American Pharoah and Victor Espinoza: Early Odds for Preakness and Triple Crown

For nearly 40 years, dozens of horses have tried and failed to win the Triple Crown of horse racing. Now that he has captured the 2015 Kentucky Derby, will American Pharoah be the horse who bucks the trend?

The three-year-old colt won the Run for the Roses on Saturday by a single length over Firing Line, who certainly made things interesting late. American Pharoah and jockey Victor Espinoza did a great job of waiting for just the right moment before making their final move, and once they got into the lead, nobody was supplanting them.

You can see the full results below.

Place	No.	Horse	Jockey	Trainer	Lengths
1	18	American Pharoah	Victor Espinoza	Bob Baffert	-----
2	10	Firing Line	Gary Stevens	Simon Callaghan	1
3	8	Dortmund	Martin Garcia	Bob Baffert	3
4	15	Frosted	Joel Rosario	Kiaran McLaughlin	3 1/4
5	5	Danzig Moon	Julien Leparoux	Mark Casse	6 1/2
6	3	Materiality	Javier Castellano	Todd Pletcher	7 3/4
7	14	Keen Ice	Kent Desormeaux	Dale Romans	8 3/4
8	6	Mubtaahij	Christophe Soumillon	Mike de Kock	9 1/2
9	13	Itsaknockout	Luis Saez	Todd Pletcher	10 1/4
10	2	Carpe Diem	John Velazquez	Todd Pletcher	11
11	21	Frammento	Corey Nakatani	Nick Zito	12
12	9	Bolo	Rafael Bejarano	Carla Gaines	12 3/4
13	17	Mr. Z	Ramon Vazquez	D. Wayne Lukas	15 1/2
14	1	Ocho Ocho Ocho	Elvis Trujillo	Jim Cassidy	15 1/2
15	20	Far Right	Mike Smith	Ron Moquett	15 3/4
16	16	War Story	Joe Talamo	Tom Amoss	19 1/4
17	4	Tencendur	Manny Franco	George Weaver	35
18	19	Upstart	Jose Ortiz	Rick Violette Jr.	60 1/2
	7	El Kabeir	Calvin Borel	John Terranova	SCR
	11	Stanford	Florent Geroux	Todd Pletcher	SCR
	12	International Star	Miguel Mena	Michael Maker	SCR

Jay Privman of Daily Racing Form noted how American Pharoah owner Ahmed Zayat has seen his horses fall just short so many times before, making Saturday's win so much sweeter:

Zayat and trainer Bob Baffert will have little time to bask in American Pharoah's success before they will begin to look at the bigger picture—namely the Triple Crown.

Baffert confirmed the obvious, that American Pharoah will take part in the Preakness Stakes in two weeks barring some sort of catastrophe, per The Courier-Journal:

He added that the colt will begin making the trip to Maryland a few days before the race, per Jim Gluckson:

According to Odds Shark, American Pharoah has 5-2 odds to win the Triple Crown and roughly 2-3 odds of taking the Preakness.

If horse racing were a rather straightforward pursuit, then you'd certainly favor American Pharoah to win the Triple Crown. He's built physically to handle the rigors of the Preakness and Belmont Stakes, and the Kentucky Derby silenced any doubts that the colt couldn't thrive when having to fight for a victory.

However, there are a ton of outside factors to consider when evaluating American Pharoah's Triple Crown chances. A lot can go wrong between now and June 6.

Maybe weather becomes a factor and slows down the track at Belmont Park or the Pimlico Race Course, or American Pharoah draws a tough post position. That would seemingly level the playing field a bit.

Maybe American Pharoah picks up an injury or gets sick and has to pull out of a race. Barbaro is one of the more recent unfortunate examples of how a strong horse's Triple Crown hopes can go up in smoke in a split second.

There's also the consideration of how much American Pharoah will have left in the tank for the Belmont Stakes if he goes into Belmont Park with his Triple Crown hopes still intact. Steve Coburn, who co-owned California Chrome, presented a somewhat valid critique of a system that seemingly hinders any horse trying to win the Triple Crown, per ESPN.com:

"

It says Triple Crown. You nominate your horse for the Triple Crown. That means three. Even the Triple Crown trophy has three points on it. So when you earn enough points to run in the Kentucky Derby, those 20 horses that start in the Kentucky Derby should be the only 20 allowed to run in the Preakness and the Belmont for the Triple Crown.

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Three major races in a little over a month is a lot to ask of a horse, and American Pharoah could be at a serious disadvantage when facing fresher competition.

USA Today's Christine Brennan thinks this might be the year history is made despite all of the reasons to say otherwise:

"

"There's a certain aura about him," Baffert said. "He's a lightly raced horse but he's caught everybody's attention. This American Pharoah, he's just something. He keeps bringing it. It's a fantasy moment for us.”

Four horses—American Pharoah, Dortmund, Carpe Diem and Materiality—came into this Derby with spectacular resumes, having run 19 races in their careers, winning 17 of them. This year, the four horses were 10-0.

For American Pharoah to beat the other three in front of 170,513, the largest crowd in Derby history, makes the possibilities seem endless as his Triple Crown quest continues.

"

There shouldn't be much argument as to whether American Pharoah can to win the Triple Crown. He has the perfect blend of speed and size.

But so many horses before him have looked great at the Kentucky Derby before faltering at either the Preakness Stakes or Belmont Stakes. So much has to go right for American Pharoah beyond him simply being good enough to win.

Racing fans are free to hope that American Pharoah joins elite company and buy into the hype, but he still has a long way to go from here.