PBR livestock director, Cody Lambert, talks about putting together a bull pen together answering questions of interest to bull riding fans.
Question: When we have an event like Tulsa, how far out are you already thinking about that event?
Cody Lambert: Tentatively, February and March, I get the guys down that I think are going to go to Tulsa, but I don’t get too critical of one bull or another or get too comfortable with one bull or another until about three weeks out, because bulls that are really good today might not be so good by the time Tulsa rolls around. If a bull was good last month and he hasn’t been anywhere since, sure, he’ll work for Tulsa, but if he’s been to two events in the last two weeks, I want to know what he did at those two events. If he failed at one of those he won’t be at Tulsa.
Q: How much attention do you have to pay to the rest of the schedule – the events leading up to it as well as the events after it? Is it safe to say you can’t overwork a bull?
Lambert: Yeah, and logistically, here’s my schedule for bulls. I have 100 bulls in Tulsa. There will be some Classic bulls, the bull teams will be there, and then the rest of the bulls that I fill it up with. There will be 100 bulls in Tulsa. That’s on the 18th, 19th and 20th. On the 21st and 22nd, I need 80 bulls in Cheyenne. There’s no way you can use the same bulls that were in Tulsa in Cheyenne. It’s too far too travel in that short of time. You could get there, but the bulls would be worn out. So I finish that, and then I need another 95 bulls in Edmonton. Cheyenne is over on the 22nd, and on the 24th we start Edmonton, and I need 95 bulls there. That’s a whole different pen of bulls – plus 50 of them will be from the United States, and 45 of them will be from Canada. So those three days I’ve got those 95 bulls, and that’s the 24th, 25th and 26th, and on the 27th we have our first ESPN2 event in Del Mar, California, and I have to have about 60 really good bulls there. Well, they can’t be the bulls I had in Cheyenne, but there may be a couple that were in Tulsa that make the trip out to California, because they have a little over a week in between. Actually it’s one week from the day Tulsa’s over until the day Del Mar begins, and then the week after that is Glendale, Arizona, which is only six hours from Del Mar, so I can easily use the same bulls in Del Mar and Glendale, but the day after Glendale I have Paso Robles, California, another ESPN 2 event, so there’s no way I can use the same bulls on Saturday and then use them again in Paso Robles on Sunday. All of that stuff starting in Tulsa and for the two weeks – from Tulsa through two weeks later - I’ll use about 300 bulls.
Q: To pick those 300 bulls, how many bulls will you consider? How many legitimately get looked at to make sure you got the 300 best bulls available to use?
Lambert: This late in the year I’d say I’m looking through about 1,000 bulls to get those 300, because I’ve narrowed my pool of bulls down to about 2,200 bulls right now.
Q: Wow.
Lambert: But the hard one is that out of these 2,200 bulls that I’ve narrowed it down to, they’re all good bulls. Well, when we get to the time of the PBR World Finals, 130 get to go. In 1994, the first year we had our Finals, I had trouble finding enough good bulls to put the thing together. The big problem then was finding enough good bulls. Today the big problem is figuring out which one you’re going to leave at home. Out of the 130 you take there’s another 500 at home that are just like them.
Q: And their owners are (upset) that they’re at home.
Lambert: Absolutely—every one of them. Any bull can have an off day, and as soon as one has an off day, there’s 15 guys calling me asking why I didn’t take their bull instead of that one.
Q: I’m a voting member of the CMAs, and as soon as it’s award season I hate going to my mailbox, because every day I get letters, video tapes and all sorts of things telling me way one (country) artist or another deserves my vote.
Lambert: It would be nice if they all just sent a gift.
Q: No gifts. I get a few trinkets, but no gifts. At an event you’re trying to work, but I would imagine you experience the same thing. How do you manage that and keep everybody happy?
Lambert: I really don’t worry about keeping everybody happy. I really try as hard as I can to do the best job of picking bulls. If it’s down to two bulls, I pick the one I think is the best. If I only have room for one, I pick the one I think is the best and I don’t look at anything else. Then, at the end of all of that, I think that the people I do business with respect me for that. I might not give people the answer they want, but I give them the answer that I believe. At the end of it all, that is the very best that I can do. I try to put out – you know the effort that I was talking about earlier about the bull riders, about how they expect perfection every time, the guys that started the PBR, they expected it. No one rode every single bull they got on, but the majority of them expected to. Well, I expect to be perfect at every event, and I’m never perfect at any event, but I try to put it together that way, and that’s the only way I can do this job without going nuts. I don’t give special favors and I don’t expect special favors from anyone. I don’t have to worry that I owe someone something and I just do it that way.
Q: If there’s a bull you’re sort of on the fence about, and the stock contractor has a history of having great bulls, I don’t know, have you ever been on the fence and then you said given their history I’m going to give them the benefit of the doubt?
