Fried Twinkies, Buckle Bunnies, & Bull Riders Read online

  6 Jody Newberry 1,841.5 points

  7 Reuben Geleynse 1,750.5 points

  8 Ross Coleman 1,740.5 points

  9 Troy Dunn 1,725 points

  10 Greg Potter 1,608.5 points

  SEVEN

  REVENGE OF THE BULLFIGHTER

  Indianapolis, Indiana

  Saturday, March 6, 2004

  With revenge on his mind, Rob Smets blew past the animal-rights protester outside the RCA Dome. The woman wore a bull mask and a sandwich board that on the front read “Rodeo Making Sport of Cruelty” and on the back “Abuse Should Not Amuse.” Handing out pamphlets, she decried bull riding as mistreatment of the animals. If only the protester had followed Smets to the Outdoor Life Network’s TV truck, she would’ve seen it was guys like him and his fellow bullfighters who were suffering most of the cruelty and abuse.

  The three bullfighters that worked every BFTS event wore snug jerseys, shorts, and cleated shoes and stood outside the chutes, ready to intervene if a bull tried to trample or hook a fallen rider. Fans used to call them rodeo clowns back when they wore face paint, baggy pants, and overalls, which was like seeing a member of the Secret Service wearing a big red nose and a water-squirting flower on his lapel. All bullfighters used to be rodeo clowns, responsible for entertaining the crowd and protecting the riders. But the self-respecting, modern bullfighter uniforms are as serious as the new job description: bull rider bodyguards. Gags are left up to the barrelmen and the latter-day rodeo clowns who still wear face paint and the funny-looking attire.

  Guardian angels, in-arena announcer Brandon Bates called the PBR’s bullfighters. Smets, a stocky 44-year-old, was the oldest in the business and one of the best. He had short brown hair and a square jaw that looked like it belonged to a boxer. Built like a Division II linebacker, Smets occasionally went after bulls as if they were running backs and he were Dick Butkus. He talked trash to the bulls as if they understood his insults and taunts. But now, in Indianapolis and inside the TV truck, Smets grimaced as he watched a replay of the previous week’s encounter between him and a black bull named Sniper. There it was: the first round of the Philadelphia Invitational at Wachovia Spectrum, Andre Moraes on Sniper, everything running like clockwork, until Moraes got bucked off and hit the dirt. The next moment belonged to Smets and the two other bullfighters—Dennis Johnson and Greg Crab-tree. Smets took charge, moving in and distracting the bull as Moraes scrambled to safety. Textbook move. So far, flawless. But impulse took over. Smets wanted more.

  He wanted to show the crowd what he could do. He wanted a shot at the bull, one-on-one. He moved in on Sniper.

  Waving him on, Smets tried to dodge the charging bull, got scooped by its horns, and flipped end over end and onto the dirt. Quickly on his feet, Smets again waved on the bull, and Sniper came back. This time the bull pitchforked Smets’s backside and launched him face-first into the dirt.

  Undeterred, Smets waved the bull forward one more time. Sniper caught him from behind yet again and tossed him into the air. Gravity slammed Smets to the dirt.

  “Flipped him like a cheese omelet,” cracked Justin McKee, one of the OLN commentators.

  Smets scrambled to his feet and moved toward Sniper before Cody Lambert, vice president and livestock director for the PBR, stifled his own laughter long enough to tell Smets to give it up. On horseback, the cowboy known as the “pickup man,” on standby to lasso uncooperative bulls, saved Smets further embarrassment. He roped Sniper by the horns and led him out the center gate while Smets punched the protective barrel always kept in the arena.

  The bull had made him look like a rookie: Smets feinting right when he should have feinted left, rushing in when he should have held back, and going back for more when he should have quit.

  Now, a week later in Indianapolis, Smets boiled over while watching the replay in OLN’s truck. “That bull and I are going at it tonight,” he fumed, “and this time he’s mine.”

  An hour before introductions, Smets got dressed in his work uniform alongside Dennis Johnson and Greg Crabtree, two of the PBR’s other regular bullfighters, and regaled his junior colleagues with stories. Like the time in Salt Lake City when Smets took a bull horn in the ass. Right between the cheeks.

  “How far up there?” asked Crabtree.

  “Four and a half inches,” Smets said.“Straight to the sphincter muscle.”

  “Smets hasn’t had a loud fart since,” cracked Flint Rasmussen.

