There's no Triple Crown to be had for the 35th straight year as horse racing's most prestigious three races moves to New York, but that won't stop any of the 14 horses in contention from giving it their all during the 2013 Belmont Stakes. Longshots are always apart of horse racing and one of them is Midnight Taboo, who is listed as 30-1 Odds to win the 145th running of the Belmont Stakes.
Trainer Todd Pletcher has entered seemingly every single horse that has trains into one of the legs of the Triple Crown. Midnight Taboo is most certainly one of the lesser three-year olds that he is bringing to the table for the Triple Crown, but it's never necessarily too late to be bringing in new blood, especially when the horses are relatively fresh. Midnight Taboo hasn't raced since May 8th, and whereas a lot of these colts are going to have just three weeks off, this colt has been readying himself for the Belmont Stakes betting lines for a full 4+ weeks.
Many believe that this pedigree sets up for the longer distances, though. Midnight Taboo has some great horses in his bloodlines, including his sire Langfuhr was a good distance horse, and his dam Hot Red had a good history of distance in her pedigree as well. All of the "Thunder" horses are relatives of Midnight Taboo as well, and we his dam's sire Thunder Gulch win the 1995 Belmont Stakes with Jockey Gary Stevens aboard.
When you look at the past performances for Midnight Taboo, there isn't much to like. However, there isn't much to not like either, knowing that there simply isn't much there, period! Midnight Taboo has only raced three times in his entire career, and he hasn't finished worse than second in any of those three races. Of course, he hasn't run up against a field with any contenders in the Belmont Stakes either, so this is going to be a huge step up in class.
What's more concerning with all of this though, is how far apart most of these races have been for Midnight Taboo. The horse ran as a two-year old one time in August 2012, finishing second and 7 ½ lengths off of the pace. He was shut down for eight months before returning for a rare maiden race against three-year olds. Midnight Taboo won that race with Jockey Javier Velazquez on his back, but on that day at Aqueduct, he only had a Beyer Speed Rating of 73. He is a horse with potential but hard to call being first stakes and fourth lifetime start.
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Belmont Stakes Best Bets
Marco D'Angelo and Richard Saber give their best bets for this year's Belmont Stakes that takes place on Saturday (6/08/13)