Lambert: Absolutely. There’s some contractors that I value their opinion more than others. There’s some bull riders that I value their opinion more than others. The one that has the ability to take his own personal agenda out of the equation and just tell me which he feels is better, or the reason he feels one is better, that’s the person who – he may not be my favorite friend or anything – but he’ll be the one that I respect his opinion the most. The stock contractors that have had great bulls before are more likely to see them more clearly and have something to compare it to. I treat it like a coach that has seen hundreds or players or thousands of players, and knows where his kid stacks up, but a parent that’s not familiar with that has his first kid involved in sports and he thinks he’s the very best at everything. He might be really good, but he might not be quite as good as he thinks.
Q: In typical week – I don’t even know if there is a typical week for you – how many hours are you spending looking at bulls; either going somewhere to watch them or watching tape or going over stats?
Lambert: I’m going over stats every day, and I’m watching video tape, and then some people will email me videos of their bulls. I’m looking at that quite a bit and going over stats every single day. I look at video footage of bulls bucking every other day. I rarely travel anymore to see them unless it’s at a Challenger event or an Enterprise event or some type of PBR function because there’s just not enough days in the year to do that and to organize the bulls for the events. Just like the number of events I have for the second half of July, well, if I travel to look at bulls then I can’t spend 50 hours putting a bull riding together and one of them might only take me 10 hours to put together and the next one might take me 80 hours to put together. So I’ve got to leave myself enough time to get the job done.
Q: Once a bull makes it to the Built Ford Tough Series, is it easier for that bull to stay on the Built Ford Tough Series then it is to prove itself ready for the series?
Lambert: I don’t know if it is or not. That would be a good question for the guys that own the bulls. I think that everyone would kind of have a different opinion of it, but I think any bull is subject from retirement from the Built Ford Tough Series. (laughs) He’s one trip away from being out. He can have two years of excellent trips and say he comes out and stops tonight—he will not be back. Now if he has a weaker day, or something like that, we’ll try to figure out what the problem is, but if he stops, he’s telling me he does not want to buck anymore, and I’ll listen to him.
Q: You talked before about when you put the pen together you want every bull to come out and have its best day, but inevitably a bull here or there is going to have a bad day. What is your mindset if you leave an event knowing a bunch of bulls have had incredible days – and you know you did your job and put the best pen together – but you were off on a bull or two? Do you still leave thinking you could have done a better job?
Lambert: Yeah, it kind of ruins my day. I’ll give you an example: in Dallas on the first night, June 21st, Dallas was an event where everybody wanted to go. There’s so many people with bulls in Texas and Oklahoma and Louisiana that everybody wanted to go. Well, I’ve only got room for 90 bulls because it’s a two-day event. There were bulls that I didn’t accept for Dallas that I know are going to make PBR Finals, so in a roundabout way it was tougher to get a bull in Dallas then it (will be) in PBR Finals. I actually had 92 bulls there and I felt like every bull there was Finals quality, but there were four bulls on my list that, while I was taking those Finals-quality bulls, there were four on my list that I didn’t know at all but I took their owners' word for it. I took their owners' word for it because I knew they were leaving bulls at home that were PBR Finals quality. So if I’m only taking three bulls from this particular stock contractor and he thinks his third best bull is this one, and I know he has these other two or three at home that are that good, then I’m going to take his word for it if I know him well enough. Well, on that first night every single bull bucked except one, and it happened to be one of those bulls that I didn’t know. I was so (upset) about that because I left 100 good bulls off the list, 100 good bulls that wouldn’t have failed. In Dallas we had 47 riders, so we bucked 47 bulls that night and that was the one that just ate on me. I had to vent. I had to tell the guy I won’t take his word again.
Q: (Laughing)
Lambert: It was a bull there were no stats on. This is a new bull, and he had bulls that were good enough, and I explained that this is not the place. He said he thought that bull would buck because it was doing well at home, but he’s taken bulls to 10 different Challenger events this year, but he hasn’t taken that bull. Dallas wasn’t the place to be trying out a bull. That kind of stuff doesn’t work with me, and I’m the one to blame. I’m the one to be held accountable for that bull, because all I had to say was “No, I don’t have any stats on that bull.” But I made a mistake.
Q: Being willing to share that story and say, “I made a mistake,” coupled with the kind of guy you are ... a no (bull) kind of guy—
Lambert: I hope. I try to be.
Q: That’s what it’s going to take for someone to be in the position you’re in.
Lambert: I understand, yeah, I understand what you’re saying. See, the weird thing about is: that’s how I want to be treated. I don’t want the long, sugarcoated answer and I don’t want people to search for the answer they think I want to hear. I want what they believe to be the truth.
Q: These next two weeks, you have all these bulls all over the country. Are you going to be at each one of these events as well?
