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Honest Mischief has been the most popular stallion in New York in each of the two years since his retirement to stud, and he makes an excellent match for the well-bred young mare Luna in 2023.
Honest Mischief himself has plenty of qualifications to justify his popularity in the breeding shed: he is himself a stakes-winning sprinter by the now four-time reigning leading sire in the USA; he is a half-brother to 3 stakes winners, including the Grade 1 winner First Defence (who sired Eclipse Champion Close Hatches and 2020 Irish classic winner Siskin); his dam, Honest Lady, was a Grade 1-winning sprinter who also finished 2nd against males in both the Grade 1 Breeders’ Cup Sprint and Met Mile and she is out of Grade 1 winner and Broodmare of the Year Toussaud (whose offspring include five graded stakes winners, four of them Grade 1 winners, and two of those are Belmont winner Empire Maker (sire of Grade 1 winners like Pioneerof the Nile (in turn sire of American Pharoah) and Bodemeister (sire of Kentucky Derby winner Always Dreaming)) and his half-brother Chester House (sire of Grade 1 winners like Ventura and Divine Park)).
So this is without a doubt a “sire family” and Honest Mischief clearly has every reason to hit it big in the breeding shed.
Luna, meanwhile, was a winner of 5 races on both turf and dirt, and is out of the stakes winner Ruthville, who is herself a half-sister to G1W Rutherienne and G3W Ruthenia (the latter a multiple stakes producer in the breeding shed, too). Two more of Ruthville’s siblings achieved black-type on the track, and another is a stakes producer at stud — all of them being out of the stakes winner Ruthian (dam of 12 winners in total). So this is a nice, deep family with plenty of quality — and although the family hasn’t had a lot of chances with this particular sire-line, there are reasons to think it will be a good match.
TrueNicks rates it “only” a “B” (looking at the Into Mischief/AP Indy cross), but it features recent G1W Atone, promising 3YOs of 2023 Hoosier Philly, Newgate, Interpolate and Pretty Mischievous, as well as Godolphin’s brilliant Strobe, who looks destined to be a stakes caliber sprinter in the very near future. Luna’s dam Ruthville is a daughter of Afleet Alex, and that cross with Harlan’s Holiday-line stallions has produced 2023 Kentucky Derby candidate and G2W Practical Move.
So there are lots of promising young horses bred on this particular pattern, and we think that bodes very well for the chances of Luna’s foal by Honest Mischief when it reaches the races in 2026!