It might not be the best time to say what I'm about to say, but I did not like Sunday Silence. You couldn't if you loved Easy Goer and Easy Goer did something for me that few horses have. He was so graceful, so talented and he won so effortlessly that he made you believe that there were no limits– absolutely no limits–to what he could do. It was fun to dream. But almost every time he seemed ready to fulfill his promise and your fantasies, here was this ugly, snarling black thing from California screwing it all up. Sunday Silence was an enemy.

But liking a horse and respecting a horse are two entirely different things. Sunday Silence, who died at age 16 in Japan due to complications from a bacterial infection, was more than just a very talented horse. He had that rarest of qualities that goes beyond breeding and ability and speed. He wanted to win and he knew how to win. And that is what separated him from Easy Goer. For Sunday Silence to have gotten the best of such a talented adversary he had to have been a very special horse. I have come to have great admiration for him.

It wasn't that way May 6, 1989. This was to be the first step toward immortality for Easy Goer. He would win the Kentucky Derby and then, no doubt, the Preakness and the Belmont. That Charlie Whittingham had a highly regarded winner of the Santa Anita Derby was really of no concern. He was a horse. Easy Goer was perfection.

Neither one seemed anything particularly special that miserable, muddy afternoon at Churchill Downs. Sunday Silence weaved and staggered down the stretch while Easy Goer barely showed up, plodding around the track, lethargic every step of the way. The time was dreadful, 2:05. But all that mattered was that Sunday Silence was first and Easy Goer was second.

The Preakness was their best show. Easy Goer came to play this time, but so did Sunday Silence. The two hooked up in the stretch and fought ferociously to the wire in a scintillating and pulsating duel that was this sport at its very best. Easy Goer fought, but Sunday Silence, the warrior, would not let him by. The Belmont Stakes seemed to be confirmation of what all Easy Goer fans still believed, despite the Kentucky Derby and the Preakness results, that their horse was still the better of the two. Somehow the first legs of the Triple Crown were an aberration and Easy Goer's eight-length win in the Belmont was the real deal. Easy Goer fans were exhilarated and they were triumphant and it felt great.

The 1989 Breeders' Cup Classic at Gulfstream would be the final round. Easy Goer had been sensational since the Belmont, winning the Whitney, Travers, Woodward and Jockey Club Gold Cup. Meanwhile, Sunday Silence was beaten in the Swaps and beat nobody in the Super Derby. So on the afternoon of Nov. 4, 1989, everything would be right with the world again. Easy Goer would beat Sunday Silence, the Kentucky Derby and the Preakness would be forgotten, he would be named Horse of the Year and the entire world would recognize him as the best horse.

Never had I felt worse leaving a racetrack than I did that night. A journalist isn't supposed to root or care who wins, but professional standards were no match for emotion. Easy Goer hadn't had the best of trips around the racetrack that day at Gulfstream. He ducked into the gap at the start, seemed to lose his concentration while dropping back on the far turn and then came on again with a powerful burst that fell short by just a neck. But this was a time for admissions and not excuses. The score was Sunday Silence 3, Easy Goer 1, and it was impossible not to admit that Sunday Silence was best. There would be no tomorrow; this was a total and crushing, and in some respects, humiliating defeat. Sunday Silence had ruined everything and I could not help but hold him responsible for so painfully shattering my love affair with Easy Goer. How I hated that horse.

In time, though, reality set in. This was not life and death, the fulfillment of dreams, good versus evil. It was merely about two very good race horses who engaged in a wonderful rivalry in which one horse came out on top. Sure, there was a lot of disappointment, but there was also a tremendous amount of excitement. Since 1989, the sport has seen nothing that even remotely like it. It wouldn't have been possible without Sunday Silence.

Thirteen years later, there's no denying what he was, simply one of the great race horses of his era. And it didn't stop there. He went on to become one of the best stallions ever. He was Japan's leading sire eight times and his progeny have earned a staggering $323 million, most of it in Japan.

After the thousands of words I wrote cheering on Easy Goer, some of which weren't that kind to Sunday Silence, I'm surely not going to be invited to any funerals or ceremonies in his honor. Nonetheless, I'd like to send my respects.