PBR’s 30th Anniversary Season Officially Kicks Off in New York City

By: Darci Miller

PUEBLO, Colo. – Thirty years ago, twenty bull riders gathered in a motel in Scottsdale, Arizona, with an audacious idea.

They each chipped in $1,000 to start a new, standalone bull riding league.

Well, sort of.

“That day, I didn’t have $500,” Jerome Davis said. “I gave them $500 and told them the next week I had some pretty good bulls, so I could give them the other $500.”

“There were 20 of us, and most of us didn’t have $1,000 at the time. But we borrowed it, and Michael Gaffney wrote a hot check,” Bobby DelVecchio said, laughing. “We all make it good for him. That’s what camaraderie’s all about.”

The two founders were on hand at the Garden Party ahead of the Monster Energy Buck Off at the Garden, presented by Ariat, in New York City to officially kick off the PBR’s 30th-anniversary season.

Introduced into the Hulu Theater by Matt West, Davis and DelVecchio reminisced on the league’s humble beginnings, as well as their own.

“Fifty years ago, I’m standing out here in front of Madison Square Garden shining cowboy boots to make a little money so I could pay my entry fees in Cowtown, New Jersey, and get on some bulls out there,” said DelVecchio, who was known as the Concrete Cowboy thanks to his New York City roots. “When I got on the first bull and he bucked me off, I said, ‘I’ll never do that again.’ On my way home, my dad said, ‘You okay?’ I said, ‘Yeah, but dad, can we go back there next week?’ He said, ‘Why?’ I said, ‘I think I can ride that little fella.’ And I did when I went back, and it changed my whole life. And so all I’ve known since I was about 15 years old was shining shoes and bull riding.”

It’s a far cry from where he is now, holding court inside the world’s most famous arena amid executives, owners, and corporate sponsors.

The business couldn’t be more different than how it started out, and Davis remembers his early barometer for success.

“Randy Bernard got me cornered up one time, and he said, ‘What do you think a bull rider needs to make in one year that you’ll really feel like we’re starting to go somewhere?'” Davis said. “I said, ‘Well, the day that a bull rider makes a million bucks in one year, I feel like we’re starting to gain some ground.’ And it wasn’t but just a few years later, Chris Shivers was the first $1 million winner, and Randy gets me cornered up and said, ‘What do you think about that?'”

These days, a PBR World Champion wins $1 million in one day when he earns the gold buckle.

Rider earnings have also increased thanks to the PBR Team Series, launched last summer. Every rider on a team roster gets paid for each event, and PBR Commissioner and CEO Sean Gleason says it’s doubled the earnings of everyone who participated.

“The Team Series is the next thing,” said Davis, the head coach of the Carolina Cowboys. “I think this is really getting ready to take off. I know a lot of you guys got a lot of money invested in this thing, but the dream that y’all had is real. I really feel like this thing is going to take off and go a long way.”

Things have already come so far. There are Team Series squads in eight cities – DelVecchio believes there will one day be one in every state – and the premier series visits such places as Los Angeles, New Orleans, New York City, and Chicago, which will host this weekend’s PBR Tractor Supply Co. Invitational (Round 1 airs Friday at 8:45 p.m. ET on RidePass on Pluto TV).

The eventual winner of the Buck Off at the Garden, two-time World Champion Jose Vitor Leme, earned almost $46,000 for his weekend of work and has accumulated $5.5 million in his career thus far.

“You’re going to see a billion-dollar bull rider someday,” DelVecchio said. “With endorsements and everything else, as this continues to grow. You’ve got some of the greatest owners and the greatest companies sponsoring events, and don’t forget the great men and women and families that raise these great bucking bulls. Some of them cost $500,000, and you might not be able to get it for that.

“Without a doubt, you’re seeing history in the making. It’s going to grow. It’s going to get bigger and bigger.”

Photo courtesy of Andy Watson/Bull Stock Media

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