Top Ten

- I’m not really in to the Derby Top Ten list thing, but due to popular demand, I’ve decided to do one, but it’s just a little bit different. This is the Left at the Gate top ten list of who we think will be running fastest on Derby Day, May 7 (Pool 2 odds in parenthesis where applicable).

1. Afleet Alex (8-1) – Inherits the top spot with Declan’s defection and his impressive sprint comeback, which will give him three preps for the big race. Demonstrated his class at 2, and has done nothing to dispel that thus far in 2005.

2. High Limit (9-1) – Yeah, I know, he’s untested and only has three races, but who else would you suggest putting in this slot at this point?

3. Jockey Guild members – They’ll be racing to form a new association after additional audits of the Guild’s finances fail to account for how they’ve been spending their money, and instead turns up a new Wayne Gertmenian resume claiming that he’s served as King of Nepal, played bass guitar in Sleater-Kinney, and traveled on Galileo, the unmanned space probe that reached Jupiter in 1995.

4. Nick Zito – We currently like Sun King (10-1), another one who showed class at 2 and a spotless record thus far at 3, and Noble Causeway (18-1). But by the first Saturday in May, Zito has accumulated 18 additional Derby prospects including his stable cat, and gets so overwhelmed and confused that he decides to run in the race himself.

5. Don’t Get Mad (21-1) – We’re still impressed by his late rally in the San Vicente, but we’ll find out more this weekend in the San Felipe when he tries two turns.

6. Giacomo (26-1) – Wide both turns and minus one shoe, he still finished reasonably well in the Sham. Why is his trainer still hedging on entering on Saturday?

7. Congressional Republicans – As the president’s social security plan fails to gain necessary support, GOP representatives, with an eye on the midterm elections and followed close behind by Joe Lieberman, run as fast and far as they can from the notion that any of them ever supported private accounts.

8. Bandini (14-1) – Starting to like him more and more in the wake of his Fountain of Youth, in which he settled down late and launched a nice run to finish a diminishing length behind High Fly; he can only improve from here.

9. John Servis – With Rockport Harbor still start-less in 2005 after suffering 18 more foot injuries and a bout of self-doubt from reading unfavorable comparisons to Smarty Jones, Servis is seen running to the racing secretary’s office on Derby morning to persuade them to write a race for Rockport early in the card so that he can still get a prep in.

10. Jason Giambi – Looking healthy but still devoid of the power he’d shown in the past, Giambi stuns the baseball world by instead adding an element of speed to his game, and after one month of the season has stolen 31 bases, legged out 3 inside the park homeruns including one on a high bouncer to third, and played all nine positions in a single play.