The Dale Jr. Download - Jerome Davis: The Bull Riding Champion Who Helped Build The PBR

Episode Date: September 30, 2026

Jerome Davis has lived one hell of a life.The 1995 PRCA World Champion, 2026 ProRodeo Hall of Fame inductee, founding member of the PBR and head coach of the Carolina Cowboys joins Dale Jr. to talk about the moments that shaped his career — from winning a world championship to helping build the PBR from the ground up.Jerome also opens up about the injuries that changed his life, what kept him coming back to bull riding, and why he still believes he’ll walk again. Dale and Jerome get into the early days of the PBR, the $1,000 buy-in that helped get it started, Richard Childress and the Carolina Cowboys, and the similarities between racing and rodeo.Plus, Dale tells some unforgettable stories from the few times he’s been around bull riding, including a wild night with Ross Coleman.For more on Jerome Davis’ story, visit our Dirty Mo Rodeo YouTube page to for a three-part docuseries that details his world title, the accident that paralyzed him, and the values that have kept him strong as the current coach of PBR’s Carolina Cowboys.Check out Dirty Mo Rodeo on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@DirtyMoRodeo Check out Dirty Mo Media on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@DirtyMoMedia Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

All right, everybody, y'all got to check out this cowboy life. Jerome and Tiffany Davis have a show coming out every Thursday. Where do they find it? We have a new episode every Thursday on the YouTube episode on Dirty Bow Rodeo. Yeah, y'all check it out on all your podcast platforms also. The following is a production of Dirty Mo Media. Time for the Dale Jr. download. It's time.

Buckle up. Hey, everybody, it's Dale Jr. back again for now. Another episode of the Dale Jr. Download here in the Arby Studio, Arby's heads there, meat and three box. You get more meal for your money at Arby's. We have the meets and we got a great guest for you today. Jerome Davis is coming into the studio and coming into the studio and come to the desk here. Jerome and Tiffany are a couple that are host of a podcast called This Cowboy Life. You can listen to this on all of our Dirty Moe platform. and wherever you find podcasts,

he's had a extensive career in bull riding and in rodeoing. And at one point during his professional career, he was injured significantly and has been in a wheelchair ever since. But he continues to play a big role in that industry. And he has incredible stories. And just his will to push forward is inspiring. and I want to learn more. So I'm thrilled to be able to have the opportunity

to sit down and talk with him, so let's get him in the room and have this conversation. Jerome Davis on the Dale Jr. Download. Can you cover him? I ain't going to say he's the ferret bull. He's just debunking this bull in the world. I look at it as a challenge.

If I can get him rolled, they'll talk about it everywhere. That's all I've wanted to do, be a world champion. I mean, literally when I would say prayers at night at the end of it, just, I would have to be a world champion one day. The look in his eyes, I knew it was bad.

The nurse come after the surgery and everything and said, hey, I don't know if you know it or not, but you ain't close to being here. I remember him being, having that scared look. You never seen that look in his face. You know, this cowboy life that I'm living today, I want to trade for him. Things are bark.

She said, God must have a plan for you. She said, You wasn't supposed to live through that one. All right, Jerome Davis on the Dale Jr. Download, man. It's awesome to have you here in the studio. Man, I'm excited. I'm excited to be here. Are you 54 years old, 1995 PRCA World Champion, Pro Rodeo Hall of Famer, Class of 2026,

founding member of the PBR. That's a big damn deal. Head coach of the Carolina Cowboys, you guys have a lot of success. and 2025 PBR Teams World Champion. Also, part of the Dirty Mo Media family. Yeah, man. You and your wife, Tiffany, first of all, how you enjoying that? Man, it was kind of off my grind a little bit.

It was kind of different, you know? But, man, I really like it. You know, after I got in and got to doing it and telling stories and getting some guys on there, I really like it. Yeah. And it's kind of cool, really. It's great for us because we're always. racing, racing, racing.

And I like to, you know, even with this show here, it's nice every now and then to get somebody in here from, from your line of work or baseball or whatever, you know, wrestling or just something a little different. And break up the monotony a little bit of just covering motorsports and NASCAR all the time. Oh, yeah. For our fans, it introduces some of our race fans to what you do

and bring some of your fans on board to see, you know, what we're all about. You know, and I feel like racing and bull riding a rodeo in general. It's kind of the same demographics, you know, the fan base. You know what I mean? It's just down-home country people that just love. Yeah. There's always been a connection. Yeah.

And even through music as well. But, you know, when people are listening to your show, what can they expect to experience? Man, we tell a lot of stories, recaps from the weekend, you know, kind of going into our life and what we do every weekend, you know, from the, we raise buck and bulls. We teach the team with the Carolina Cowboys, so we're recapping that every week because we're on the road every weekend. And it's always something. And then in the middle of all that, there's always something getting stirred up, you know. So it's always a good time on our podcast, and we're always got good. There's always something exciting happening, it seems like.

Yeah. So you've had a pretty incredible life. Born in, where were you born, Colorado? I was born in Colorado Springs. My dad got drafted out there. I was on there for about six months. Drafted. Yeah.

And then I ended up in Archdale, North Carolina. Drafted. And what? In the Army. Really? Yeah, he was in the Army out there when I was born. Wow. And our family had a dairy farm here in North Carolina.

