My guess is earnings themselves would probably not be a good guage to rank them because of the purses shifting/changing over time...
According to the link down below, it claims the final times for alot of the races even long before Speed Figures, were unreliable.
For what it's worth, it does however try to rank the top 5 and I assume using final times... Here is the Top 5
1. SECRETARIAT. It wasn't even close. He holds record times in all three legs of the Triple Crown, and his combined time for the three races is six seconds faster than the next competitor.
2. AFFIRMED. His 1:54.4 in the Preakness matches the second-fastest for any Triple Crown winner, and his 2:26.8 in the Belmont over a muddy track also is impressive.
3. SEATTLE SLEW. Score one for the modern winners. They completed the series faster than any combination of their older counterparts. Seattle Slew, also, ran a 1:54.4 in the Preakness, three seconds faster than the other Triple Crown winners outside of Secretariat and Affirmed. (American Pharoah, by comparison, ran the Preakness in 1:58.46 over a sloppy track.)
4. COUNT FLEET. Remarkably, he actually was injured before the 1943 Kentucky Derby, but won it anyway with the sixth-fastest winning time among Triple Crown winners. He then dominated the Preakness by eight lengths and the Belmont by 25 (after winning the Withers in between). That margin stood as the Belmont record until Secretariat beat it in 1973.
5. WAR ADMIRAL. The son of Man o'War in some ways raced in the shadows of his more famous sire. He delayed the start of the 1937 Kentucky Derby for eight minutes, but once he was ready to start, he led from wire to wire. At the Belmont, he stumbled at the start and cut about a quarter inch off his left right hoof, but still led wire to wire in what was then a course-record time of 2:28 3/5. He led all three legs of the Triple Crown wire-to-wire.
Here is the Full Link.
John
~żo