  While Smets and the other two bullfighters went after the bulls, Rasmussen went after the laughs. Rasmussen, known as a barrelman because of the steel barrel he and his counterparts used to protect themselves, got his laughs with style—moonwalking across dirt like the King of Pop, kicking and jumping like a cheerleader, and jigging to the song “Cotton-Eyed Joe.” Stylish moves were of no interest to Smets. As introductions drew near, not even Rasmussen could get the grizzled bullfighter to laugh.

  Smets pulled on his uniform top, wrapped his ankles with adhesive tape, and strapped on a hockey girdle.

  Poking his head into the dressing room, Tommy Joe Lucia, the PBR’s chief production officer, looked at Smets. “Is it going to happen tonight?”

  “Yes,” Smets said firmly and continued to get ready. On went the bicycle shorts, the thick cotton shorts, and the cleated shoes. He leaned against a locker and stretched his calves, working out the kinks, aches, and pains accumulated over his 26-year career. Then he made a final stop in the sports medicine room, where a trainer rubbed heating balm on the back of Smets’s permanently stiff neck. On his way out, Smets swallowed five Advils and broke into a jog.

  The crowd was waiting. So was Sniper.

  In the old days, the bullfighters’ main job was to produce laughs. That was before Melvin “Wick” Peth arrived on the rodeo scene in 1955. By Peth’s own admission, when it came to being a rodeo clown, he had a major shortcoming. “I was a piss-poor clown,” he said.

  Instead of giving up on rodeo, Peth gave up the gags. But a funny thing happened: Peth helped redefine the job of a rodeo clown, giving birth to the modern-day bullfighter.

  Focusing on protecting the riders and showcasing the art of bull protection, he went after the bulls like they were opponents. He rushed them, dodged them, taunted them, and did it with unsurpassed skill. Then along came a kid whom Peth branded a “young punk.”

  The kid was Rob Smets, then 18 and a hell-raiser from California.

  Riding bulls in high school, Smets had a big heart and a bigger mouth. He was an average rider and remembers the day he was sitting on a fence during a high school rodeo and popping off to the bullfighters. “If you think it’s so easy,” they shot back,“why don’t you try it?”

  Why not, thought Smets, who hopped into the ring.

  Instead of riding bulls, Smets found he was a natural at fighting them. He displayed the necessary quickness, instincts, and courage. And though his father encouraged him to learn a craft, Smets decided to pursue a career as a bullfighter.

  A 6-inch scar ran down the back of his neck, which he’d broken twice. The first time was in 1992, when he fractured vertebrae C4 to C6, the same injury that former Detroit Lions football player Mike Utley suffered in a game and that left him in a wheelchair. Four years later Smets broke the C1 vertebra in his upper neck, the same injury that paralyzed actor Christopher Reeve during an equestrian accident. By contrast, the injuries left Smets with little more than a permanently stiff neck. But he knew he’d been lucky. For that reason, he swore off freestyle bullfighting—where the men go one-on-one with a bull for 40 to 70 seconds and for which, while competing on the Wrangler Bullfight Tour, Smets had won five world championships—and promised his wife he’d focus on rider protection.

  But impulse ruled Smets, who continued to engage in bouts like the one with Sniper. And when he lost, he always vowed revenge. His chance in Indianapolis came in the second section of bull riders that night.

  With B. J. Kramps riding Sniper, the bull took a few sluggish jumps before the 8
-second buzzer sounded. It was as if Sniper had saved his fury for Smets; instead of heading for the out gate, the bull lingered in the arena.

  Chugging forward, Smets circled in front of the bull and slapped him on the snout. Round one to the bullfighter.

  Sniper sauntered toward the center of the ring. Smets positioned himself behind the barrel and prepared to climb on top. Those who had seen Smets compete in freestyle competitions knew what was coming when Sniper charged. Smets would either leap over the bull or walk down the animal’s back. The move would establish dominance—the bullfighter’s equivalent of a knockout.

  But as Smets propped a foot on the barrel, the pickup man on horseback sailed his rope into the air and lassoed Sniper by the horns. Just like that, the showdown ended. Later, Smets learned that Cody Lambert had hollered at the pickup man to get Sniper out of the ring before Smets got run over yet again, which naturally ticked off Smets.

  While Sniper was led out of the arena, Smets trotted over to the chutes and, still panting, grinned while explaining to Tandy Freeman, the PBR’s orthopedic surgeon, how he’d outsmarted the bull. Freeman rolled his eyes. The “war” had proven to be no more than a skirmish.

