM

That's a pretty lousy analogy, since using 5 pitchers in one game doesn't increase the team's chances of winning by a factor of 5

It has nothing to do with chances of winning. Pletcher has a team, just like the Yankees. His team lost. Whether his team consisted of one runner or five is irrelevant.

Had two of his horses finished in a dead heat for first as he posited, he still gets credit for one win: 2007.

PaceAdvantage

05-08-2007, 02:55 AM

BTW, didn't Lukas get tagged early on as a guy who couldn't win the Derby? And that was back in the days when ANYTHING went at Churchill, just ask Doc Harthill...we all know how Lukas and the Derby turned out....

In any event, all this Pletcher conjecture is about as silly as the BC Juvy Jinx.

Robert Vaughan

05-08-2007, 03:02 AM

In baseball, using 5 pitchers in one game can result in losing more than one game ... repetitively so doing generally results in producing more loses than you would otherwise incur. I like 0-19 but contagion must be considered ... if he had all the entries, he would have one winner but he would still be a loser.

ryesteve

05-08-2007, 10:32 AM

Pletcher has a team, just like the Yankees
At least I can agree with THAT statement... both of them have been underachievers in the big situation over the past few years.

Greyfox

05-08-2007, 11:07 AM

It has nothing to do with chances of winning. Pletcher has a team, just like the Yankees. His team lost. Whether his team consisted of one runner or five is irrelevant.
.

Like the Yankees?
Michael and Doreen Tabor own Circular Quay.
WinStar Farm Padua Stables own Any Given Saturday.
While both employed Pletcher to get their horses ready, do you really think that those owners considered themselves part of a team?:lol:

Tom

05-08-2007, 12:51 PM

His overall record increased by 5 stats and 0 wins. So does his derby starter record.
His Derby record is o fer, but his records with straters is different.

And btw.......who cares?! ALL the tracks can't be closed today.:lol:

badcompany

05-08-2007, 02:18 PM

Like the Yankees?
Michael and Doreen Tabor own Circular Quay.
WinStar Farm Padua Stables own Any Given Saturday.
While both employed Pletcher to get their horses ready, do you really think that those owners considered themselves part of a team?:lol:

We're talking about one man, Todd Pletcher. The owners are a separate entity.

He has attempted to win the derby on 15 occasions. The number of horses that he has used to acheive this goal is irrelevant.

badcompany

05-08-2007, 02:19 PM

And btw.......who cares?! ALL the tracks can't be closed today.:lol:

It's cheaper to argue about this:lol:

Cratos

05-08-2007, 03:21 PM

I'm not clear on this issue, and not being sarcastic, just trying to
evaluate this situation:

Does Pletcher's record now become 0-19 as a result of the Derby or 0-15?

Both numbers can be used and they would be defined as “number of chances” for horses entered and “number of events” for derbies entered.

Last Saturday in the KY Derby, Todd Pletcher had 5 chances to win 1 event.

Froggy

05-08-2007, 03:47 PM

The fact that he has a lot of very wealthy owners that own really very good race horses that are not quite "Derby" winners, and that they could post 25k to be nominated for the derby and then another 25k if they were lucky enough to get in should mean something.

How many other owners put up the first 25k for nomination?

I would imagine that he told each of these owners privately that "their horse or horses stood a real chance to win (and after all accidents do happen) and wouldn't you like to own a Kentucky Derby winner."

I believe that he was trying to bolster his own reputation and therefore his services would be worth more in the future.

If you keep throwing spaghetti on the wall some of it is bound to stick some time.

Froggy

NY BRED

05-09-2007, 02:18 PM

PaceAdvantage

05-10-2007, 01:01 AM

It is simply incredrible all of Pletcher's horses finished off the board
and were Vegas to have given odds on this scenario, would anyone have taken them?

this devastation will probably impact his business to some degree with his clients who undoubtedly expected to be in the mix (other than Cowton Cat).

No doubt he will take a shot in the Belmont and probably pass on the Preakness

You considered Sam P to be a viable threat? Really? CQ I did not consider a threat either....ditto for Cowtown....I thought AGS and Scat Daddy had the best chance to hit, and AGS was suspect due to the tough races he had in Florida and NY.

Incredible? Devastating? Nah....When Lukas first started sending horses to the Derby, they said the same thing about him after a while....then he went on quite a tear, didn't he?

jotb

05-10-2007, 04:19 PM

Hello all:

In this years KD it was a Kentucky Bred that won the big race. Mr. Pletcher had 5 runners all bred in Kentucky. In 2004 there was a total of 9,731 foals in the state of Kentucky which made up 28.7% of the foals in North America in 2004. I believe there was 17 Kentucky Breds in this years derby out of 20 in the field. What are the odds that Pletcher or Naftzger would have the Derby winner out of the 9,731 Kentucky Breds foaled in 2004? I don't think the odds are very good for any trainer to have the eventual Kentucky Derby winner when there are close to 30,000 foals to choose from in 2004.