Lambert: I’m going to be in, oh, lets see, Tulsa, Cheyenne, Edmonton ... I won’t be in Del Mar because it’s a one-day event, so after I get all my bulls set and everything done all I’d be doing really is watching the event. I don’t have to make a decision at the event.
Q: At two and three-day events, are there decisions you’re making as the event unfolds?
Lambert: Absolutely. It’s usually which bulls get to buck tomorrow, and which ones are going to be in the short go, and which ones are going to be in the long go, and which aren’t going to come back tomorrow, and which ones are never going to come back.
Q: Are there some bulls, that when you select them for an event, you know you’re holding them back and they’ll only buck in the short go?
Lambert: Oh, yeah, every event there are some like that – bulls like Chicken on a Chain or Voodoo Child. Now those are the best bulls in the world, so if their owner tells me they want to buck him twice, I’d love to have him both days. I’d love to put him in, but if they want to buck him one time I’m going to hold him for the championship round. I will ask them that. I’ll ask just about everybody. I don’t want to buck a bull two days in a row if their owner doesn’t think he can take it. I’ll ask everybody: Is there something you only want one trip on? Generally, these days, bulls that are so valuable like Chicken on a Chain or Jacob’s Pet or Voodoo Child, they’ll say they just want to buck him one time over the weekend.
Q: You don’t want him to have a championship-like out in round one and then go stiff on you in the short go.
Lambert: These bulls just extend themselves and they put – those champions – they put out so much effort they might be a little body sore the next day or something. They might have a sore muscle or something like that, but there are also a lot of them that are better the second day. They loosen themselves up the first day and there will be guys who tell me to be sure and try to buck him twice, if you can, because he’ll be better the second day. White Magic is a bull that his owner has told me several times that he thinks he’s better the second day, so if at all possible buck him the first day.
Q: I love that bull. You know, I’m a Johnny-come-lately to bull riding, but I love watching that bull – White Magic.
Lambert: Yeah, he’s pretty special.
Q: I don’t know what the riders think about having to get on him, but I love watching him. Have there been bulls like that, that as the season progresses – we know Chicken on a Chain is a World-Champion-quality bull – but are there other bulls that each time you see them they seem to gain more of your respect?
Lambert: Oh yeah, there are, and there are lots and lots of them. There’s bulls that I’ll lose a little respect for. I’ll still respect their ability and everything, their desire. Any bull that doesn’t want to buck, he has that option. Every bull out there, there’s nothing we can do to make one buck if he doesn’t want to, so if his heart’s not in it – a truly gifted athlete – he’s not going to put up the fight that a bull who loves his job is going to. I keep comparing them to humans because the most physically gifted athlete isn’t always the best at any sport, but occasionally there’s that one freak. I don’t have a better word for it. There’s one freak like Ty Murray that is more gifted – stronger, faster, has better balance and a desire that no one’s ever seen before – and then he also has a work ethic that no one’s ever seen before. As bad as he wants to win in the arena, as much effort as he puts out in the arena, when he gets home he’s working that much harder, that much more, that many more hours in the gym or in the practice pen or whatever it takes to just continue to get better.
Q: Right.
Lambert: When that happens, then you get somebody like that. It’s very rare that the guy has all the physically ability, more determination and higher standards than everyone else.
Q: I think "freak" is the right word, and when you were talking about athletes – I’m not sure if you are a baseball or not, but I hate the Minnesota Twins.
Lambert: (Laughing)
Q: I’m from Wisconsin. I hate everything about Minnesota.
Lambert: (Laughing)
Q: But the late Kirby Puckett was a freak. To think about the ability he had, the eye-hand coordination, the ability he had to play the outfield and yet he was short and overweight.
Lambert: Yeah.
Q: But he played (his guts out).
Lambert: His stuff was—he did have a lot of talent, but it was mostly self-induced talent. It was from work. He developed everything from out working everybody.
Q: Exactly, and as much as it would suck to watch the Brewers get their (butts) kicked by the Twins game after game, you had to hand it to Kirby Puckett, because he made it happen. Even above all that he was a leader, and the guys around him felt like they had to step up their game.
Lambert: See, that’s something that I’ve tried to explain and I’ve never come up with the right words for it. Justin McBride is such a leader in that locker room for that reason. He leads by example because he expects the most out of himself. Even Justin, who expects the most out of himself ... expecting that, he doesn’t work at it one-tenth as much as Ty (Murray) did.
Q: What more do we need to know about what it takes to put the pen together that I just simply don’t know to ask?
Lambert: I don’t think there’s anything we haven’t covered. It’s not that I have some kind of magic answer or magic button to push, all I do is try to stay brutally honest with the guys that own the bulls and with myself. If I feel like I need to put in 10 or 20 more hours to do a better job than I did last week, then I’ll do it. That’s just how it is. I’ve been at events every year that I wasn’t proud of. I’ve had events this year that I’m disgusted with.