  In truth, the fans were more interested in the battle between Adriano Moraes, Justin McBride, and Mike Lee. Though less than a third of the way into the season, Moraes was threatening to turn the race for the championship into a rout.

  Two weeks earlier at the St. Louis Open and the PBR’s 10th stop of the season, Moraes had ridden Spotted Jacket for 90 points in the championship round for his third victory of the season. He finished third the next week at Philadelphia, giving him a big lead over Justin McBride and Mike Lee as he arrived at the RCA Dome for the Indianapolis Invitational, the 12th stop of the season.

  In baseball, the magic number for a hitter is .300. Manage hits in three out of every 10 at-bats, and the player has had a good year. In the PBR, the magic number is 50 percent. Make the 8-second buzzer on every other bull, and a rider has had a good year. By those standards, Moraes was on pace for an unfathomable year. He arrived in Indianapolis having successfully ridden 21 of 25 bulls, for a staggering rate of 84 percent. In the PBR’s past four seasons, only Ty Murray, the seven-time all-around world champion and two-time bull riding world champion, had successfully ridden more than 70 percent of his bulls over the course of a season. Moraes’s impressive string in 2004 included scores on three of the tour’s baddest bulls—Mossy Oak Mudslinger, Kid Rock, and Western Wishes—and six rides for 90 points or more.

  In the first round at Indianapolis, Moraes drew X Rated. Out of the chute, the bull feinted left and staggered back to the right. Moraes was not fooled. Maintaining his spot in the pocket, Moraes looked in command on his way to the 8-second buzzer, whereupon he dismounted, landed on his feet, and gave the bull a quick Clint Eastwood stare. The judges awarded him 86 points for the ride. Then it was McBride’s turn.

  The bull was Mohegan Sun, bucking for only the second time on the PBR. Out of the chute, he spun hard to the right and completed four revolutions before reversing direction. McBride stayed centered, the 8-second buzzer sounded, and in came the score: 88 points. During the 1-night competition, McBride and Moraes headed into the championship round one-two in that night’s standings.

  In that final round, with Moraes on a quick spinner named Western Wishes, the bull whirled to the left. In control, Moraes spurred with his right foot on his way to 91.5 points—the top score of the night—and the seventh time in eight tries that Moraes had ridden his bull in the championship round. The only way Moraes could lose was if McBride stayed on Mossy Oak Mudslinger, among the PBR’s rankest bulls, and scored 89 points.

  Moraes made a point to watch every ride, like a disciplined baseball player preparing for future at-bats and watching every pitch. But as McBride settled onto Mossy Oak Mudslinger, who had bucked off McBride in the last round of the 2003 finals, Moraes climbed down the metal deck behind the chutes and walked toward the locker room.

  An OLN reporter dispatched someone to stop him. If McBride bucked off or scored less than 89 points, the reporter needed Moraes for the postevent TV interview.

  Moraes stopped. He looked irritated and brusquely predicted McBride would ride the bull and score at least 90 points. But there was nothing predictable about Mossy Oak Mudslinger’s trip.

  Out of the chute, the bull departed from his regular pattern and spun to the right. Then he spun back to the left. No matter. He couldn’t shake off McBride before the 8-second buzzer.

  In came the judges’ scores: 91.5 points! McBride had triumphed.

  Cupping his hand, Moraes shouted, “Go, Justin,” and then marched toward the locker room. He still had a commanding lead in the standings, but McBride won $57,363, moved back in front of Lee, and shattered Moraes’s aura of invincibility. Of course, the riders weren’t the only ones battling it out.

  So were the bulls.

  That night in Indianapolis, in the championship round, Little Yellow Jacket bucked off Lee in impressive fashion. Yet the judges awarded the highest scores to another bull—Crossfire Hurricane, who dumped rider Bryan Richardson. With the cowboys determining Bull of the Year by a vote at the end of the regular season, the judges’ scores served as a potential guide—not the ultimate measuring stick. The random draw meant one bull might face better riders over the course of a season. So the riders judged them not only on the number of consecutive buck-offs but also on how good the bulls looked when throwing riders. Riders liked to know that even the greatest bull could on occasion be conquered and that, when he was, the ride produced high scores. A qualified score on Little Yellow Jacket, for instance, was virtually guaranteed to be 90 points or higher. But the scores from Indianapolis for the two-time reigning Bull of the Year made him no shoo-in for a third straight championship.

