Bloodstock Agent Stevens has Momentum on his Side

Just 32 and a bloodstock agent for fewer than six years, Josh Stevens is still trying to make a name for himself and still trying to build up his base of clients. It's been a learning process and not always easy, but along the way he has learned firsthand that the way you make it in this business is by establishing a track record. Buy horses–particularly relatively inexpensive ones–that turn out to be successful, and people will notice.

That's why Stevens will go into yearling sales season as a person to watch. He's got a few more clients and a few more dollars to spend and, now, a resume highlighted by some rather impressive recent achievements. At the 2017 Keeneland September sale, he bought Mr. Money (Goldencents) for a new client, Chester Thomas's Allied Racing LLC, for $130,000. A few months later, he plucked By My Standards (Goldencents) out of the OBS April 2018 Spring Sale of Two-Year-Olds in Training for the same client for $150,000. By My Standards has so far won the GII Louisiana Derby, which got him into the field for the GI Kentucky Derby, where he finished 12th. Mr. Money is among the hottest 3-year-olds in the sport and could show up next in the GI Haskell after winning the GIII Pat Day Mile and the GIII Matt Winn in succession.

Not only have they won important races, they have proven that Stevens is not a one-hit wonder or someone who just got lucky when buying Divisidero (Kitten's Joy) for $250,000 at the 2013 Keeneland September Sale for clients Gunpowder Farms. The now 7-year-old has earned $1,484,539 and is a two-time winner of the GI Woodford Reserve Turf Classic.

“Josh has a good eye for a horse and he's conservative when it comes to spending other people's money,” Thomas said. “He'll say, 'If you don't get this one that's okay; we'll get the next one.' Josh is trying to buy a horse who is going to develop into an elite, top-notch athlete.”

Stevens graduated from Louisville, where he studied in the Equine Industry program. After graduation, he went to work at Margaux Farm, where he served in various roles, and then left to form his own management and consulting firm, J. Stevens Bloodstock. Thanks to a connection he had made with trainer Buff Bradley, Tom Keithley's Gunpowder Farms was among his first clients and Divisidero was among the first horses he purchased.

Stevens said he was proud of the fact that Keithley was new to the business, and he understands how important it is for newcomers to get off to a fast start. Unless they have either unlimited patience and/or unlimited money to spend, a new owner can come and go very quickly if they don't have any initial success.
“I had seen the industry go through the recession, which caused a real need to attract new owners into the business,” he said. “These people need to be successful. The sport actually does get plenty of new owners, but a lot struggle and swiftly leave the business. My idea has always been to cultivate new owners and new owners doesn't just mean new to the business. That can also be owners who want a fresh start or want to do something different than what they've done in the past. Gunpowder was a brand new owner. Basically, within three years they were running in Grade I's on Derby Day (with Divisidero).”
Thomas was also a new owner, at least when it comes to aiming high and being able to spend at the major racing sales. He had owned horses before, but only a few claimers here and there that he owned in partnerships with others.

What has impressed Thomas most about Stevens is how he concentrates on finding an athlete and prioritizes that over the horse's pedigree.

“When Josh first gets to a sale, he doesn't look at the page at all,” Thomas said. “He goes to each barn and marks down the hip number. He looks them over and evaluates the physicals of the horse. Then he makes a short list. He's looking at everything that he can a day or two ahead of time and he cuts the list down to a certain number of horses. Only then does he look at the pedigree page and I think that's more so he gets a better understanding of what the horse might cost.”

Stevens admits that when he started he had little choice but to downplay a horse's pedigree. If a horse was by Tapit or Medaglia d'Oro and was checking all the right boxes when it comes to the physicals, his clients were not going to spend the type of money it would take to wind up being the winning bidder.
“I never had the money early on to buy the big pedigrees so we had to make our pedigrees,” Stevens said. “My theory is you always want to buy the best horse by a stallion. What you don't want to do is buy at the bottom when it comes to the very top sires.”

So while he will always look for the athlete first and worry about the pedigree second, Stevens is also trying to be among the first to jump on the bandwagon of a sire that might be flying under the radar. It is not a coincidence that Mr. Money and By My Standards are both from the first crop of Goldencents.”

“I had really liked Goldencents when he was a race horse and I been on the Into Mischief bandwagon from day one,” Stevens said. “He was a horse that did it the blue-collar way. I thought Goldencents was going to have to do it same the way and it looks like that's exactly what is going to happen.”

Stevens will be put to the test shortly as he says he plans to be active at the July 9 Fasig Tipton July Sale. He said he particularly likes that sale because it is not overly difficult to find a top prospect there for a reasonable amount of money, particularly if you are looking for horses that will win early on in their careers. He also knows that whether it be at The July Sale or any other yearling sale this season, he will need to continue to find horses that go on to prove themselves on the racetrack. He's still at the point in his career where his reputation is developing and his primary clients are not going to spend $1 million for a horse.

“As you grow as a bloodstock agent you are always looking for that one guy who will go after that big horse if you see it,” he said. “I've seen plenty of horses over the years at sales that I was sure were going to turn out to be great horses and most of them did. But I didn't have an owner who could afford that kind of a horse. I know I'm capable of finding a horse in the $150,000 range that can go out there and beat these seven-figure horses. Like any bloodstock agent, I'd love to have a client or two that will spend what it takes to buy a horse high up on the list of sales toppers. I would love the challenges involved with that.”
That may take some more time and some more success stories.

“What I have to do is keep working and prove myself over and over again that I can do this,” Stevens said. “In time, your work speaks for itself.”