This lady needs to live up to her name and get her mojo working again. No black cats, broken mirrors or spilled salt in this house. Everything’s coming up 4-leaf clovers. Some nice races today – we have the Sham, the Borderland Derby and the return of my old friend House of Usher at Hawthorne. It was hard to choose, so we’ll pick all 3!

Your BEST BET is 1 THE PROGRAM in SANTA ANITA RACE 8 (7/2 ML). This is a wide open race and the graded stakes debut for most of these, but I’m going with this Baffert trained boy. Coming off a hard-fought win here in his last in spite of a bad break, plus he finished 4th to amazing stablemate Lookin at Lucky in a G1 in December. Seems to keep improving with each start plus Garcia/Baffert are scoring at a 30% clip here together.

Your NEXT BEST BET is 5 HOUSE OF USHER in HAWTHORNE RACE 5 (5/1 ML). My favorite Hawthorne horse is back and up against some old rivals. I’m giving him the edge, though. He loves this course and has fired from a layoff in the past. Proven at this level and distance. Won with Razo on board here in Oct. Front runner might be hard to catch.

Your VALUE BET is WIN/PLACE on 7 GUILTBYASSOCIATION in SUNLAND RACE 10 (10/1 ML). Birdstone baby just broke his maiden here against easier in a nice late run. That was his first time on the dirt and his first time for new trainer Fincher – expect some improvement in his second here, even with the big step up. Showed some stamina in his turf routes and should be able to handle the distance. Barn is hot, hot, hot right now and stablemate Chuchuluco will get a lot more action at the windows, but if some of the big players chase the #9 rabbit, this guy could steal this at a very juicy price.