Bailey's success controlling 2-year-old maiden races

I'm not in a position to document the possible trend, but looking at all of these old charts of 2-year-old maiden special weights from the late '90s, it seems to me that Bailey was consistently sending his mounts. I've always said that jockeys don't make horses run faster, but certainly they can determine the shape of a race, although one would think a little more in routes than sprints. I've been looking at sprints.

Today, whenever there is an impressive maiden special weight winner on the west coast, I assume the horse is trained by Baffert, and I do the same with Pletcher on the east coast, although with not quite the same degree of confidence. Lukas was perhaps to the Pletcher level in the era that I'm examining. But as much as I like to look past jockeys, Bailey was undeniably a presence in maiden special weights, almost on the order of elite trainers. I don't know whether his winning percentage was uncanny, especially in light of strong mounts. But I do think he was consistently making the lead, and from what I've seen looking at charts, the lead is a good place to be.

We had a 2-year-old at Saratoga in 1994, Silver Midnight, who opened up two or three early and hung on to win when he was ridden by Bailey, and he didn't run like that in his first two races without Bailey. So that recollection vivifies the idea for me.

I'm such a poor follower and watcher of jockeys, I can't even tell you whether what I've noticed with Bailey in the maiden charts is in line with his reputation. I suppose I would have expected more nuance in his game than just sending horses. And he was an older jockey, and one might have expected him to be more timid, and not shooting his inexperienced horses out of the starting gate. But, in my observation, Bailey had clearer philosophies about race riding than any other jock, and it's likely he had a distinct idea about 2-year-old maidens -- specifically, that you had to hustle the youngsters to win. He probably noticed this, and decided he was going to do something about it. He was a very, very determined guy.