Is Violence the Next Into Mischief?

The sire with the most grade one winners this year is the young sire Violence. Prior to this year he had never sired a grade one winner in the United States but now he has three. Interestingly those three are from three different crops – Volatile, a four year old, No Parole a three year old and Dr. Schivel, a two year old. He really came out of the gate strong as a leading freshman sire, second and third crop sire. His fourth crop to race are two year olds of this year. What’s scary is that the foals conceived after his first crop are only yearlings this year. As has been mentioned many times before a sire often gets good mares in their first crop and then the quality of mares tails off in later crops. There is also a typical drop off in the number of mares bred – for Violence his first two crops produced over 110 foals while his third crop produced only 78 foals. This obviously means that the best is yet to come for Violence.

Violence is a son of Medaglia D’oro who won the Grade One Cashcall Futurity as a two year old. He was unfortunately injured early in his three year old season and was retired. He comes from the family of Hall of Fame mare Sky Beauty. Violence is easily the best of her descendants but her dam, Maplejinsky ancestress of sire Point of Entry and a half sister to Dayjur. Another sire from this female line is Tale of Ekati so there is a very good family backing up a top sire in Medaglia D’oro.

As a top two year old it is no surprise that Violence has done well with his two year olds. What may be a bit surprising is that his best foals, and indeed the majority of his major winners prefer sprints. All three of his 2020 grade one winners have done so at six or seven furlongs. His two year old Dr. Schivel will almost certainly try to stretch out to make it to the Breeders’ Cup at a mile and a sixteenth later this year and could prove up to the distance. Both Volatile and No Parole are likely headed to the Breeders’ Cup Sprint, although No Parole does have a listed stakes victory at a mile and could possibly try the Breeders’ Cup Mile to avoid the talented older sprinters that have dominated the year. Overall though Violence’s 2020 runners have an average winning distance of just 6.68f.

He’s currently ranked 26^th on the overall leading sires list and first on the fourth crop sires list. He has 94 winners and seven stakes winners. His 2020 stud fee was $25,000 but that will almost certainly increase for 2021, especially if one or more of his offspring were to win at the Breeders’ Cup. His first three season saw him stand for $15,000, what seems like a bargain looking back now. After his freshman year his fee went up to $40,000, again suggesting that he got higher quality mares, although the fee was decreased for 2020.

So why do I compare Violence to Into Mischief? Both were brilliant two year olds and interestingly they both scored their biggest victories in the Cashcall Futurity. Both entered stud with modest expectations but have really moved up in the world. Both seem to produce sprinters, with Into Mischief’s runner’s average winning distance is 6.69f (although Into Mischief’s best runner is obviously Kentucky Derby winner Authentic). Also both come from strong female families.

Into Mischief’s foals came out of the gate running with grade one winner Goldencents (another strong young sire) and grade two winner Vyjack from his first crop. His first four crops saw him get less than 50 mares each year, but after his first two year olds hit the track he received over 100 mares in his next foal crop. The numbers have kept going up for Into Mischief, both in terms of number of mares bred and his stud fee which for 2020 is $175,000. He is currently the leading sire of 2020 and his success is quite amazing considering his humble beginnings.

Will Violence reach the heights that Into Mischief has achieved? That remains to be seen. But with his meteoric rise and quite amazin