Todd Pletcher, Mike Smith, and John Velazquez are three veteran competitors whose participation in the Kentucky Derby is as close to a lock as you’ll find on the first Saturday in May — except for this year.
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Who’s out, who’s in?
Grande out due to heel
On Friday morning, Daily Racing Form’s David Grening reported that Wood Memorial runner-up Grande had been scratched from Saturday’s Derby by Kentucky Horse Racing and Gaming Corp. veterinarians due to a cracked heel on his right front foot. Grande’s removal means two-time Derby winner Pletcher will not have a starter in the race for the first time since 2003.
Velazquez, who’s earned more purse money than any jockey in the history of horse racing, was set to ride Grande. Left without a Derby mount, he’ll remain tied with Bill Shoemaker for the second-most Derby rides with 26.
Rodriguez scratched; Baeza in
Smith is third in all-time jockey earnings and first in Derby mounts with 29. He was set to ride Rodriguez in this year’s Derby until the horse’s connections, including trainer Bob Baffert, elected to scratch him Thursday due to a slight bruise in his right front foot.
Rodriguez’s scratch meant the Derby’s lone also-eligible, Santa Anita Derby runner-up Baeza, has drawn into the race. He will break from the far outside — post 19 in what could have been a 20-horse field. This is the seventh straight year in which there have been scratches from the Kentucky Derby after post positions were assigned a week prior to race day.
Baffert, who has won six Derbies, has not participated in the Run for the Roses since 2021 due to a lengthy medication-related suspension that Churchill Downs Inc. lifted after last year’s Derby. With Rodriguez’s scratch, Baffert’s hopes for a return to the winner’s circle rest on his lone remaining entrant, the champion juvenile male Citizen Bull.
New Kentucky Derby faces
Mind you, there are a few new faces involved in the 151st Kentucky Derby. Jockeys Nik Juarez (American Promise), Luan Machado (Final Gambit), João Moreira (Luxor Cafe), Jose Ramos (Flying Mohawk), and Juan Vargas (Coal Battle) have all earned their first Derby mounts, while four trainers will saddle their first entrants.
Among these first-timers is Coal Battle’s trainer, Lonnie Briley, a 72-year-old Louisianan who has won 10 stakes races in his long career and just one of the graded variety — that being Coal Battle’s triumph in the Grade 2 Rebel at Oaklawn Park. Also 72, Baffert will be enjoying his 22nd trip to the Derby paddock. He can now count Briley among his peers at the pinnacle of their sport.
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