Affirmed (right), pictured here fighting off Alydar at the Belmont, was the last Triple Crown winner.

We've had three horses that have come close in recent years in Silver Charm, Real Quiet and Charismatic. But I think Fusaichi Pegasus is a better horse, maybe more suited to the 1 ½ mile Belmont Stakes that comes up three weeks after the Preakness.

Fusaichi Pegasus simply toyed with the other 18 horses in the Kentucky Derby. People have been comparing him to Secretariat. That's about as far as you can go. Of course, we won't know if this comparison is appropriate until the Belmont on June 10.

The Belmont will be the great test, assuming he wins the Preakness. I will say that Steve Nagler, our top man at ABC Sports as far as horse racing is concerned, told me before the Derby: "If he wins the Kentucky Derby, the next two will be a breeze." We'll see.

A lot of Fusaichi Pegasus' challengers at the Preakness suffered through disappointing runs at the Derby. Even the big-name trainers had forgettable outings at Churchill Downs.

High Yield, D. Wayne Lukas' horse at the Preakness, faded to 15th place at the Derby after being one of the morning favorites. Bob Baffert's horse, Captain Steve, was also favored and didn't get the job done (8th place). Florida Derby winner Hal's Hope is coming again, the one trained by 88-year-old Harold Rose. Rose thinks Hal's Hope has a pretty good shot. I don't know why, judging from his Derby performance (16th), but he thinks so.

Then, believe it or not, there is a Preakness entry called Hugh Hefner. I was talking to someone at the track on Monday who makes the odds at Pimlico, and he said Hugh Hefner would be 75-1 at best.

Red Bullet, who was second to Fusaichi Pegasus at the Wood Memorial in April, will also run at the Preakness. A lot of people think he has the best chance to beat Fusaichi Pegasus. Wheelaway, third in the Blue Grass Stakes at Keeneland, may have an outside chance at beating the favorite as well.

But I don't think anybody can beat the favorite and his jockey, Kent Desormeaux. Desormeaux will be coming home to Pimlico, as he started his career in Maryland. He was the top jockey in Maryland for several years before heading to California, and that experience will help a great deal. Local knowledge about this track is very important.

One year, there was a horse named Linkage, trained by Hall of Famer Henry Clark. Clark trained at Pimlico for more than 50 years. He passed up on the Kentucky Derby just to give Linkage a chance to win the Preakness. Clark thought winning at Pimlico was a lock, as Bill Shoemaker, who flew on the red-eye the night before the race, rode Linkage. But a local jockey who had ridden the whole card the day before knew the rail was very much favored. So the trainer thought he had the best jockey in the country, but he didn't have the knowledge about the rail and was beaten.

The greatest race I ever saw was the 1989 Preakness, when Sunday Silence and Easy Goer went at it. As they came down the stretch, their legs moved in unison as if they were a shadow of one another. Their heads bobbed up and down in unison too. There was absolutely nothing to choose between them. At the wire, Sunday Silence won by the narrowest of noses.

As the two horses came down the stretch, you could almost sense the size of the crowd's roar wasn't for one over the other, but for this pinnacle of competition. The 1989 Preakness Stakes was what a horse race should be. It had a kind of excitement you always hope for but seldom get.

It would be great for all of us at ABC Sports to have a Triple Crown in our final year of covering the races, of course. We covered Triple Crown winners Seattle Slew (1977) and Affirmed before, but we also didn't have the Belmont at the time. We covered the first two legs but not the third when the actual Triple Crown was won.

By the time we got to the Kentucky Derby this year, we started right into work. I was so caught up with the workload I wasn't thinking this would be our last Derby. And as soon as the race was over, we jumped in the car and ran for the airport to go home. So I think it will hit me more a week before the Derby and the Preakness next year. The Preakness a little more so because it is a home game for me. The first Preakness I actually covered was in 1948 when the great Citation won. That was a local telecast, the one national telecast was on radio at the time.