ONTARIO, Calif. (September 26, 2009) - At the Dickies Invitational in Ontario, Calif., this weekend, the riders will be looking at a pen of bulls they don't see all that often.
There are a good many bulls set to make their first appearances at the BFTS level, and the draw in Round 1 is pretty evenly matched.
The top three in the standings all have good draws: Lostroh will face Hyland's Shaggy, a bull he should be ride easily. Marchi has a fairly new bull with impressive numbers in 4C/L&G Cattle's Hank. Hank tossed Edvaldo Ferreira at Reno and registered a 44.5-point bull score. Mauney will face Flying U's Chili, a bull that would seem on paper to fit him well.
Mike White makes his return to the BFTS this week after being off since March, and he drew a good one to come back on in McLure's White Lies - a bull that has been ridden 3 out of 4 times by riders of Mike White's caliber. Plus, the name fits, if you are superstitious.
The only real standout matchup in Round 1 is Ryan Dirteater on 4C's Little Bo. Little Bo has been vulnerable against left-handed riders - getting ridden 75 percent of the time, and what makes him a standout bull in this round is that riders have earned an average score of over 88 points on him.
Ultimately, though, this pen of bulls is pretty evenly matched, and the win in Ontario will come down to who can make a ride in the short round, where the contenders will face top bulls including Flying U's Bring It and Hawaiian Ivory, and Moreno's Charlie Bullware and Troubadour.
-by Slade Long
(Slade Long, PBR Web Developer and Statistician, has been crunching the numbers on bucking bulls for 10 years.)
