Relevancy of the Breeders' Cup Juvenile Field Going into Next Year

Get ready for a large data dump. Below is every BC Juvenile starter since 2006. Horses that I've subjectively considered to maintain or exceeded their 2 year old form are colored in green. Those colored in red, once again completely subjectively, have been deemed to have completely bombed out of being a notable racer.

Well, the article tool keeps cutting this off, but there are 5 more horses, 3 of which are red, 1 (Teuflesberg) is of any note.

A few items of note:

• Every time you look at the horses foaled in 2008, it gets more and more disappointing. Only two BC Juvenile 2010 starters held their form and three were never heard of again in even allowance company.
• 18 horses maintained or exceeded their 2 year old form
• 17 horses completely bombed out of stakes company
• The Cigar Mile seems to literally be a stepping stone to being a sire
• A disproportionate number of horses here are stallions. This falls in line with Bull Hancock theory that a sire should be a winner at 2, for obvious reasons
  
• Only 2 winners of the KY Derby are amongst these 6 fields (Mine That Bird and Street Sense)
• 26 of 73 starters in the BC Juvenile won a 3yo Derby Prep Race
• 25 of 73 starters started in the Kentucky Derby
• 5 Derby starters from BC fields did not win a significant Derby Prep Race
• The only real positive correlation is that of the top 3 or 4 finishers in the race, at least 1 will show good form as a 3 year old and older.

Seeing that the biggest juvenile race in the country only places 33% of its field in the biggest 3 year old race which is just 6 months later, doesn't the Derby Qualifying System kind of make sense? Placing value on races that actually may indicate future success is a pretty solid idea instead of giving equal credit to dollars earned in restricted races that have sub-standard competition.

I wish there was less emphasis on these Juvenile races. They're fun, but they really do incentivize an asset (quick growth) that doesn't truly indicate ability. Surely, some of these 2 year old phenoms are world class in their own right, but so many are just big at an early age and not truly talented.