When my daddy left, my grandpa whipped a, milk inspector and then we had to quit milking cows. Wait, he beat the guy up. Yeah. So what happened was, you know, the milk inspector would come and inspect your milk, you know, and they made my grandpa always go to the house and my daddy would talk to him because my grandpa had a little bit of a temper and my dad would go down. When he got drafted, went to the army, well, then my grandpa had to meet the milk inspector every week and he got on the grandpa about, I don't know, something with the milk and they

had it out. There wasn't a more dairy farm. Really? That was the end of it. That was the end of the dairy farm. I mean, so you're out in Colorado Springs. You lived out there throughout your dad's military career. How long was this?

Well, it was only six months. I mean, I never remember being out there. Okay. And then you came back? Yeah. We've always lived here in North Carolina. When you came back, the Davis family ranch, it's not a dairy. There's no dairy farm.

What is the ranch? No dairy. So now we raised beef cattle. And my dad traded horses when I was a kid. How far is Archdale from here? Iron 15 minutes. Which way? Back towards High Point, Greensboro.

Gotcha. Down that way. Yeah, not real far. Yeah. It used to be a dairy farm, but how did y'all switch from dairy to bulls? Well, the bulls come in after I started riding bulls. You know, my grandpa and dad, we always had herd bulls around there, and I built a, I built arena there on the place and started getting on. So I was wanting to ask this question.

I have, I don't know nothing about being a cowboy or rodeoing or riding bulls. Now, I've hung out with the guys that do. Yeah. You know, and I've been around, you know, especially through the Budweiser relationship back in the day in the 2000s hanging out with Ross Coleman and all those guys. Oh, yeah. And we had a blast. And I'm telling you. And I know you, I'm not telling you nothing that you don't know, but for all these people listening, Bull riders are some of the wildest, craziest, on just a day-to-day basis, guys that I've ever been around.

You don't know what's coming next. They're pretty unfiltered. And so it's fun being around them. It is. but I didn't really educate me much on what that life's all about. You would say that, you know, even back in the day when you were kind of getting started, rodeoing and riding bulls, for example, roping and things like that, was predominantly in Texas. Wasn't it more geographical?

No, for sure. I know this is silly, but like when you, when you, I know this is silly, but like when you, when you listen to songs, George Strait, all those towns, they're in Texas, they're out mid, you know, they're out in the Midwest. It wasn't Archdale by,

no, or Amarillo. Exactly. So, you know, you have this farm, y'all are raising some beef cattle. You build an arena.

Why did you build an arena? What made you, that click? What did you see? What did you think when you were like, I want to learn, I want to do this. Well,

I was just, I don't know what it was, but I got infested with bull riding or just being a, Cal who did you see well I see it on TV okay you know who was who was your heroes so Lane Frost Lane he was he was a guy before the movie ever come out or any of that I was a big fan of Lane and Lane how I learned how to ride was a videotape I went to Siler City North Carolina to a back then you rented videotapes and and I rented it never took it back and I paid I just

sent them the money for it and I watched it every day and I watched it Because there really wasn't guys. There was guys at road bulls around here, but not at that level. Yeah. You know, so, but that tape, I just watched it over and over and over. Then I won me some money in Cincinnati, Ohio. I won $1,200. Then what?

Riding bulls. So wait, wait. You build the arena. You teach yourself. Where's the bull come from? So, all right, that's a good question. And so my grandpa had a breeding bull. My daddy had one.

And those. I run them in and tried to buck them. And they wasn't all that great. Right. But there was a guy that traded cattle down below my house. He was a horse cow trader. He had a little black bull in there that looked really athletic, and I bought him for a practice bull. And just so happened, he bucked.

Oh. He was a bucker. He got lucky. Oh, yeah. I did. And I got on him all the time. I rode that bull over. So you ride, you would go out and ride this.

bull like somebody would get on a bicycle or go drive a car just well then well tell you what we're done didn't you get hurt didn't you get thrown around well i mean you get hurt doing anything you know but we we we uh what we started doing i started having jackpots i ended up with eight bulls we had eight bulls and then we might have 20 guys that day so you may have 31 a the third trip you know i mean we would buck them two and three times a day and uh man then bulls was tough but we learned you know We learned. So you created this sort of community? Yeah, pretty much.

Yeah. I mean, there really wasn't a weekly bull ride. And I heard about them in Texas and all that. So I started doing it. And then there was a guy down and Raleigh started doing it. And then there was a place right over in Concord, Stiegalls. They started doing it. Yep.

And so you basically would put on your own show. You had guys that would come from around local that wanted to ride. Yeah. You'd sell tickets. People come out. sit and watch. That's it. But you weren't making any money.

You were just probably breaking even. Well, we did one time. I'll tell you a pretty good story one time. At the old arena, one day me and Daddy is on Thursday nights. Every Thursday. People just kept coming in and kept coming in. I said, Daddy, what the heck? And I mean, we didn't have room to put them off.

Well, I found out there was two kids at the schoolhouse was going to fight. And they told everybody to go to the bull riding that night and they were going to fight. Well, I found out who it was. So I got with them two boys. And I said, look, I said, I don't mind if y'all fight, but let us do this bull riding. And when it's over, we'll just get y'all together. Well, I found their daddies. Their daddies was good with it.

So that's what we did. My gosh. We had the bull riding. Everybody left except the kids that was only watched the fight. We got the two daddies and the boys. We had a big old circle. And them two old boys slug it out. When they got done, they shook hands, and we all went home.

