Pedigree Query

How about the below from Windfields Farm Web Site....Two questions....

1) Are they changing the system because they don't have the data? Werk uses a stakes winning population only, not the complete data and I know that they did a similar change with Hat Trick earlier in the year because Werk ratings dont collect enough data from Japan so the figures that Hat Trick was generating were bad. By the sounds of it they are doing the same here.

2) Machiavellian is by Halo? Are they kidding? What self respecting pedigree analyst would make such a mistake?


Change In e-Nick Rating System

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Some changes have come about recently with respect to the Werk e-Nick Rating system and specifically, Best Of The Bests (Ire). We would like to share with you a letter from Mr. Jack Werk regarding this change.

"Dear (Windfields Farm),

We have recently made some changes in how our nick rating system treats stallions in descent of Machiavellian, and because Windfields Farm stands his son Best Of The Bests, I want to let you know how this will affect his nick ratings.

Our nick rating system gets input from a sire-line analysis that is crucial to the accuracy of the system. Among other things, it prevents a mare from say, Mr.Prospector line from a getting a nick rating based on her descent from Raise A Native. Years ago, Mr. Prospector emerged as a distinct sire line, both in terms of the number of stakes winners that represent him and in terms of his distinctiveness from other branches of Raise A Native. So at that point, we included in our system a sire-line input that prevented Mr. Prospector line mares from being treated as Raise A Native-line mares.

Within the last year or so, we established a similar sire-line input on behalf of Machiavellian. At the time, compelling arguments could be made for doing that based on his performance in Europe. However, having monitored the ratings for Machiavellian's N.A. based sons, STREET CRY and BEST OF THE BESTS, we have since realized that we overlooked an even more compelling argument.

Because most of Machiavellian's opportunity has occurred in Europe and because opportunity there differs markedly from the opportunity Best Of The Bests and others are going to get in North America, we concluded that nick ratings for Best Of The Bests would be more accurate without that new sire-line input. Therefore, we have removed it from our system.

This means that nicks for Best Of The Bests may go back as far as Halo as a basis for a nick rating, rather than being limited to assessment on the basis of descendants of Machiavellian. In fact, it is possible that those ratings that go aback to Halo will be even more accurate for North American breeders than the ones that are based on Machiavellian. Only time will tell. That's the limitation of any system that assesses nicks.

Most importantly, this change will provide breeders who have considered Best Of The Bests in the past to have another look in the light of the broader perspective represented by this change in our approach to his nick ratings. In many cases, they will find new grounds for an interest in Best Of The Bests, not to mention the fact that I think he is going to become a smashing success in Canada.

Kind regards,

Jack Werk

It was inevitable that his system would change. You could call it growth though as the whole horse data industry is blooming and emerging before our very eyes. He started the bandwagon and if he doesn't keep leaping ahead he'll get trampled. If this follows the ways of big business he'd be smart to buy the Goldmine lic or patent or whatever before it causes Nick's to fade into..... the red.

That sounds to me like a big OOPS! Probably based on a complaint from Windfields Farm.

I doubt it's anything more nefarious than a simple typo. Halo is Mach's broodie sire. Reading it, it's pretty clear he meant Prospector, not Halo. I doubt there was a 'complaint' about anything.

sounds like more bullshit, this guy has fleeced the industry and people keep lapping up his crap, Werk Nicks are the biggest joke in the world. Someone complains...don't worry I'll just mess around with the numbers a little, hey what do you know the stallion is more awesome now.

There was definitely a complaint. That is why werk nicks at best is a soft tool. He will noodle the numbers whenever there is a push back. This year especially so since there is a new competitor.

Actually this looks like a cut and paste of another letter from Werk regarding a Halo line stallion that was forwarded to a number of breeders by the farm and then posted on their website.

http://hat-trickblog.com/?page_id=12

I talked to Jack this morning, Sys, and that's exactly what it is. As I said, nothing more nefarious than a typo. No complaint involved. Some people really need to stop being so quick to condemn.

**As for why, if you think about it, it makes sense. Logically, Mach should be a stop and if most of the people using Werk were in Europe he probably would be. However, Mach's only real influence in North America right now is Street Cry and Street Cry hasn't done enough to warrant being a stop on his own, yet. He may in time. Best of the Best (the only other Mach on this continent that I know of) doesn't have runners in NA yet so you really can't have Mach as a stop for NA based nicks. Like that letter states, nicks are subject to opportunity and if there is no opportunity, then the nick isn't going to be very good.

All of the above applies to Sunday Silence as well. He would absolutely be a stop in Japan, but since the only Sunday Silences in NA I know of either don't have foals or aren't very good, there's nothing to really draw a nick from.

The bottomline is nicks are STATISTICS and subject to change and anyone who thinks a nick should be the same in 2008 as it was in 2000 is a fool who doesn't know anything about stats and probably needs to go back for a remedial math course. Nicks change. They have to. They are a record of past events, just like any other stat.

