The 2023 Eclipse Awards, recognizing this year’s champions in the sport of horse racing, are scheduled for Jan. 25, 2024, and there are several contentious categories that hang in the balance. One of the interesting categories this year will be in the voting for Outstanding Jockey, where Javier Castellano will garner some support against the favorite in the category, Irad Ortiz Jr. Let’s take a look at how these two great jockeys stack up against each other based on their accomplishments in 2023.

Ortiz and Castellano are both four-time Eclipse Award-winning jockeys in their sensational careers and together have accounted for eight of the Eclipse Award titles in the past decade, with Castellano winning the honor four consecutive years from 2013-2016 and Ortiz capturing the title four of the last five years with Eclipses in 2018, 2019, 2020, and 2022. Both riders were at the top of their games in 2023 and together accounted for wins in many of the year’s best races aboard many of this season’s top horses.

Which one of these jockeys will earn their fifth Eclipse Award in 2023? Let’s take a look at the credentials for both.

Eclipse Sportswire

Irad Ortiz Jr.

2023 Wins (rank): 359 (No. 1)

2023 Purses (rank): $38,588,995 (No. 1)

2023 Stakes Wins (Graded): 67 (40)

2023 Grade 1 Wins: 15 (White Abarrio, Up to the Mark, Elite Power, Forte, Goodnight Olive, In Italian, Atone, Red Knight, Brightwork, One In Vermillion)

2023 Accomplishments: Ortiz won three Breeders’ Cup races including the Longines Classic aboard White Abarrio, the Qatar Racing Sprint aboard Elite Power, and the PNC Bank Filly and Mare Sprint aboard Goodnight Olive. He set a career high in purse earnings to finish more than $8.5 million ahead of his nearest rival. Ortiz won the Gulfstream Park Championship Meet riding title and also the prestigious Saratoga riding title.

Walter Wlodarczyk/NYRA

Javier Castellano

2023 Wins (rank): 144 (No. 38)

2023 Purses (rank): $19,287,387 (No. 7)

2023 Stakes Wins (Graded): 28 (16)

2023 Grade 1 Wins: 7 (Mage, Arcangelo, Therapist, Fev Rover, Bright Future)

2023 Accomplishments: Castellano took two thirds of the Triple Crown including the Kentucky Derby Presented by Woodford Reserve aboard Mage and the Belmont Stakes Presented by NYRA Bets aboard Arcangelo. He won the signature race of the Saratoga meet aboard Arcangelo in the Travers Stakes and a week later captured the prestigious Jockey Club Gold Cup Stakes for older horses with Bright Future.

• All Statistics current through 12/24
  

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Irad Ortiz had arguably the best year in his increasingly illustrious career in 2023 with a new career high in purse earnings over $38 million. To put that figure into perspective, his purse earnings were more than $8.5 million ahead of the second-leading jockey in that category (Tyler Gaffalione, who along with Flavien Prat and Luis Saez is a candidate for the third Eclipse Award 2023 nominee as Outstanding Jockey). He led all jockeys in terms of overall wins while racking up 67 stakes wins, including 40 graded stakes and 15 Grade 1s aboard 10 different horses. He further strengthened his standing as a go-to jockey in the Breeders’ Cup World Championships with three victories in 2023 including his second Longines Breeders’ Cup Classic.

For Javier Castellano, the argument is more about the importance of his wins more than it is about raw numbers. The 2017 Racing Hall of Fame inductee guided 15.21-1 shot Mage to victory in the Kentucky Derby Presented by Woodford Reserve and also added a third-place finish in the Preakness Stakes aboard Mage. He then won a second 2023 Triple Crown race aboard 7.90-1 shot Arcangelo in the Belmont Stakes Presented by NYRA Bets. Later in the summer, Castellano rode Arcangelo to victory again in the Travers Stakes at Saratoga in a win that basically sealed divisional Eclipse Award honors for that ridgling as top 3-year-old of 2023. He also won other high-profile Grade 1 races such as the Jockey Club Gold Cup aboard Bright Future, the United Nations Stakes at Monmouth Park aboard Therapist, and the E. P. Taylor Stakes at Woodbine and the Beverly D. Stakes at Colonial Downs aboard Fev Rover.

When all is said and done, it is likely to be Irad Ortiz Jr. who walks away with his fifth career Eclipse Award at the ceremony on Jan. 25, with numerical stats strong enough to simply outweigh the competition in every category. However, Castellano should get his share of votes based on the important victories he tallied during one of the best seasons of his career.