And I told that boy, I said, look, now get another one of them fights lined up next week. I said, that's the best crowd we had all week. That's funny. The old time we ever had the bull ride. Yeah. So you have this going on and you're teaching yourself to ride bulls. What makes you go up north or what makes you go after real competition? Well, I got with a guy.

There was a guy who slept in Virginia and a guy here in Concord, Robbie Johnson, him and David Gather. They were traveling going to events, kind of amateur rodeos on the East Coast, but they would pay $1,500, which was a lot back then. You know, we're talking in late 80s. And I was 15 years old. Man, they just kind of took me another wing. And, I mean, I had to grow up quick. And I remember we were somewhere in Minnesota, and I got hit in the face for the first time

and busted my face and knocked me out. And I was sitting back there on behind the shoots, you know. I was 15 and, I mean, you had to grow up pretty quick. And then it was kind of a, it was a reality check. You know, is this really what you want to do? But I never backed up, you know, I wanted it. Yeah. So talk, you went up and made a little bit of money up north,

Ryan Bulls, and then that, there's, I'm trying to understand like racing, we mentioned earlier that racing and round Bulls is kind of similar. And I find some kinship in the way that you get into. it because there's no college level, there's no high school level, not at least that I know of. And you basically just got to create your own opportunities. Yeah. Right. And there's, dad said this, there's thousands of Dellenhart's all over the country

racing short tracks that never get the chance to go big time. Yeah. And there's some that do. And there's only 40 guys that get to race on Sunday at the cup level. And so it's, it's rare that you'll actually make it. But I imagine even in the 80s or even today in rodeo, it's similar. You've got a lot of small community rodeos. You got a lot of local shows.

That's right. And you got a lot of guys there with real talent and ability, you know, that might or might not ever get to see the big time or the big stage. No, you're right. There was a lot of guys like that. Yeah. But it's the guys that just push through it. But what's pushing through?

Well, in the rodeo, I mean, the thing is, it's will it crack an egg? And what I mean by that, it's like when you have that first big, like, I've seen a lot of guys get stepped on and they're done. And probably mine was in 92 in Reno as my rookie year. I was making the national finals. I was 12th in the world standings. Nobody from North Carolina even made the NFR, you know. Right. And I was winning the rookie year making the finals.

I just won the college world title. That was on Tuesday. That was on Sunday. On Tuesday in Reno, Nevada Bull steps on me. Punchers my lung, break my rib, my collarbone. Dang there to die. I mean, they had to run a tube in before we get out of the arena and drain the blood. You know, it was pretty bad.

And that was my reality check, I guess you'd say. You know, and I bounced back. You know, I just kept coming and I was able to make a good career out of it. You've seen some guys go through that. Yeah, so that's in the bull riding, that's it. It's kind of like everybody's got a plan until they get hit in the face. You know, that's the way it is in bull riding. I mean, it's really good, but the guys that really get tested and go on,

they just overlook it and keep moving. You know, guys like Ross and Justin your buddies, like them guys have got that. Like, they got that dog in them. Yeah. I mean, there's, Ross's got a plate in his head. I don't, I mean, it's one of thousands of injuries that these guys all. experience just in a regular calendar year. Yeah.

The, you know, and some of them, yeah, I don't know. There's a, there's this sort of mentality. I'll tell you, man, it's really, it's really intimidating. It is. I bet, you know, to be around those guys and behind the shoots after the show and there's these guys and there's, he's busted up, this guy's got this injury, this guy's got this injury, and they almost wear it, they wear it like a badge of honor. that they're going to get broken and they're going to come back and sometimes ride broken.

Yeah. You know, it's just, it is, it is what it is. There's a, there's a, there's a, there's a mentality in that sort of brotherhood where you, nobody, you don't let them see you weak. Yeah. Like it's, there's a, there's a, there's a, there's always one up in each other. Who can be the toughest? Well, and, and you're talking about the elite of our sport. You know what I mean?

And I think it's kind of like you guys. Like there's the elite that has that mindset. Now there's a bunch of them below that. But who you're talking about is the top guys. You know what I mean? And they have that mentality. And that's the ones that, well, I mean, like yourself, your dad and all y'all, I mean, you all climb to another level.

And it's the same way in our sport. You know, them guys that no matter what happens, they never lose a positive outlook on where they're going. And whatever it takes to get there, they're heading in that direction. Is everybody scared the first time they climb on a bull? I know I was. I was 11.

I can remember my little foot was in that buck and shoot just to, but I knew that this is what I wanted to do. And then when I want money doing it, it can make a living, I'm done. I'd worked enough when I was a kid. I mean, when you ride that first bull, whether you get thrown off of it or not, is it checking that box, so to speak,

is that a really incredible emotion? I think so. Yeah. You know, I don't know. I just, when I grew up, there was guys at Rogue Bulls and I would see them, you know, at Vents and whatnot. And I always wanted to be that guy. You know, I wanted to be that cowboy, that bull rider.

And then when I finally got to do it, it was like, hey, I'm one of them guys. But then, you know, from there, going to another level was a whole other story. You talked about Odessa Jr. college. Yeah. You were recruited there to join the rodeo team.

So colleges do have. Yeah. Yeah. Is that common? I mean, is that common in the United States for colleges? It is. I suppose, particularly in certain areas.

Yeah. To have rodeo programs. It is. And it's big in Texas. And all over the United States, really. I mean, believe it or not, one time NC State had a rodeo team. Yeah. Yeah.