**MY PERSONAL OPINION -- not Jack's and nothing I heard from him... I didn't even ask him why the change.

The problem with them is they tell breeders who know nothing to expect the same if they bred to AP Indy or one of his unraced sons standing for $1k. To me that's not worth the paper or computer screen it's written on. There are other sire lines in NA that don't have the same opportunities either but he isn't writing letters all over the place. There are idiots out there who breed strictly on what the Nick is, because they believe this crap is going to get them a Stakes horse, it's the most useless tool in breeding.

For the case of Mach he should have just gone back to Mr. P, it's easy to keep fishing backwards, you'll catch something eventually. So now I guess everyone should expect the same out of Best Of The Bests than they would from Street Cry.

AscotStud wrote:The problem with them is they tell breeders who know nothing to expect the same if they bred to AP Indy or one of his unraced sons standing for $1k.

No, "They" don't (assuming "they" means Werk). Nicks are neither good nor bad, they just are. If you run a nick on your own, no one is going to call or email you and say "Yeah, that came up an A, but you really don't want to do that with your mare because..." That's why HUMANS do the recs, not the system. The system is a tool, nothing more. If you don't know what it's telling you or how to read it, it's pretty pathetic to blame it when you get crappy results.

AscotStud wrote:There are idiots out there who breed strictly on what the Nick is, because they believe this crap is going to get them a Stakes horse

And that is that particular moron's problem, not Jack's. NO ONE says an F is doomed to failure or that an A is a guaranteed stake horse. NO ONE endorse breeding based on the nick alone. Anyone who does gets what they deserve and shouldn't be in the business in the first place.

AscotStud wrote:For the case of Mach he should have just gone back to Mr. P

I believe that's what that letter says. That the nicks for Best of the Bests and Street Cry/Street Sense will be pulled from Mr. Prospector, not Mach. And I'd be willing to be in about 5 years, Street Cry will be a stop so that he and his sons will have their own nicks, but Best of the Bests and the rest of the NA non-Street Cry Machs will go back to Prospector.

AscotStud wrote:I guess everyone should expect the same out of Best Of The Bests than they would from Street Cry.

No and that's stupid to imply since no one really says that.

The Nick is so vague that it is worthless. People don't read the disclaimers, they look at the rating and think they can be cheap and get a comparable horse. If people are not to expect that 2 stallions are going to get them the same horse why is the rating the same. That's like saying a kid got an Aon a paper, but he's really stupid so it shouldn't count on his report card as an A.

Basically what you are saying is that he is selling people numbers and ratings that you shouldn't take at face value. So what I'm saying is why they hell does anyone even care and waste their money on this crap. It's the biggest money making scam in breeding.

AscotStud wrote:Basically what you are saying is that he is selling people numbers and ratings that you shouldn't take at face value.

No, what I'm saying is that most people, especially in this industry, think they are a hell of a lot smarter than they are and are too lazy to learn how to use a tool properly. They want quick, easy, simple answers and that's what they get if they run the nick themselves and do no follow up or fail to engage their own brain.

But then I've come to realise people don't want consultants anyway. They want someone to rubber stamp their idiotic decisions so they have someone to blame when it fails. They only want the "brutally honest truth" when it's something they really want to hear. There's no diplomatic way to tell someone "That mare is dog food, don't breed her" so you have to hand-hold them and politely suggest they breed her for sporthorses instead.

Werk is not trying to promote the ratings as anything more than one tool out of many which should be used together when evaluating matings, and he makes that very clear. Anyone who wants to badmouth the system and complain about what it represents should really go read this page of FAQ's, taken directly from the Werk site:

http://www.werkhorse.com/faqs/werknickrating.shtml

The very issues that people are complaining about here in this thread are specifically addressed on that page. Therefore, I see no reason to attack and belittle the man's work. He's very clear about what a nick rating is NOT as well as what it is, and nobody is holding a gun to anyone's head and forcing them to use the rating.

For those who don't believe it makes a bit of difference ... don't use the system. If it helps you make your breeding decisions, by all means use the system, and take the time to read about and understand what you're purchasing. But to continually bash someone's work for representing the very things that their own FAQ page explains against is, IMO, really pretty unnecessary.

That's what I'm saying, people can't be bothered to look at a stallion and see if it physically matches their mare or if a stallions running style will add something the mare lacked. They would rather run a Nick and let that decide for them. The Nick is so vague it's hard to even call it a tool. When people call asking for Nicks or wondering how our stallions Nick with their mare we flat out tell them we don't use them. There are so many other factors that would lead me to select a mare for a stallion that they don't ever matter to me. Just because people are too lazy to do their own work doesn't change the fact that Nicks are useless or at best a tie breaker after every other criteria has been exhausted and you still can't pick between 2 stallions.

Roguelet,

All I am saying is it's funny he is charging for this tool then pretty much says on his site that one horse with the same rating shouldn't be taken the same as the another with the same rating and all of the other disclaimers he has on there.

trainers, jockeys, horses and people have been bashed more than Jack Werk has been on this site for doing much more credible work that he does.