Losing to Secretariat is no shame, but Sham has five other losses on his chart with only one other Stakes win besides the tainted SA Derby.
A pretty thin record for a horse to be considered "one of the greatest race horses of all time." There are over 100 horses that have been inducted into the Hall of Fame (in Saratoga Springs, NY). Sham is not one of them.
ML/NJ
And if Secretariat wasn’t running that year, Sham would probably have won 8 out of 15 and perhaps still be the record holder in the Kentucky Derby and the Preakness. I hold to my position.