So when if you're, say there's a. 13-year-old kid listening to this that thinks he wants to make a living doing this. What's his path? Where do you tell him to go? I get that question all the time. Hey, how do I get into doing it? Where do I go? How do I start?

You know what's good about it today is there's so many junior associations for kids, especially here in North Carolina. It's crazy. I mean, I got a nephew. He's 12 now. And my sister haws him somewhere every weekend within a couple of hours. of the house and all these little junior bull rides and these little rodeos. It's crazy.

And man, these kids are eat up with it. I mean, man, they're, they got all their heroes and they're just, and they're tough. Man, them little kids are tough. And it's exciting. I wish we had, like we had junior rodeos, but you'd have to wait three weeks. Hey, in three weeks, we're going to Troutlander, you know, wherever we're going. But now it's every weekend. I mean, they're going two and three a weekend.

Yeah. And it's just, it's just exciting. to see with them kids. So that wasn't happening in the 80s? It wasn't there. And the college level, that was similar in the 80s, or is that grown as well? College was going pretty strong. We had a high school team from North Carolina that went out,

and the coach seen me out there. I'd won around to college finals. He'd come and said, hey, you want to move to West Texas? I said, you bet. So it gave me a full ride, and I'm going to tell you, West Texas is different than North Carolina. I said, what the heck? What am I doing?

It was like being in Little Mexico, you know, I thought, man. But ended up living there for about three and a half years in West Texas. But what I learned was how the ropes really were. You know what I mean? Like I was, I surrounded myself with people that knew how to get where I was wanting to go. Yeah. And really learned the ropes.

And then I moved back home after I figured. it out. But yeah, it was good. I learned a lot when I was out there. Hey, everybody. The 2026 NASCAR season is underway and it's already shaping up to be another year of hard racing, great storylines, winning moments that remind us why we love this amazing sport. And when it comes to capturing all of that own track action in collectible form, nobody does it better than Lionel Racing, the official diecast of NASCAR. Their race-win die casts, are some of my favorite cars in my own collection. That's because the detail, they look exactly like the car does in Victory Lane,

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They have a meeting. Now, you got a member, Tough Heedman, Jim Sharp, Cody Lambert. Like, these guys are my heroes. Like, these are guys I look up to. you know, I watched them on TV. And they said, hey, we want you to be part of this thing we're going to start. It's called the PBR.

Hey, if we was robbing banks, I was in. I didn't care. These guys are my heroes. You know what I mean? I watched them all my life. And for them to want me to be a part of something they're going to try to do, I'm in, you know, no matter what. But we had a problem. It was a thousand bucks.

I had 500. I said, look, I tell you what. And the guy we gave our money. You just had to been there when we done. This guy, every other word, he dropped the F-bomb, and he GDed everything. He just, I don't know how we ever got this thing off the ground. But he was a good business man, but he cussed. And he was just rude and whatever.

I said, all right, I got $500. I got some good bulls drawled in California next week. I said, I think I'd pay you my other $500. He said, all right, well, let me know. So I gave him $500. I said, well, take this. And then sure enough, I won money out in California. And he lived in California.

And I seen him out there and I gave another 500. So I was in. From then on, I was in. We went up and we was moving. So what were y'all doing before then? So we rodeoed. So, you know, you have, you got Calgary, Cheyenne, all the big rodeos. And the way you win a world title, like growing up, like the world title at Lane won and

tough and all them guys. So you just enter rodeos all over the United States. at states. As many as you can. I think the year that I won the world, I went to 114. Rodeos, not counting bull rides and everything. We probably got on over 200 head that year.

But what you do is you just hit the road. And literally, we would be gone months at a time. And we would enter two and three rodeos a day sometime. I can remember one night we left Cody, Wyoming, drove to Calgary, was there that morning at 8 o'clock and got on bulls there, took off the red, Lodge, 6 o'clock, Montana that night, and 8 o'clock was in Livingston, left there and hit St. Paul, Oregon the next day.

So, I mean, we're, that's there in the 4th of July, which is, but you just go as many as you can and you win as many as you can and you try to get to the national finals in Vegas. When you get there, there's 10 days of it. What do you mean you try to get there? So the top 15. You've got to be in that group. You've got to be the top 15 guys in the world.

And if you're not, you're out. Yeah. So we, I mean, you just grind it out trying to make the NFL. And then that's where the money's at, you know. If you can get to the NFR, well, then there's some good money to be made. And that's how long? 10 days. 10 days, yeah.

Grind it out for 10 days. You get on a bull every day and find out who's the champ at the end of the day. So that's what y'all were doing. And then you established the PBR. What was the purpose of the PBR coming together? That's a good question because guys like, so let's, so I'm the youngest guy there. I was the youngest guy in the room. when we decide to do this in a motel in Phoenix.

And that's where we've done. We put this meeting together. And what was funny about that meeting, there was guys against it. And they literally about fault because there was some other associations getting started. And they were scared we was going to mess that up. And they were getting mad at the guys that want to start this thing. And they were about to fight. I mean, I was just there with whatever.

But I was going to do what my hero's done. And they wanted to start it. So long story short. So that's where, kind of how that got going. But tough, Cody, them guys, they were getting a little age on them. When I say age, I mean, they were probably getting close to the 30s. And for a bull rider, you're starting to get a little long in the tooth. And our schedule was every day.

