Declared Tuesday from the Breeders' Cup Juvenile, Maxfield appears to have bruised foot

ARCADIA, Calif. – The connections of Maxfield believe their Grade 1-winning 2-year-old has a bruised right front foot, which is why he was scratched Tuesday from Friday’s $2 million Breeders’ Cup Juvenile at Santa Anita.

“That’s how we’re proceeding at this point,” said Jimmy Bell, president of Godolphin USA. Godolphin owns Maxfield. “That would be the best of bad news.”

Maxfield was noticeably off while training Tuesday morning at Santa Anita. His trainer, Brendan Walsh, in consult with Bell and the principals of Godolphin, immediately opted to scratch the colt, wanting to be proactive rather than reactive.

“It’s disappointing but it’s the right thing to do by him,” Walsh said at the time. “He’s ahead of what we even expected him to do already this year.”

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Maxfield, a son of 2006 Breeders’ Cup Juvenile and 2007 Kentucky Derby winner Street Sense, won both of his starts this year. He was most impressive winning the Grade 1 Breeders’ Futurity at Keeneland on Oct. 5.

“It’s hard, but it’s easy,” Bell said of scratching.

Maxfield drew post 9 and was the third choice at 3-1 on the morning line behind Dennis’ Moment (8-5) and Eight Rings (2-1). Maxfield’s defection reduces the field for the Juvenile to eight.

Bob Baffert, the trainer of Eight Rings, is familiar with scratching a horse out of the Juvenile the day after entries are made. In 2014, he was forced to scratch American Pharoah out of the race.

“You feel for the connections,” Baffert said. “It’s so hard to get here, and then when you have a really good one like that . . . I hope it’s minor.”

Dale Romans, trainer of Dennis’ Moment, said Maxfield’s scratch “changes everything.”

“I thought he was the horse to beat,” Romans said. “I feel awful for Brendan.”

Bell said that Maxfield would be shipped to Churchill Downs after the weekend. The colt is likely to be based in South Florida during the winter.