Joe

Greyfox

05-10-2007, 05:16 PM

Hello all:

I don't think the odds are very good for any trainer to have the eventual Kentucky Derby winner when there are close to 30,000 foals to choose from in 2004.

Joe
It's not that these top trainers are drawing marbles randomly from a pool and hoping for a winner. The majority of those 30,000 foals will never run in one race.
The majority of those foals will never win a race.
The top trainers are being given their pick from the "cream" of the crop.
This supposedly gives them one heck of an edge of Johny Barnplow who is given the dregs. Hence year after year you usually see the Zitos, Bafferts, and Pletchers showing up for the big dances. That makes their chances actually not too bad. (Obviously if they had to evaluate each of the 30,000
themselves they'd have no time for the track.)

singunner

05-10-2007, 10:43 PM

NY BRED

05-16-2007, 09:29 AM

Jan Rushton on Inside racing placed Mr P. as 0-19

While this is sort of a chicken or egg topic, I agree , in principle , all
five owners thought they7'd be running for a win spot, not looking to set
a pace scenario between themselves and the other 15 entries for
one of Todd's "better prospect(s)"

thanks again forall your thoughts

ryesteve

05-16-2007, 12:02 PM

I don't think the odds are very good for any trainer to have the eventual Kentucky Derby winner when there are close to 30,000 foals to choose from in 2004.

But once you actually get a horse in the gate, your odds rise considerably higher than 1 in 30,000 :rolleyes:

badcompany

05-16-2007, 05:02 PM

Let's take this in a different direction.

If this were Pletcher's first Derby, and he had 5 runners, with one of them winning, would he be 1 for 5 in the Derby?

rastajenk

05-17-2007, 06:52 AM

I think you could dodge that by saying he won the Derby in his first try. http://finalturn.com/forum/Smileys/default/shifty.gif

bobphilo

05-17-2007, 07:26 AM

If you bet on all his horses, you didn't lose 2 dollars, you lost 10. He didn't have 15 chances to win the derby, he had 19. There are 15 individual events in which he had a chance to win the derby (I guess). He's 0-19 entries. He's 0-15 derbies. I'd lean towards him being "0-19 in the derby". I don't think it's as up in the air as it seems.

Not exactly. Statistically, running 5 horses in 1 race is not the same as running 1 horse in 5 races. To determine a win % probability each horse would have to be an independent trial. That means the result of one horse's race does not affect the chances of the others. That is not the case with Pletcher's Derby horses. If he wins with with one of the 5, the other 4 have no chance.
Even if his horses run 1-2-3-4-5, your criteria would have him at 1 for 5 - not really fair.
It's like if you hit an Exacta with 10 combinations. Would you say you're 1 for 10?

Bob

ryesteve

05-17-2007, 09:42 AM

If he wins with with one of the 5, the other 4 have no chance.
But if one of the 5 is known to be a loser, the same logic will increase the probability of one of the other 4 being the winner.

singunner

05-17-2007, 10:22 AM

Steve said it for me :)

If you put 5 horses in, you're quite aware that they can't all win. If he had all 20 horses, would you say he was 1 for 1? I'd say he's 1 for 20 and an ass. He increased his risk of losing and he increased his chancing of winning. But really, it is all just semantics. We're capable of completely understanding the situation, even if our language stumbles on this particular subject a little.

facorsig

05-17-2007, 11:59 AM

Todd Pletcher is 39 years old. He has had 39 opportunities to saddle a Kentucky Derby winner unless there are age restrictions for a trainer in Kentucky.

He is no better than myself, 0/39.

Fred

bobphilo

05-17-2007, 02:28 PM

But if one of the 5 is known to be a loser, the same logic will increase the probability of one of the other 4 being the winner.

Nope, the 2 situations are not the same. If one of his horses losses it just makes it slightly more likely than one of his others will win, as well as the rest of the field. If one of his horses wins, it makes it totally impossible for his others to win, not just somewhat less probable.
That does not mean that having 5 entries in one race does not increase his chances. However, the laws of probabilities do not let you count it the same as having a horse in 5 races, where it would be possible to go 5 for 5. The best he could possibly do in the Derby, where his horses are competing against each other, is 1 for 5. Not comperable.

Bob

ryesteve

05-18-2007, 10:40 AM

However, the laws of probabilities do not let you count it the same as having a horse in 5 races, where it would be possible to go 5 for 5.
No one's talking about him winning 5... we'd just like to see if he can win it ONCE.

bobphilo

05-18-2007, 01:40 PM

No one's talking about him winning 5... we'd just like to see if he can win it ONCE.

I'm not a defender of Pletcher's record. Just pointing out some statistical truths. You just can't say he was 1 for 5 when he's got 5 horses in 1 race running against each other as if it were 5 seperate races.

Bob

ryesteve

05-18-2007, 02:39 PM

Just pointing out some statistical truths.
Then let's also point out that all things being equal, it's easier to win a race if you have 5 horses running in a 20 horse field, than it is to win one race if you have one horse running in each of 5 races with 20 horse fields.