We were getting on bulls to make a living. I mean, we were having to grind it out. They had a vision of us being able to go to a Friday, Saturday night event on the weekends, have a tour, and go home with a family during the week. And that was their vision. And, you know, we was able to pick up, I think it was Bud Light. I think they jumped in and gave us $250,000, start the tour. That's pretty good.

And then the tour got started and we were still rodeoing over here and starting a PBR over here. And, man, it just took home. And if you back then, I suppose, if you wanted. to do the PBR and continue to rodeo during the week, right? You could and did. Lots of guys probably did. Yeah, they did. When the PBR got a hold, most of the older guys just started PBR.

And right up to the time I got hurt, it was me in about one more because you got to remember we're the young guys. I was still rodeoing hard every day going somewhere and going to the PBR's in the weekend because I was fresh, you know. The older guys had already kind of thinned out of the. the rodeo deal. You know, they were, they were liking the weekends and putting all their effort in the PBR and that type of thing.

Off topic just a little bit. When you're at a rodeo, what do the bull riders think of the other participants in the other events? Like, is there, is there, do y'all all admire, like, guys out there just roping? Oh, yeah, no. It's a family. Yeah. It's a family.

I mean, because you've got to think, we, uh, do you. you know, we might be in, say, we're in Calgary, and then we're trying to get the Cody Walmy, wherever it might be. We might go ask a team roper or a calf roper or a bow racer, hey, can we catch a ride? And yeah, just jump in the trailer. Yeah.

You know, and that's how it worked. And, you know, they might have, you want to get one to have a nice living quarters, but then we'd catch rides. I mean, it's just way rodeo is, you know, man. It's a group of, it's a big family, and, you know, everybody's kind of got each other's back, and we all kind of know how you got to live to make it work. Oh, my gosh.

It's like a bunch of gypsies really back in the day, you know. I can't imagine. So my, I knew a couple guys that were in the regional stuff. And they would just drop everything they had going on in their lives. They had jobs. They had family, girlfriends, whatever. And they would just go and go go for weeks at a time. just kind of like you say, just hitching rides and getting from one place to other,

however whatever means possible with 10, 20 bucks in their pocket. And it just seemed like to me fun, but at the same time, like, I don't know how you kept up the grind. Yeah, I mean, you got to want it. And at the end of the day, you're trying to make the national finals back in the old days. PBR is different now. But, and it's still that way in rodeo. I mean, that, like, it just ended last week.

Just last week, them guys have been grinding out trying to make the Vegas. And it just stopped last week on all them guys. So they've been beating up the road here in the last few weeks. But, yeah, I mean, you just, you get a vision, you get a gold. And, I mean, you do whatever you take to get there to make it happen. Yeah. And you just, you know, you want to be one of them guys. I mean, you go home and get a job.

What about the fact that the guys that you're running with? that you're depending on at times you're also competing with them for them spots, right? Well, yeah, I mean, but you know, you want that guy, like, you don't want to travel with a bunch of half beats. You want a guy that's greedy.

Like, I had a, there towards the end of my career is me and J.W. Hart, and we went a lot together. But we didn't show no mercy on each other. Like, we called it out. You know what I mean? And we kept each other on top of our game. But at the end of the day, it kept us

winning and it kept us to keep us going you know and we were good for each other you had a tough tough skin though back in them days so you competed in your first national finals in 93 the second year on the whole deal um it was held it's held by the PRCA annually as you mentioned the top 15 money earners so it's all about earning money throughout the year yeah that's kind of how y'all kept to score. You continued to qualify for the national finals from 94 to 97 and you won the championship in 95. You became the first world champion from the east, from east of the Mississippi.

Yeah, that was pretty cool. That was a big deal to me, you know, to win a world title and the bull riding. I mean, North Carolina there hadn't even made the national finals. And then to be able to go out there and after 10 days, you know, be the champ, it was pretty cool. Did you feel like over the course of that time that you got overlooked a little bit because of where you were from? Or did that not matter to anybody in your industry? Well, it did at first. I mean, I took some, I ain't going to complain.

Did you keep it to yourself if you could? I just kept grinding. I did. Like, I knew it. You weren't going to tell them where you're from unless they asked you. No, I mean, they said it. Every time they nodded where you was from or at the gate. But now there was some times when I wrote.

wrote some bulls that, you know, I thought, come on, man. You know what? I didn't want to be that guy. I want to just keep coming every time. And I never said anything. I never complained. But I just kept riding. Yeah.

I said, it's going to happen. Do you feel like that ever, you were ever scored uniquely because of where you were from? Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I rode the one, the one I remember a lot. There was, I was in Guthrie, Oklahoma at the Bull and Anzan. And I just rode the buck and bull to. the NFR out there.

I wrote him. I was a rookie. And I should have been about 89 or 90, 91. I was 84. And I didn't say nothing. And all my buddies, they're like high-fiving me. They're all pat me up. But them old-timers, you know, that had that pencil back in.

Yeah. You know, they said, that's all right. I write him again. They'll remember it. And I did. Yeah. And, you know, and that's just things you had to do, you know, working your way up the ladder.

And, you know, but after I won a world title and they knew who I was, I probably got gifted sometime more than I should have. Yeah. You know what I mean? Interesting. It's just part of it. So you got off the plane after winning the championship in Greensboro. There were hundreds of people at the airport waiting on you.

Yeah, that was pretty crazy. Yeah, it was really crazy. And I think it just built up over the 10 days. They said, hey, man, that kids got a shot, and he might win it. You know, and then the news started carrying it. I knew it was a big deal when my grandpa was there. Like, my grandpa, he never left home. Like, he was kind of, all he wanted to do was deer hunt and hang out the house.

