With regard to West Coast it seems he should have won in Dubai. The fact that he didn't seems less a compliment to the winner than a caution that the outing wast not a good effort from West Coast. It's reasonable that he was a victim of the "speed bias."

That said some of BB's trainees just seem to stop being competitive and are usually retired post haste. Game of Dude comes to mind and then suddenly if he can't get an easy lead he can't win.

Of course many of BB's stars are retired early in order to cash in on Breeding revenue. In those cases its hard to know what kind of success/longevity they might have had as older horses.

I'm supposing whatever magic BB uses puts intense strain on his horses and has a cumulative long term negative effect. Understand I'm just blowing smoke and have no objective explanation. But that does not change the impression I get watching his stable all told.

If the juveniles don't excel we don't see or hear about them. His success in pointing a horse to a specific race or even series of races is well known what seems to dovetail with that ability is his unwillingness to run a horse that is not shouting "Put Me In Coach"

What has not been discussed much is how fast his runners disappear from competiition once it goes back in a race or two. West Coast s/b capable of a competitive summer performance and c/b he is just saving his last bullet for BC or Pegasus.