Ruy Lopez 3. ...Lc5, repertoire for black?

Ruy Lopez: Classical Defense 3...Bc5 is a suboptimal move. Best continuations for white are 4. O-O and the Central Variation 4. c3.

Cuz Morphy 3...a6 and Berlin 3...Nf6 are stronger and better for black.

A master told me years ago that many grandmasters used the 3.Bc5 lines as a way to "cut their teeth" on the Black side of the Ruy Lopez.  That is, rather than jumping straight in with the mainline Closed Zaitsev or whatever, they would play Bc5 a few times, get used to these less theoretical positions and then 'graduate' to the mainlines when they felt ready.

With the huge advances in computers and databases, not to mention the meteoric rise of the Berlin, I'm not sure if modern masters still use the Classical as a learning tool, but it's certainly a solid choice.

Possibly helpful:

Starting Out: Ruy Lopez by John Shaw (2003)

https://web.archive.org/web/20140627024240/http://www.chesscafe.com/text/hansen53.pdf

The Ruy Lopez Explained by Gary Lane (2005)

https://web.archive.org/web/20140626201436/http://www.chesscafe.com/text/hansen80.pdf

Play the Ruy Lopez by Andrew Greet (2007)

https://web.archive.org/web/20140627023224/http://www.chesscafe.com/text/hansen94.pdf

http://www.jeremysilman.com/shop/pc/Play-The-Ruy-Lopez-76p3792.htm

The Ruy Lopez: Move by Move by Neil McDonald (2011)

https://web.archive.org/web/20140627022042/http://www.chesscafe.com/text/hansen153.pdf
The Ruy Lopez Revisited by Ivan Sokolov (2009)
http://dev.jeremysilman.com/shop/pc/Ruy-Lopez-Revisited-The-p3765.htm

https://www.newinchess.com/Shop/Images/Pdfs/931.pdf

The May 2017 issue of Chess lists the top twenty openings compiled from a list of 1810 March games where both players were rated over 2400 Elo. One can not take position on this list too seriously because it is greatly influenced by how the openings are grouped. For example, all the Retis are grouped together, while English is separated into 1...c5, 1...e5, etc. Nevertheless, for what it is worth, some of the list entries are: 117 Retis, 83 King's Indians, 79 Slavs, 78 Nimzo-Indians, 71 declined Queen's Gambits, 65 Najdorf Sicilians, 64 Caro-Kanns, 47 Tarrasch Frenches, 43 Closed Ruy Lopezes, 42 Classical Gruenfelds, 40 1...c5 Englishes, 40 Queen's Indians, 37 1...e5 Englishes, 37 Kan Sicilians, 35 Berlin Ruy Lopezes, 33 1...e6 Englishes, and 29 1...Nf6 Englishes

Sometime ago Mark Morss wrote some nice articles on similar 3...Nf6 and 4...Bc5 line http://jfcampbell.us/CampbellReport/hard/h990517.htm

Saw a nice correspondence game with 3...Bc5 too. Might try and dig it up.