Like, he was that guy. Really? But when I seen him at the airport, I thought, man, I've done something. Because I never, I never seen him away from home. Like, he just stayed down there. He had a pond and a cabin, and he hung out down there. and that was his deal. Dang. Dad called you to congratulate you.

How old are you at this point? I mean, you got to be still in your 20s. Yeah, I was like 23. Yeah. So did you know who dad was? Well, so I kind of knew your dad through Mike Collier. Yep. Mike Collier was dad's pilot, but also he was in the rodeo business.

He was a bull rider. Yeah. Yeah. I didn't know Mike was a bull rider. Oh, yeah. Yeah, he was. He was a bull rider. Really?

Yeah. Yeah, you had to ask him about it. He never told me that. Yeah, so I kind of knew your dad through Mike a little bit. And then, like, he was at the track when all the Bull Riders was there during the event at Charlotte. And we got to say, hey, a little bit. And, but it was really after I got hurt when I kind of got to know your dad. He called us in the hospital.

We was, I got hurt. I was laid up in the phone rung. And Tiffany answered the phone. And she said, and your dad said, hey, how's our boy doing? She said, hey, Tiffany, how's our boy doing? And Tiffany's like, they weren't hard. Not the phone.

Like that. And she said, well, he's right here. You want to talk to him. And so she did. She handed me the phone. And, man, we just talk like old buddies. I mean, he was just, man, let me know if there's anything he could do. Said he really hate it happen.

It meant a lot, you know. This is Dale Earnhardt. Yeah. You know, to me, that was a pretty cool deal. And, yeah, so after that, you know, we went on. And, well, it was after that Mike Collier, there was a hunt down in Georgia. And David Blanton and Realtree and them guys. And I guess Mike had your dad's plane.

And he said, hey, use that plane to fly drone down there. So we went down there on that hunt. And we had hunted that. that evening and the next day come around the next morning we didn't get anything and your dad called and said hey it uh drone getting anything yet they said no not yet and they said well look bring him to the house if he don't get one this evening and i was hoping i wasn't going to get one i was hoping that i was going there wasn't nothing going to show up but it did and it was right i had to shoot you right in front of him but i was kind of wanting to come and hang out with your dad

Oh, yeah. I thought, take, I go Dells, you know. I can relate. And I was thinking, man, he's going to let me hunt. And, but anyway, it didn't work out, you know, and I didn't get to go back and hunt there. But yeah, yeah, it was kind of cool. So after 95, you had a career high 10 wins in 96.

You made the finals from 94 to 97. And then in 98, your goal was to win the PBRD. championship by March you'd rode 26 bulls you'd only bucked off a three and then you have the accident in Fort Worth, Texas in March. Yeah. And I know you've probably talked about this more than you care too, but I'm I'm curious to know, you know, when you have this accident, you're you're asking the doctors about, you know, when, when am I going to be able to walk again? When am I going to be able to ride bulls again? I'm obviously going to get back from this.

How do you, what do you recall, I suppose, from reckoning with the reality? Oh, yeah. Well, it was a tough pill to swallow. I mean, it was the next day. And doctor came in there and he said, well, I got some bad news. I said, well, what is it? I said, just shoot me straight, tell me what we got. He's, well, you ain't going to never walk again.

And the first thing I said, wait, but you're telling me I'm going to never get to ride bulls again. And I don't know why that, that's what I ask him. Because I guess my mind was just my world surrounded around bull riding. And I said, so you're telling me I can't ride bulls again. He said, no, you don't understand. He said, you're never going to walk again. And I said, all right, give me a percentage.

Right. You know what I mean? I get it. You can tell everybody, but give me a percentage. He said, well, if you want one, I'll give you one. He said, I'll give you one percent. So that's what we're at with it. Yeah.

And that was, you let that, I mean, you don't go beyond that thinking, I'm going to figure it out. Oh, yeah. There's going to be, I mean, I'm sure you probably exhausted every even today. Yeah. No, and I've done crazy. things. Yeah. I went down to Mexico for 30-some days down there, hit out at a hospital,

wouldn't leave it, told my wife, we ain't leaving the hospital. I was in Guadalajara, you know, it was down there. It was pretty rough. Just trying some treatment. Yeah, I had a stimulator, did a surgery down there. It was tough. My wife, she gutted it out with me down there. But you were headstrong about it.

Yeah, no, I wanted it. And I'm kind of glad I've done it. I mean, I can, when I turn that stimulator, on it does kind of light my body up and help get things going a little bit. You still today. Still today. Yeah. So, yeah, no, I think you just have that mindset.

I think people that, you know, who would have thought I'd won a world title, you know what mean, but if I can get that video. And I still got it today and there's so much stuff happening and so much research that's out there today. You still hold hope. I do. Really? I feel like it's going to happen.

You know, we're 20-some years into it now. Yeah. But, I mean, there's so much out there. Yeah. It can happen. All it's got to do is hill's spinal cord. Yeah. And we're back at it.

