Preakness 2015 Horses: Full Lineup, Favorites and Sleepers in 140th Race

With just two full days between now and the start of the 2015 Preakness Stakes, the race is finally starting to take shape. The field for the Preakness is set, and we finally have post positions to accompany the eight horses who will run Saturday at Pimlico.

The 140th running of the Preakness presents us with a rather weak field outside of the top three—American Pharoah, Firing Line and Dortmund—and it wouldn't be a surprise to see those three colts run one, two and three again this weekend. 

Still, one colt stands out enough to earn "sleeper" status, and we'll take a look at him a little later.

Before getting to that sleeper pick, though, here's a look at the full lineup of horses competing in the Run for the Black-Eyed Susans, as well as a breakdown of two favorites: AP and Firing Line.

First, the race lineup.

Full Lineup

Post Position	Horse	Odds	Trainer	Jockey
1	American Pharoah	4-5	Bob Baffert	Victor Espinoza
2	Dortmund	7-2	Bob Baffert	Martin Garcia
3	Mr. Z	20-1	D. Wayne Lukas	Corey Nakatani
4	Danzig Moon	15-1	Mark Casse	Julien Leparoux
5	Tale of Verve	30-1	Dallas Stewart	Joel Rosario
6	Bodhisattva	20-1	Jose Corrales	Trevor McCarthy
7	Divining Rod	12-1	Arnaud Delacour	Javier Castellano
8	Firing Line	4-1	Simon Callaghan	Gary Stevens

Favorites to Watch

American Pharoah and Firing Line are obvious favorites to watch. In such a small field, the post position draw does nothing to change that.

Pharoah was dominant his last time out in the Derby, and he's run off a string of five straight wins, including two straight Grade 1 races: the Derby and the Arkansas Derby. 

With solid showings in each of his last five races, Pharoah looks to be the runaway favorite in the Preakness, right? Well, maybe not.

According to the Weather Channel, there's a 40 percent chance of thunderstorms Saturday afternoon, as of this writing, and if heavy enough, the rain could play a huge role in the outcome of the race.

According to Pharoah's trainer, Bob Baffert, that shouldn't be too much of an issue, though. He had this to say of Pharoah's ability to take to a wet track, per Tim Wilkin of the Albany Times Union:

That win over a sloppy track came in the Grade 2 Rebel Stakes, and it is one of the most impressive races on Pharoah's record. It's shown below:

If his performance in the Rebel is any indication, we could be in for a thoroughly dominant showing at Pimlico this weekend.

What about Firing Line? 

Though we don't have anything in the way of wet-track performances to point to and tell us exactly how he'll perform, he's still the best of the rest. The Line of David colt held the lead for a brief period of time and finally bested his rival, Dortmund, by a full two lengths while finishing second to Pharoah in the Derby.

Maybe Dortmund felt the pressure of Firing Line early and spent himself trying to gain and regain the lead from the Simon Callaghan-trained colt. However, it's totally possible that this was more of a sign of things to come and that Firing Line is finally starting to come into his own.

The young colt boasts strong bloodlines, including ties to Storm Cat, Seattle Slew and Secretariat on his sire's side, and he has shown a trend of improvement since breaking his maiden back in November 2014.

Expect him to be on or near the lead when they cross the finish line May 16.

Sleeper to Watch

With such a small field of horses to choose from, picking sleepers can become significantly more difficult. When the field looks like a near-carbon copy of the Derby, it's even more difficult.

That said, there is one colt to watch, and he's completely capable of jumping up for an in-the-money finish this weekend.

Divining Rod, an Arnaud Delacour-trained colt, comes from impressive bloodlines, including the A.P. Indy-Pulpit-Tapit line that has produced Tonalist, Untapable, Frosted and Constitution. That kind of pedigree, combined with his performance in recent showings, suggests that this colt is ready to take on other Triple Crown contenders.

His last time out, Divining Rod took on a somewhat weak field in the Grade 3 Lexington Stakes (shown below), but that doesn't detract from the impressive nature of his win there.

Saddled by Julien Leparoux, Divining Rod sat just off the pace through quarters in 24.03 seconds, 23.87 seconds and 24.76 seconds, respectively, before making a clean kick from the rail to the three path. From there, the Tapit colt was able to grab the lead by the quarter pole, by the 300-yard mark, before working out a 2 ½-length victory.

Of the non-Derby runners present in this year's Preakness field, Divining Rod is clearly the best, and at 12-1 he's a must-use on all your exotic tickets.