Through Dec. 15, there were 105 jockeys with at least 600 mounts this year. Of those 105, only one – 1! – had a flat-bet profit across all his mounts: Dylan Davis.

This is made even more impressive when you consider this occurred at arguably North America’s toughest circuit: New York.

Indeed, Davis is 0-for-26 outside New York this season but notched 207 wins from 1,077 starts in New York. Where he really shined, though, is in Horse Racing Nation Impact (HRNi), which measures expected wins based on win odds against actual odds, and in return on investment. His HRNi was +14%, meaning he won 14% more often than bettors thought he would. His ROI of +7.1% towers above Edgar Morales’s -0.5% ROI from 802 starts.

Davis is one of 13 jockeys with at least 1,000 rides this year, and the next closest ROI is Jose Ortiz at -13.6%. This is like when Babe Ruth led the league in home runs and his total was more than any other team combined.

Saratoga was especially good to Davis, as his seemingly “just OK” 15% strike rate was good for a +36% HRNi and +30% ROI. Both of those numbers were easily best among regular riders at the world’s most prestigious race meeting.

Davis is surface-agnostic, too. Ignoring the meaningless 0-for-5 synthetic sample size, he has positive numbers on both turf and dirt, sprints and routes and all combinations therein. It really is quite impressive. 

The only minor quibble is that his ROI on favorites is negative. His HRNi is still a solid +14.5% on chalk, but the flat bet return is -2.2%, a loss. He went gangbusters on non-favorites, of course, hitting at 13.7% impact with a +9% ROI.

A few honorable mentions based on certain variables:

• 31 jockeys rode at least 250 turf races, five had positive ROIs including Davis, of course, but Hector Berrios was a green machine, winning 21.1% of the time, posting a 34.9% HRNi and +38.9% ROI.
  • Frankie Dettori, despite all his celebrity, managed a positive ROI this year on turf, earning bettors +4.9% on his grass mounts.
• Emisael Jaramillo gets the synthetic nod as one of five of the 19 jockeys with at least 300 synthetic mounts, but he stands tallest with a +18.9% ROI.
• Davis covers dirt in spades.
• When it comes to chalk, Luis Saez is the one you want. Of the 38 jockeys with at least 150 rides on favorites, only Saez has a positive ROI (+1.3% w/ a +19% HRNi)
• Looking for a long shot? Edgar Morales was the man this year. He is one of 28 jockeys who rode at least 300 horses whose odds were 10-1 or higher, and he registered an impressive +19% ROI.

The Bettors’ Best Friends Awards continue Wednesday with a look at trainers.