I don't think of where I bulls, you know. I'm trying to get lonely to do that. I'm asking you to this because I'm very fascinated by the strength of the mental strength of the mind, particularly in people that are in sports. And I've, you know, we've, you deal with either. loss, you deal with own personal injury, all types of people

in all walks of life that are that are in sports have experiences that are unfavorable and uniquely I got a buddy of mine that's coming in here next week Shane Mill that was paralyzed in a racing

accident. Yeah, so I'm going to talk to him about the same thing, you know, how he I just wonder, I think about myself and how I might handle a similar situation, whether it's your situation or something completely different that happened to this other guy that's standing outside the building today. Yeah. And I just ask myself whether I'd be tough enough to do it.

And I marvel at your ability to not only continue with your life, but be productive, be part of things, be an asset to something and have a positive mental attitude about it. You know, come in here today, smiling. Because you, because I can imagine I know what riding bulls meant to you. I can imagine if it meant the same to drive in a race car, right? Trying to turn loose to that's still hard for me at this age when I don't need to really be doing it. I don't need to be really messing with it anymore, but it's hard to stop. you know, but you didn't get that choice and having that taken from you and having to figure out,

all right, what am I going to, what am I going to love next? What's going to love me back? You know, where am I going to find that same competitiveness and thrill? So how did you figure your way through that? You know, it's crazy. I've had that question asked, but there wasn't a backup plan. Right. You know what I mean?

Like everything I've done was to ride bulls or being a cowboy. So I knew I'd better stay in that avenue because that's all I knew how to do pretty much. You know, there wasn't a... So from there, I just had to figure it out. And we'd raised buck and bulls. And I'd raised buck and bulls so that I could practice on them. So I'd said, hey, I just got to get a better caliber so we can haul them to the PBRs. So that's what I did to get kick started when I first got out of the hospital.

Well, how long were you in the hospital? About 30-some days. And then they finally said you could go home. Yeah, well, no, they didn't. I went home. They just kept, I stayed sick in the hospital and they couldn't figure it out. And find out old country doctor in High Point figured it out. It wasn't over here in Charlotte because we left Fort Worth, went over here to Charlotte.

And I stayed in there. It was over a month. And I just couldn't get better. And they were telling me, you're going home on this date. when it come to that date they said no you can't go home your health ain't good enough i said no i'm going home and uh so i did and i was dizzy my wife she wanted to kill me she we had this whole van that they raised some money to put me in and we get in this ramp we had to lay me back to get home and i got home i was there for about four or five days and they had to sit ammeline it's over and get me

well find out i just had some thrust in my throat and that got got in my, I was just like sick from, you know, all the poison or whatever. And anyway, that old country doctor figured it out right off the bat. And I was, I was good there in about a week. Really? And I'd been sick all that time, you know. But after that, I was, you know, then I just had to get a vision. And I was like, I was actually laid in the, I was laid up.

And I was trying to think how we're going to make this work. And me and dad have been putting on these little old bull ridings every Thursday night. You know, we just buck bowls every Thursday. You know, I was kind of the backbone behind it. So I thought, you know what, that ain't going to work. We ain't going to be able to do that. So I said, I know what we're going to do. We're going to have one PBR event here at the ranch.

And I'm going to start calling sponsors. Because right now, you know, I'm kind of stirred up. People are talking. Sponsors kind of want to be involved, I guess. So I just started calling and putting this event together. And we had it in the cornfield. I put up a portable arena because we had to move the old arena. The lake was coming in.

And all this happened about the same time. They had bought the land part of the farm because the lake had to go in there. And we had a cornfield. And I said, let's put up big portable arena. We'll bring in what bleachers I can get. We're going to have a boor riding one event. So we did. And there was so many people.

I mean, they were, we had not near enough seats. But nobody complained. You know, they was kind of helping the guy with the wheelchair. Yeah, you know what I mean? Everybody was there because, you know, they was kind of wanting to help be a part of it. It was somewhat of a fundraiser, I guess, for me, you know, but we had a PBR BBR BOR. I know all my buddies was our best guys in the world over in that cornfield. And we've freaking done it.

And it was awesome. And now we've done it last year was our 28th year. And that's what you're doing. Yeah, so we're still putting on events. And we're doing that. And then out of the blue, Richard Childress calls me. and he said, hey, I want you to coach this team that we want to do here in North Carolina. So first off, can you explain to me what the team part of this is?

Because I know this is relatively still new. It's new. Yeah. So what happened is it's been about five years now. And, you know, we got the – so let's set it. So the PRCA was the rodeo and everybody going to – to Calgary Shan. Then a group of guys started the PBR.

It was 20 of us. Now it's just bull riding. PBR. It's been going on for 20-some years now. I go with 30-some. Well, the CEO, Sean Gleason, comes up with this idea. He said, why don't we have PBR teams? Five on, five of head-to-head matchups.

Teams of five. And we'll sell these franchises, sell these teams, and we'll, we can make a sport out of it. Well, he called me first about coach, Sean called me with the idea. This is how the very beginning got started. And I love the concept. I thought it was a great idea. He said, I got a group in Austin, Texas,

wanting to put a team together. I want you to coach it. I said, all right, I'm in. Well, then he calls me back. He said, hey, the UFC guys want, Dan, Dana White. Dana White. Want to do a team maybe in Florida.

