PUEBLO, Colo. (May 24, 2010) - The stock contractors turned the tables on the bull riders in Decatur, Texas, last weekend.
“We did something different,” said J.W. Hart, who hosted his annual Touring Pro event there on Saturday. “Instead of the bull riders drafting, we let the stock contractors draft the short round. It worked good and it was kind of fun.” Hart had spoken with the riders beforehand, and they all agreed to the arrangement.
Boyd and Floyd provided four of the 10 bulls for the short round, while Diamond S Rodeo Co. and Tino Martinez each had two bulls in the final round. Cody Hebert and James Riley had one each.
According to Hart, Spit Fire was the rankest bull in the pen, so Toby Floyd was given the first pick. The other nine selections were evenly distributed among the remaining contractors.
“When Toby Floyd came up to get first pick for Spit Fire, he said Valdiron [de Oliveira] had been riding him a bunch, so he was going to go with Douglas Duncan,” Hart said.
“And then Edward Martinez came up and said, ‘Valdiron always picks on my little bull Far West, so he has to get on Say When tonight. He always picks on my little one … now pick on my big one.’”
Aaron Pass won the J.W. Hart PBR Challenge with a 91-point effort on Insaniac, for a two-bull total of 173. He was followed by Clayton Baethge, who scored a combined 170.5 on two bulls. Duncan finished third and Oliveira was fourth.
“They picked me because they thought the bull would fit me,” Pass said, “and we got along great.”
“It was a fun concept to change it all around, and let the stock contractors pick on the bull riders,” Hart added. He said the idea of allowing stock contractors to select riders had been “kicked around and thought of” for some time, but that the concept needed testing, and “it’s better to have a kink in it at a Touring Pro event than at a Built Ford Tough Series event on TV.
“I’m the same way on this draft as I am on the other draft. It’ll be fine in some places, but not an everyday deal. If the bull riders pick, they’re supposed to ride them all, and if the contractors get to pick, they’re not going to get to ride. But they rode two of them in the short round, so it didn’t really seem to change much.”
NEWS and NOTES
Just like old times: Mike White outscored Chris Shivers and Guilherme Marchi in a special three-head bull riding challenge last weekend in DeKalb, Texas. According to White, each rider rode two of three bulls. “I beat ‘em both,” White said.
White rode Moody Two and Crooked Neck at the first annual Open to the World Pasture Roping and Bull Riding.
“They were better than everybody expected,” said White, who told Shivers and Marchi he was going to bring nine “real nice spinners” to the event. “I made two pretty good rides and they sure bucked a little bit.”
White said the pasture roping “went great” and they’ll be doing it again next year during the break from the Built Ford Tough Series. This year’s pasture roping had 162 teams, and included Shorty Gorham. In 2011, White hopes to invite several PBR riders.
