ARCADIA, Calif. — Former jockeys Gary Stevens and Richard Migliore have been on the job this week every morning at Santa Anita as analysts for HRTV leading up to tomorrow’s and Saturday’s 29th Breeders’ Cup World Championships. Not only were they great riders — Stevens is a Hall-of-Famer and the “Mig” won 4,450 races including the 2008 Breeders’ Cup Turf Sprint at Santa Anita — but both are expert horsemen, with a keen eye for a good runner and strong opinions on their form.
Yesterday, they shared those opinions with The Post.
For the Breeders’ Cup Classic, both were in full agreement: Bob Baffert’s Game On Dude, the 9-5 favorite, will be very tough to beat.
“He looks phenomenal,” Migliore said. “He has the home-court advantage and the right running style, because there’s not that much pace.”
“Game On Dude has been on his game the last month and hasn’t had a bad day,” said Stevens, who also got positive reports about Mucho Macho Man from his sources in New York.
Stevens tabs Groupie Doll, the even-money favorite in the Filly & Mare Sprint off four straight stakes scores, as “the most likely winner. If she brings her ‘A’ game, they’re not going to beat her.”
But in that race, he also gives high marks to Steve Asmussen’s Dust and Diamonds, who has won three in a row.
“She looks awesome,” he said. “And My Miss Aurelia [Asmussen’s unbeaten champion in the Ladies’ Classic] looks outstanding.”
“All of Asmussen’s horses look great,” Migliore said. That group includes Tapizar in the Dirt Mile, Unbridled’s Note in the Turf Sprint and Justin Phillip in the Sprint.
Another horse both agree on is the 7-2 favorite in the Filly & Mare Turf, Euro-invader The Fugue.
“She’s been very composed, very relaxed in the mornings,” Migliore said.
Stevens’ good friend Gary Foster, The Fugue’s gallop boy, “is really excited,” he said. “She’s doing tremendous.”
Migliore said he is really excited about the 3-year-old filly Reneesgotzip, who will be taking on the colts in the Turf Sprint going 6 1/2 furlongs on Santa Anita’s downhill course.
“Her workout last Saturday [five furlongs in :59 2/5 on the turf] might have been the work of the week,” Migliore said, adding that California Flag, who won this race here in 2009, is badly compromised by breaking from Post 1.
Among other Europeans, Stevens said he was impressed by the French filly Moonlight Cloud, who is running in the Mile. Migliore said that Godolphin’s 2-year-old colt Artigiano, 8-1 in the Juvenile Turf, has been galloping like a monster.
In the Sprint, Stevens likes the “come-from-behinders,” including Baffert’s pair of Coil and Capital Account, while Migliore said last year’s winner, Amazombie, “trained fabulous in the dark the other morning (five furlongs in 1:00 3/5). He’ll be very tough to beat.”
Are there any horses they don’t like?
“Of all Baffert’s horses, Executive Privilege (in the Juvenile Fillies) was the least impressive,” Migliore said.
He is also concerned about how Todd Pletcher’s high-profile 2-year-olds — the colt Shanghai Bobby and the fillies Dreaming of Julia and Kauai Katie, who did not arrive until yesterday after their trip was delayed by Hurricane Sandy — will handle the long journey.
“You hate to have to see them go through that,” he said. “The first day horses ship in, they’re usually a bit tucked up. It takes them a day or two to rehydrate and get back to 100 percent, and if you have to make an adjustment, [shipping in late] gives you less time.”