Saturday marks the 151st running of the Kentucky Derby, the greatest two minutes in sports and one of the most bet-on events of the year. According to Churchill Downs, $210.7 million was wagered on the race last year, up from $188 million the previous year.<\/p>\n
As we prepare for mint juleps and the playing of \u201cMy Old Kentucky Home,\u201d let\u2019s dive into the 2025 field and how to bet it.\u00a0<\/p>\n
First it\u2019s important to know about the Kentucky Derby\u2019s unpredictability. The favorite has won the race just under 35% of the time since 1908 (40 times) and not once in the last five years.<\/p>\n
There are two classifications of bets in horse racing: straight and exotic. A straight bet involves a single horse. An exotic bet involves more than one horse.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The three most basic bets are all straight bets. They are betting a single horse to win, place or show. Choosing a horse to \u201cwin\u201d is exactly what you think. You are betting on a specific horse to win the race. Betting on a horse to \u201cplace\u201d means you are betting on said horse to finish first or second. A bet on a horse to \u201cshow\u201d is wagering that the horse will finish first, second or third.<\/p>\n
In the simplest of terms, exotic bets are parlays featuring multiple horses:\u00a0<\/p>\n
Exacta<\/strong>: a bet on two horses to finish first and second in that order.<\/p>\n Quinella<\/strong>: a bet on two horses to finish first and second in any order.<\/p>\n Trifecta<\/strong>: a bet on three horses to finish first, second and third in that order.<\/p>\n Superfecta<\/strong>: a bet on four horses to finish first, second, third and fourth in that order.<\/p>\n Now that you know a few of the terms, let\u2019s dive into the field.<\/p>\n Journalism is the favorite with odds of 7-2. It is followed by Sandman (5-1), American Promise (8-1) and Sovereignty (11-1). <\/p>\n No. 1 Citizen Bull (17-1)<\/strong><\/p>\n No. 2 Neoequos (60-1)<\/strong><\/p>\n No. 3 Final Gambit (17-1)<\/strong><\/p>\n No. 4 Rodriguez (9-1)<\/strong><\/p>\n No. 5 American Promise (12-1)<\/strong><\/p>\n No. 6 Admire Daytona (40-1)<\/strong><\/p>\n No. 7 Luxor Cafe (14-1)<\/strong><\/p>\n No. 8 Journalism (4-1)<\/strong><\/p>\n No. 9 Burnham Square (22-1)<\/strong><\/p>\n No. 10 Grande (17-1)<\/strong><\/p>\n No. 11 Flying Mohawk (39-1)<\/strong><\/p>\n No. 12 East Avenue (36-1)<\/strong><\/p>\n No. 13 Publisher (33-1)<\/strong><\/p>\n No. 14 Tiztastic (19-1)<\/strong><\/p>\n No. 15 Render Judgment (12-1)<\/strong><\/p>\n No. 16 Coal Battle (31-1)<\/strong><\/p>\n No. 17 Sandman (5-1)<\/strong><\/p>\n No. 18 Sovereignty (11-1)<\/strong><\/p>\n No. 19 Chunk of Gold (37-1)<\/strong><\/p>\n No. 20 Owen Almighty (44-1)<\/strong><\/p>\n Kentucky Derby predictions<\/p>\n NBC Sports’ Drew Dinsick likes “American Promise,” the youngest horse in the field, to win Saturday. <\/strong><\/p>\n It is rare to have a strong opinion about a race that is as wide open and unpredictable as the Kentucky Derby. This is undoubtedly a very strong field with a completely worthy favorite in Journalism, but I\u2019ve been taken by the physically impressive American Promise, the Justify colt trained by D. Wayne Lukas. <\/p>\n American Promise was a late foal and is just now maturing into the horse to beat for this race, in my opinion. His Virginia Derby romp was a sign of things to come, and I think he has an enormous run in him Saturday to hold off this competitive field. Expecting American Promise to be stalking a fast pace through the opening half-mile and be in ideal position to take the lead into the final turn and hoping his pedigree and recent development can help him hold on down the stretch. I’m hopeful that we get a price in the 15-1 range for this potential breakout superstar. \u2014 Dinsick<\/p>\n NBC Sports’ Al Bernstein expects Journalism to place but come up just short of a win.<\/strong><\/p>\n Journalism is the morning line favorite, and he is probably the fastest horse in the race. His stalking style, however, could see him either getting caught up in the pace or having front-runners backing up in his face in the late going.\u00a0In my top five, I have four closers and Journalism, and I see the favorite getting caught at the wire.\u00a0 <\/p>\n Any one of those closers winning would not surprise me. That includes Publisher, who will be a big price and has never won a race.\u00a0He might give Steve Asmussen his first Derby winner after having gone 0-for-26. Here’s how I see it finishing:<\/p>\n 1st: Sandman<\/p>\n 2nd: Journalism<\/p>\n 3rd: Sovereignty<\/p>\n 4th: Burnham Square<\/p>\n 5th: Publisher \u2014 Bernstein<\/p>\n If you or someone you know has a gambling problem, call the National Council on Problem Gambling for help at\u00a01-800-522-4700<\/a>, or go online at\u00a0ncpgambling.org\/chat<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Saturday marks the 151st running of the Kentucky Derby, the greatest two minutes in sports and one of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":66799,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4107],"tags":[1071,79,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-66798","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-racing","8":"tag-racing","9":"tag-sports","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114434919951793647","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66798","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=66798"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66798\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/66799"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=66798"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=66798"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=66798"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}\n
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