  But even after the event, the only bull on Smets’s mind was Sniper. Back in the dressing room, Smets’s cell phone rang. It was Carla, knowing her husband had ignored her advice to avoid a rematch with Sniper.

  “I got him,” Smets boasted. “I waited on the fake.” As the conversation continued, disappointment crept across Smets’s face. “I didn’t do enough,” he said, subdued.“I didn’t get enough out of that bull.” But that had no effect on Smets’s ultimate goal. Measuring himself against Peth, he wanted to be remembered as the greatest bullfighter. Peth had retired at 54. Smets vowed to continue until he was 55, which would require 11 more years in the business—by which time Sniper and countless other bulls with which Smets had tangled would be long since retired.

  STANDINGS

  1 Adriano Moraes 4,865 points

  2 Justin McBride 3,473 points

  3 Mike Lee 3,088 points

  4 Ross Coleman 2,748 points

  5 Mike White 2,319.5 points

  6 Dave Samsel 2,248.5 points

  7 Jody Newberry 2,227 points

  8 Greg Potter 2,191.5 points

  9 Dan Henricks 2,079 points

  10 Reuben Geleynse 2,047 points

  EIGHT

  THE FORT WORTH MASSACRE

  Fort Worth, Texas

  Saturday & Sunday, March 13 & 14, 2004

  The bull rider lay sprawled on the arena dirt like a wet bag of cement.

  The four-man sports medicine team, followed by paramedics, rushed in. But for Ross Johnson, it looked like it might be too late.

  Behind the chutes, a PBR official pressed a cell phone against her ear. “He’s not moving,” she said, the color draining from her face. Standing nearby, rider James White placed his cowboy hat over his chest, bowed his head, and whispered, “God, please help him.”

  One moment Johnson had been atop the bull named Panda, trying to ride out the 1,700-pound storm. The next moment he was bouncing across the dirt and under the thrashing bull. As Johnson fell off Panda, his right spur had caught the bull rope, sucking him under the bull. Now Panda’s stomping hooves came down like metal pistons, pounding Johnson on his back, his shoulder, his neck, and the s
ide of his skull.

  Blood oozed from his head onto the dirt.

  “Ross! Ross! Ross!”

  Bolting from her seat in the stands, Abby Johnson screamed for her husband, her shrieks piercing the hushed arena. Ross Johnson’s father and stepmother tried to calm her, but it was hard to stay calm as the crowd of about 5,000 inside the Will Rogers Memorial Center watched in stunned silence.

  By the time Johnson’s spur came loose and the bullfighters separated him from the bull, he lay motionless and directly in front of the open center gate through which the bulls exited. Panda circled back.

  Bullfighter Rob Smets, kneeling beside Johnson, peered over his shoulder at the approaching bull. A week earlier at Indianapolis, Smets was consumed with exacting revenge on Sniper, but now his only thought was saving Johnson—and he knew he had but one option.

  Smets draped his body over Johnson’s and prepared to take the blow. Panda charged forward. Smets closed his eyes and covered his head. He heard the beating hooves.

  Mercifully, the bull passed behind him and through the center gate. Out rushed the orthopedic surgeon, the athletic trainers, and the paramedics. As they hurried into the arena, they were certain of only one thing: Johnson was either unconscious or dead.

  It wouldn’t have been the first death on the PBR tour. In 2000, at an event in Albuquerque, New Mexico, Promiseland tossed Canadian rider Glen Keeley and stomped on Keeley’s chest. Doctors performed emergency surgery, but their efforts were unsuccessful. Keeley, 30 years old, became the first rider to die from injuries suffered during PBR competition and joined the long list of riders who’d died in the arena. The list included well-known professional riders such as Lane Frost, the 1987 PRCA champion, who died in 1989; Ronnie Rossen, who died in 1991; and Brent Thurman, who died in 1994. Although the number of amateur riders killed is unknown, during a 3-month stretch in 1993 three riders died at amateur bull ridings in Canada.

  But that night in Fort Worth, as paramedics strapped Johnson onto a flat board, lifted him onto a gurney, and wheeled him out of the arena, not one rider withdrew from the event, the 13th BFTS stop of the 2004 season. Officially it was the Tuff Hedeman Championship Challenge. But even before Johnson’s wreck, the PBR’s medical staff was calling it the “Fort Worth Massacre,” a reference to the 2003 stop in Fort Worth, which had been a bloody mess.