This was not a great racehorse, but a good racehorse, so don't get carried away.
What's with all these ridiculous horses in the top 100?
I loved La Zanzara, I am going to go give her a good score, she deserved it!
I find it strange when horses like Cougar II, Zenyatta and Cigar get dismissed by people who ask, "Who did they beat?" while the same people endlessly praise horses who ran in a time when there were almost no horses in training at all.
18,857 foals were born during 1910 through 1919, and Man O' War's year of birth saw only 1,680 foals. He didn't face older horses but once, and that was Sir Barton. Not a big deal. And Man O' War's "record setting" was done at a time when there were no horses around, as the statistcs show, and the sport of racing was in its infancy. He was a great horse, but his "legend" is surely exaggerated.
Did you know that the Jockey Club estimates that 15,000 foals were born in the USA from 1890 to 1899? So Imp, for example, didn't have much to run against. And from 1910 to 1919, Man O' War's decade, it was 18,857. The 1960's saw 182,533, or 10 times more horses than the 1910's. Then came the real boom in the size of foals crops. The only thing foal crop size does is make suspect a horse who distinguished itself amongst a tiny group of horses. It just has to give you a moment of pause. I notice Cougar II got the "who did he run against" routine, but Man O' War certainly doesn't get that, and Imp didn't get it either. The horses who deserve that question don't get it because it's a "historical fact" how great they are - and there's no examination of facts - they're just forgiven for having faced no one.
I don't think I said that because a foal crop was bigger that the best horse of that crop is "better" than a horse from a small crop. However, distinguishing yourself, year after year, like Cougar II, for example, in a time when there were 20,000+ foals being born every year sure seems like it could be a bigger accomplishment than distinguishing yourself at a time when there were 1,500 horses born every year. The size of the group of which you are "the best" does have something to do with it. It doesn't have "everything" to do with it, just "something" to do with it. As for Man O' War, though, he was setting records at a time when racing in this country wasn't very old and the entire number of Thoroughbreds born and bred to that point wasn't big.
You're right about the foal crop thing, but when Imp was born it was during a decade where there were only about 1,500 to 2,000 foals born each year. Still, I do think she was a phenomenally giften racehorse, and an iron horse to boot. When Cougar II raced there were a lot more horses around, in general, and he was good from 2 through 7 years of age. I wasn't trying to put down horses from the past, because I think all the horses we discussed are great.
The number of horses "around" has everything to do with it. As I said, Imp was one of 1,500 horses born that year. There were about 1,500 horse born each year during that period of time, so the pool of horses was tiny. It doesn't mean a horse isn't great, but it does mean that there's something to consider when wondering just how great - and that's the size of the pool of horses. By the time Cougar II came to America, for example, in 1970, there were tens of thousands of horses around. Distinguishing yourself in that Age says something. No, of course it doesn't "necessarily" mean a horse is "great" or "greater" because of the size of a particular foal crop, but that information does make you wonder when there are just a few horses in existence.
I think Cougar was greater than Discovery, Exterminator, Seabiscuit, etc., and definitely better than Gallorette. I am not putting those horses down, though, because they're all clearly great. He and John Henry are a toss-up. I don't know what to say about Imp, other than she doesn't really compare to the Top 25 greats, and she couldn't even hold a candle to Cougar either; she was from a crop of about only 1,500 horses too. I think it's much easier to distinguish yourself amongst a few thousand horses because it's a lot easier to look really good when there's quite literally no one else around. During his entire career Cougar II was a consistently remarkable horse, and his record, especially in stakes (40 placings) attests to this fact). Just my opinion.