Preakness 2016 Payout: Prize-Money Payout, Order of Finish and Reaction

Nyquist entered Saturday as horse racing's unstoppable force. Nineteen horses tried and failed to take him down at the Kentucky Derby. Seventeen of those horses dropped out of the Preakness rather than trying again.

One rose to the challenge.

Exaggerator again used a hard late charge to move to the front, overtaking a gassed Nyquist to win the 2016 Preakness Stakes. A second-place finisher at the Kentucky Derby and four-time failure in head-to-head matchups against Nyquist, Exaggerator was the strongest horse in the field Saturday.

He defeated Cherry Wine and Nyquist by 3 1/2 lengths in what turned out to be a five-horse race. The first five finishers were within five lengths of one another. Sixth-place finisher Laoban was 12 lengths back on a day when race conditions were of the utmost importance.

Baltimore played a huge part in stopping Nyquist on Saturday. A rainstorm left the field of 11 navigating a sloppy track, which created trepidation in picking the favorite. Exaggerator won the Santa Anita Derby amid similarly bad conditions by 6 1/4 lengths.

Finish	Horse	Post	Trainer	Jockey	Owner(s)	Odds	Lengths Behind	Prize Money
1	Exaggerator	5	Keith Desormeaux	Kent Desormeaux	Big Chief Racing	5-2	--	$900,000
2	Cherry Wine	1	Dale Romans	Corey Lanerie	William Pacella, Frank L. Jones Jr., Frank Shoop	17-1	3 1/2	$300,000
3	Nyquist	3	Doug O'Neill	Mario Gutierrez	J. Paul Reddam	3-5	3 1/2	$165,000
4	Stradivari	11	Todd Pletcher	John Velazquez	John Gunther, Michael Tabor, Derek Smith, Susan Magnier	8-1	4	$90,000
5	Lani	6	Mikio Matsunaga	Yutaka Take	Koji Maeda	30-1	5	$45,000
6	Laoban	8	Eric Guillot	Florent Geroux	McCormick Racing, Southern Equine Stable	60-1	12
7	Uncle Lino	2	Gary Sherlock	Fernando Perez	Tom Mansor, Purple Shamrock Racing, Gary Sherlock	35-1	16 1/4
8	Fellowship	10	Mark Casse	Jose Lezcano	Jacks or Better Farm	50-1	21 3/4
9	Awesome Speed	4	Alan Goldberg	Jevian Toledo	Colts Neck Stables	50-1	24 1/2
10	Collected	7	Bob Baffert	Javier Castellano	Speedway Stable	16-1	25 1/4
11	Abiding Star	9	Ned Allar	J.D. Acosta	Stonehedge LLC	35-1	39 3/4

It was the polar opposite of the Kentucky Derby, where a beautiful May afternoon offered a clean race that went off without a hitch.

At Pimlico, the differences were apparent from the start. Whereas jockey Mario Gutierrez held Nyquist back at the Derby, keeping him in second or third place for more than three-quarters of a mile, this time the jockey pushed his horse on a blistering pace. He battled Uncle Lino early on, pacing the first quarter-mile at a quick 22.38 seconds.

Exaggerator, meanwhile, again bode his time in the middle of the field. As the horses entered the stretch run, it was clear who had run the better race for the conditions. Exaggerator barely looked tired while taking over the field as Nyquist faded and wound up in a photo finish with Cherry Wine for second and third place. 

NBC Sports shared the replay:

“I can't even fathom this," jockey Kent Desormeaux said, per Erik Brady of USA Today. "I think Nyquist had company all the way around the course and they stayed real wide. For the abbreviated (trips) I’ve had in previous starts, I had a dream trip today.”

The talk from Pimlico all week was about Nyquist, a horse carrying the sport on his back. After American Pharoah ended the Triple Crown drought last year, Kentucky Derby ratings were down 12.5 percent from 2015, which was an obvious byproduct of the generations of fans who had never seen a Triple Crown finally getting one and moving on.

NBC analyst Laffit Pincay III chimed in, per Childs Walker of the Baltimore Sun:

"

You can't dangle that 37-year carrot anymore. As incredible as it was to watch American Pharoah win and watch Belmont just shake — with several minutes of a standing ovation and complete strangers hugging each other — in this society, with a shorter attention span, that same trick ain't going to work twice. Not with the same intrigue.

"

While still an overall ratings bonanza for NBC, Nyquist represented the best chance of keeping things riding high. He won his first eight races and offered the chance at history. Only one horse has won the American Triple Crown without a loss in his career: Seattle Slew in 1977. It's a distinction not even Secretariat could boast.

“He’s really fast,” trainer Bob Baffert, who has Collected in this week's field, said of Nyquist, per Jonathan Lintner of the Courier-Journal. “He stays out of trouble. He has a winning attitude. Horses like that, they’re tough to—it’s like, ‘Pass me to win.’ I’ve always thought he reminded me of Smarty Jones.”

Nyquist, as it stands, will have to join the ever-growing list of Derby winners who went on to disappoint. He's the first Derby winner since 2013 to not take the Preakness, and it's clear Nyquist's camp thought he'd win.

"I didn’t think we could get beat,” trainer Doug O'Neill said, per Brady. “Nyquist is such an amazing horse; he still ran a great race, but we’re still trying to figure this out. I haven’t talked to (jockey) Mario (Gutierrez) yet, but Nyquist still ran a huge race."

Doug Gottlieb of CBS Sports offered his thoughts:

"

no idea about being a jockey, but feels like #Nyquist took the bait... #Exaggerator had a clean run+Loves the Slop,eats it up#Preakness2016

— Doug Gottlieb (@GottliebShow) May 21, 2016"

We'll have to see how the Belmont field shakes out before assessing our hype level. If Nyquist and Exaggerator both enter the field, it could be a rubber match between the two best three-year-olds in the world. If only one of them enters the race, NBC is going to be scrounging for narratives.

If neither of them does, though, the Triple Crown season could end in a dud.

For now, it's no exaggeration: Saturday was a brilliant run and a surprising outcome for Exaggerator.