Good morning!
A field of eight 3-year-olds will go to post for the 153rd running of the Travers Stakes today at Saratoga Race Course.

Epicenter is the 7/5 morning line favorite. Trained by Steve Asmussen and ridden by Joel Rosario, the colt won last month’s Jim Dandy and was the runner-up to Early Voting in the Preakness, and to Rich Strike in the Kentucky Derby.

Haskell winner Cyberknife, trained by Brad Cox and ridden by Florent Geroux, is the 7-2 second choice off four wins in six starts this year, and the steadily improving Chad Brown trainee Artorius is the 9-2 third choice after winning the Curlin Stakes at Saratoga on July 29.

Jim Dandy runner-up Zandon is listed at 5-1 under Flavien Prat, and Early Voting is 8-1 after fading to fourth in the same race. Both are trained by Brown. After Rich Strike won the Run for the Roses at 80-1, he finished sixth at 4-1 in the Belmont Stakes. If you miss the wedding don’t go to the funeral, as the saying goes. This afternoon he’s 10-1 from the two post.

Ain’t Life Grand, trained by Kelly Von Hemel and ridden by Tyler Gaffalione, ships in from Iowa where he won six of seven starts at Prairie Meadows. A week ago he turned in a bullet best-of-79 work in 45.4 seconds at Saratoga and is 20-1. The name of his sire will likely prove prescient today: Not This Time.

Gilded Age is 30-1 and will likely remain the longest shot on the board. Trained by Bill Mott and ridden by Junior Alvarado, he comes in with two wins in eight career starts.

The previous two Travers were won by odds-on favorites Essential Quality and Tiz the Law. Recent longshot winners were V.E. Day at 19-1 in 2014 and Keen Ice the following year when he nipped Triple Crown winner American Pharoah at 16-1.

We asked Saratoga handicapper Dave Gonzalez of Sure Thing Selections for his pick: “I think Epicenter and Cyberknife will both get beat but Epicenter is more likely to hit the board. One of the Chad Brown horses will win. Artorius intrigues me but he really needs to up his game. So… Early Voting, gate to wire.”

The 1¼-mile Travers is the 11th race on today’s card. Post time is 5:44 p.m and will be telecast on FOX. The undercard will be on FS1 (11:30 a.m. to 2 p.m.) and FS2 (2 p.m. to 4:30 p.m.).

On Sunday at the Spa, a casually dressed horse player from Methuen leaned against the paddock fence before the sixth race and nodded at a 2-year-old filly named Rosie’s Alibi. “I own a piece of that horse,” he said. “I got her for a Christmas present.”

A few feet away somebody else said he had a stake in the steed, and others around him wore Rosie’s Alibi T-shirts. Indeed, the MyRacehorse stable is composed of 4,000 railbirds all of whom have stakes in the steed about to make her career debut.

Rosie’s Alibi isn’t your run-of-the mill Zippy Chippy. She was sired by Triple Crown winner Justify for $100,000 and cost $625,000 at the Saratoga yearling sale. She’s trained by seven-time Ecipse Award winner Todd Pletcher and would be ridden by 3,000-race winner Luis Saez.

“What’d your share cost, about $10,000?” I asked another one of the stake holders. His wife turned and looked at me and grimaced, shaking her head. “A little more than that,” he said.

Rosie’s Alibi was 5-1 in the morning line but her legion of supporters bet her down to 7/5. “What if she wins?” I asked. “Can you go to the winner’s circle?”

“There was a lottery,” said the Methuen native. “Only 20 of us could be in the picture. We’d have to wear pants, shirts with collars, no T-shirts…”

They needn’t have worried. When the starting gate opened jockey Joel Rosario quickly steered Grand Love into the lead and kept her there from gate-to-wire.

Rosie’s Alibi retreated from third to fourth to fifth and finished next-to-last, 24½ lengths back. “Floated six wide into the stretch and failed to respond,” the chart writer commented.

Alas, Rosie had no alibi.

John Kennedy sends his preseason report on coach Tory Verdi’s UMass women’s basketball team: “They have a very strong top seven and just added three new players, 6-2 forward Laila Fair from Saint Joseph’s, 6-5 forward Piath Gabriel from UConn and 5-8 guard Kristin Williams from Pensacola State. She can shoot lights out.”

The Minutewomen will get a good look at themselves when they play at Tennessee on Nov. 10. The Lady Vols were 25-9 and finished 18th in the AP poll.

Season tickets for this season cost $75 and are $60 for seniors, faculty and staff. The season opener is Nov. 7 against Central Conn. State at the Mullins Center.

Looking to read a good baseball novel? “The Celebrant” by Eric Rolfe Greenberg was published in 1983 and centers around Christy Mathewson who won 373 games. Mathewson was exposed to poison gas during WWI and wasn’t the same when he returned. “The world makes you a god and hates you for being human, and if you plead for understanding it hates you even more. Heroes are never forgiven their success, still less their failure.”

Great writing. Mathewson died from respiratory disease when he was 45.

SQUIBBERS: Sean McDonough said during a Red Sox game that his broadcast career began doing the Syracuse Chiefs in 1982. “I got $15 a game, $25 to keep score and $25 to call in the box score, and I needed the money.” … ESPN’s pregame summary gives UMass a 6.1 percent chance of beating Tulane next week. The Minutemen are 30-point underdogs against the Green Wave. … The Yankees and Mets drew 97,777 into the Bronx for their two-game series this week. … Asked to name his favorite baseball movie, NFL analyst Peter King said, “A League of Their Own.” C’mon Peter, really? …. Chris Simms on Bill Belichick: “I love Coach Belichick. He’s the greatest coach in the history of sports in my opinion.” … SI reports that Jackson State football coach Deion Sanders prohibits earrings in the clubhouse and mandates suits on game day. …. Braves outfielder Marcell Ozuna was arrested last year for choking his wife, and he was cuffed again two weeks ago for OUI. “I’m Ozuna from the Braves,” he told the cops. When he was booed during his first at-bat after the arrest, Atlanta radio broadcaster Ben Ingram said, “Here’s Ozuna from the Braves.”

Chip Ainsworth is an award-winning columnist who has penned his observations about sports for four decades in the Pioneer Valley. He can be reached at chipjet715@icloud.com