Preakness favorite Muth has been scratched from the 149th Preakness Stakes. The horse shipped Tuesday from Los Angeles to Newark and then vanned down to Pimlico arriving about midnight, accompanied by Bob Baffert’s top assistant Jimmy Barnes.
The 3-year-old spiked a 103 degree fever Wednesday morning and was pulled from the race. The usual temperature of a horse is between 99 and 101 degrees.
“We are sick about this,” Baffert said. “The horse had been doing very well. But we have to do what’s right for the horse.”
Baffert still has Imagination in what is now an eight-horse field.
Mystik Dan, winner of the Kentucky Derby, will most likely be the new favorite. On the morning line Muth was at 8-5 and Mystik Dan at 5-2.