Q: Disgusted with?
Lambert: Oh, Fresno, California, was pathetic.
Q: Really?
Lambert: As far as the bulls went. I had a lot on my plate that week, but I didn’t do a good enough job. That particular week I had Worcester on the 11th, 12th and 13th, Denver on the 14th, 15th, 16th and Fresno on the 18th. That’s how many events I put on, and I took some bulls off of video and I took some bulls off stats, and I took a few bulls that I hadn’t seen before, but I didn’t do a good job.
Q: After an event like that what do you do to make yourself feel better about yourself?
Lambert: I do a better job next time. I understand - I rode professionally for 17 years - I understand that you’re not going to win every time, but I expect to win every time. (laughs) I expect to do the very best job I can every time. Whenever I know I did the very best I can, I can handle an off day. I got bucked off of bulls before, and when I got up and said, “I gave it everything I got. He just kicked my (butt).” Usually it was, “If I hadn’t made that stupid mistake…” (There have) always been times that I got up and felt proud of my effort even though I lost. Well, if I know how hard I worked on that event and I know I gave everything I had and it didn’t work out, then I can probably take it better, but that particular week I spread myself thinner than I needed to and focused harder on the Northeast than I did the West Coast, and so I feel like I let ‘em down when we went to California. A few weeks later when we went back to Anaheim I felt like I redeemed myself.
Q: Glad to hear that, because you also talked about that one bull in Dallas—
Lambert: Yeah, Dallas was a very successful event, and I was really proud of the bulls overall. I knew going in it was going to be that way. I was just so disappointed for leaving a good one at home that I knew was good — I felt like I got greedy. I mean, I have a bull that I’m leaving at home that if they ride him I know they’re going to be 87 to 89 on, and I left him at home for one, hoping they’ll be 90 or better. I felt like I just kind of got greedy in that way.
Q: What event are the most proud of?
Lambert: I’ve never really looked at it that way. I’ve never really stopped and looked at it that way.
Q: Can I rephrase the question?
Lambert: Yep.
Q: I know you always want to be the best, but has there ever been an event where you walked away thinking, “OK, that went a lot better than even I hoped it would” – it met or exceeded your expectation?
Lambert: No, not really. I tell you what, someone called me and said they read on the Internet that San Antonio was the best pen of bulls ever assembled for one event – that’s San Antonio this year. I didn’t feel like they were different than anywhere else. I was proud of what they were and I was proud of the event, but it was the best that I could do. I don’t look at one that I’m more proud of than the other for some reason. I just, the one I’m the least proud of this year is Fresno, California.
Q: I’m going to preface this question by saying you do a (heck) of a job doing what you do as the PBR livestock director, but when the day comes that you say, “I have a wife. I have a family. I’ve had one (heck) of a ride, but it’s time for me to sit home and drink lemonade while I watch the sunset.” Is there someone you’re thinking about bringing in to work under you, to learn from you?
Lambert: I would love to know who that ism because I think about that a lot, and there are plenty of people that know as much about bulls as I do, and there are plenty of people that can tell a good one from a mediocre one. There are plenty of people that can see that, but the one thing that I haven’t found yet is anyone that can take themselves out of the equation. That can totally take themselves out of the equation. Everybody wants to own a bucking bull. Everybody wants to raise a bucker, and that is a conflict for what we do. It cannot happen, and that is the only reason I can’t throw any names out there right now, but I do know this: as much time as I put into this thing, as long as I’ve been doing it, I’ve also had a family, and if I have to stay up all night and work on the bull riding stuff so I can spend all day with my family, I just do it. That’s one thing that I can honestly say is that I’ve never had to neglect my family. It just wouldn’t happen. I wouldn’t let it happen. When I was riding and I was rodeoing, I came home every week. When my son was growing up I was home every single week even though I was gone every weekend. If I was gone four days that week, then I was home three days, or gone three days and home four days, but I came home every single week, because that’s what’s important to me, and it still is to this day. My son’s 21 years old and I’ve been married for 26 years, and during these events – the event I told you I was disgusted with in Fresno, California – I wasn’t there at that event because I was at my son's basketball game at Angelo State University that weekend. That’s one thing that does happen—when it’s a one-day event like that, I can fly home and go to that. I didn’t have any more decisions to make in Fresno. So I was sick about (the event), but I was still happy that I was at my son’s game.
Q: Yea, it’s going to take a heck of a person.
Lambert: There will be somebody. Every one of us is replaceable. We might like to think we’re not, but every one of us is. The most important job in the world, the President of the United States, they change every four years, so it’s not like, “Oh, what are we going to do if Cody’s not there.” There will be somebody else there.
Learn more: Professional Bull Riding 101
