Talk:Man o' War

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"Also quite interesting is the fact that Upset's jockey's middle name was Sanford." Removed. Does this make any sense at all? If someone can shed some light to this sentence, by all means add it back to the article. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.93.90.245 (talk) 07:10, 17 March 2008 (UTC)

I believe it is incorrect to suggest that the upset of "Man O'War" by "Upset" is what created the use of the new phrase.

http://www.wordorigins.org/wordoru.htm


It might warrant mention in Lexington, KY, there is a Man O War Boulevard named after him.


Man O' War the horse was not named initially "My Man O' War." The name that August Belmont II and his wife Eleanor reserved with The Jockey Club in New York in 1917 was simply, "Man O' War." None of the Belmonts' letters or writings ever mention the name "My Man O' War" as his name at any point. // for additional reference see, "Man O' War, A legend Like Lightning," by Dorothy Ours (St. Martin's Press, c 2006) Chapter 2, Note 2

[edit] "Considered by most to be the greatest horse of all-time"

This statement is speculative and unable to be proven regardless of whether an author claims it to be the case in a book. A huge number of experts and fans consider Secretariat to be the best. Still others consider Citation to be the best. Europeans would make a case for Sea Bird. Australians would make a case for Phar Lap. All of the previous factions could build a solid case. As is, the phrase contains weasel words, is unclear because it doesn't explain who it's referring to, and is not encyclopedic. The blood horse ranking appears later in the entry and is the sort of information that is relevant and allows the reader to draw his or own conclusions. The Secretariat article went through the same problem a while back. Devout fans of a particular horse likely feel it was the best. However, it's unlikely that "most" of any group of experts or horse racing fans feels that way about either horse or any other because there are at least as many candidates as I cited above, and that's far from an exhaustive list of candidates. Moreover, it's really an impossible claim to prove. Lb34 (talk) 05:45, 9 May 2008 (UTC)

Having just looked at page 283 of the Ours book through Google book search, it's clear that the cited reference did not state what was asserted in the prior wording of this article. The page is titled "Comparing Man O'War with other greats." The beginning of the page says "clearly any debate about the best racehorse in North America has to include Man O'War." I don't think anyone would dispute that statement, but it's a far cry from asserting that "most think Man O'War was the greatest racehorse of all time." Ours then goes on to mention some of the horses I mentioned above, along with a few others, that would be included in the discussion. She then lists various print, video, and Internet references that provide information about the best American racehorses. However, she never makes any assertion about Man O'War being considered the greatest by "most" of any group. Lb34 (talk) 06:04, 9 May 2008 (UTC)

Also Lb34, I want to point out that the reference used—this "Ours" thing—is extremely vague. It says only "Ours" and lists a page number. This is not a proper reference; in fact, it is the opposite of a proper source citation, so when writing "considered by most to be greatest," or whatever, the phrase MUST be backed not only by accurate sources, but must also be cited correctly. Thanks for catching that "greatest" phrase, too, Lb34. Fdssdf (talk) 20:03, 6 June 2008 (UTC)