He said, I want you to do that team. I said, I love it. I think that's a great idea. I'll do it. I said, but I can't believe that there ain't somebody in North Carolina with all these race teams and all these people up here that wouldn't want a team in North Carolina. Well, I didn't know at the time, but Johnny Morris and Richard had been talking about putting

a team together in Missouri. well the next thing I know that's when Richard called me and Johnny done his own team and Richard called me about doing the team I said I would a whole lot rather be here than Florida well just because you know it's my backyard where you live and me and Richard talked about it and Richard had sponsored my boor riding

he was one of the guys at the beginning that helped me I knew him and Tom Tigg Tom Tigg was a buddy of mine And so, yeah, we just kind of kicked it off. And Ben Richard was buddies. We're a lot better buddies now, you know, because of the team. And then Austin Dillon got involved. And now me and Austin's almost best buddies, I mean, I talk to him daily. And, you know, it's a good group of people to be involved with.

And our team's been pretty successful. And it's been good. Forgive me for my ignorance, but a lot of people, too, I think. I think we're probably thinking about this when they're listening. So the PBR are still active. The PBR are still going. Guys are going in there on their own as single guys riding their own events. But they're also team events.

This is a companion to the traditional to PBR? Yeah. So there's a, there's, so half the year is individual. Individual. The other half of the year's teams. Was that a hard shift for riders? It is. Yeah, it was. It was a big deal. And it was a tough one for them to understand, wrap the brand around. Yeah. Do they all seem to get the idea now? They do. The money's so much better. Why?

Well, so let's go back to the PBR. A bull rider, when you get hurt, you're done. You don't make money. There ain't a backup. And the only way you make money is if you ride and you win. Like, you got to show up. You got to win that race. You don't win that race. You don't win that race. You don't. go to the next one. You know what I mean? You got to you got to win. Well now with the teams it's a little different. So let's say if Austin Dillon he's our GM and he sees a guy and he says man we need that guy and you got this other GM

over here and other team. Well now they're getting contracts guaranteed money. Yeah. And now it looks a little different. You know now I can go buy a place and know I got the money to take care of them payments. You know we never had guaranteed.

contracts before. Yeah. And now the best guys in the world, they're getting pretty good money. Yeah. You know, and it's good to see. Hey, this is Dellenhart Jr. And for all the latest Dale Jr. download gear, including the I'm old drink some beer T-shirt that we've been talking about here around the office, head over to shop.

dot dirtymo media.com for all the latest merch. Are you specifically a team owner or coach, I'm sorry, to this particular team? Like how do you control, how do you make sure there's no conflicting interest, I suppose, because you know, you're involved in starting the PBR coaching this team? Well, the PBR still owns the team series. So the PBR owns the individual season now. Do you still have owner stake in the PBR? No, we sold.

We ended up. Yeah, we all cashed out after a while. we was uh yeah we finally we finally all let's just say it was the best thousand bucks ever school i bet yeah awesome it was good so we we was uh and what was crazy was i was just go back a little bit so this was probably about 90 godly wouldn't it all no it's about 2008 somewhere right in there and i'm i'm still struggling like i'm i'm putting on boor riding schools we're hauling bulls we're doing whatever we got to do to make 11 and uh cody lambert called me and he said hey i was having i was a ride in the middle of a boor riding school i had about 15 20 kids are teaching them how to

ride and uh he said uh i just want to be the first one to call you and let you know we're going to sell the pbr and uh i said no kidding he said yeah and uh i was just it's one of them phone calls like you remember where you're at and i said well how much i mean cody how much i mean we're going to get enough to you know know, can I retire? Can I still put on boor riding schools while we're doing? And, you know, he tells me, and I thought, whoa, what's more money than I'd ever had, you know?

Right. So it's pretty cool. Damn. All right. So as a coach of the team, you know, what's your role in responsibility? Yeah. So that was a new one for me, you know, because we, I've always been a bull rider, rodeo, been around guys, you know.

But now I've got to lead the team. Yeah. Like, it all falls on me. If we're not winning, we're coming to the coach. What's happening. And I'm going to tell you, Richard Childress, he wants to win. Hell yeah. Like, he's wanting to know what, but, all right, so now,

now you got to look at it from my perspective. I got these guys over here. Like, I got a guy right now whose shoulder come out two weeks ago, and he's begging me to come to Fort Worth because, but he wants to tie in. and we're not sure his shoulders even going to stay in. So I've got a group of guys that's got this dog mentality that want to ride, and I'm having a hold him back and bring in a young kid

and let this guy heal up. And then I got over here, why we're not playing our superstar right now? Yeah. You know what I mean? But we've got to juggle all this around to have the best healthy team, but at the same time play our best guys and play, you know, and then as we lead up to the finals,

keeping everybody, you know, healthy. And, yeah, it's, it's, I love it, though. I love having the guys. I love, you know, that group of guys and the mentality and the standards that we set every year. And just, man, this old saying, like iron sharpens iron. And, man, that's what I like about it. Man, being around that group of guys and got a good Brazilian coach that helps so we can relate and talk to the Brazilians.

Yeah. My Portuguese ain't real good. Yeah. So yeah. I'm going to tell you right now. I somehow got involved in a rodeo, PBR event. Yeah.

We held an event, God, it must have been 15, 20 years ago in Charlotte. Yeah. And the, I was not aware of just how talented the Brazilians were. Oh, yeah.

And they are a, I mean, this was years and years ago, so I'm sure we're like, because I think in my mind, watching it from a watching it from TV shows and movies

and songs and all that your head had you thinking that it was a bunch of cowboys right and then when I when I actually go to an event and experience it it's international there's guys from all over the world right and it's it's very competitive

and the Brazilians aren't no joke they are freaking tough oh yeah and good and big boys And so I was really impressed by, I guess, just how it had grown and become more, you know, there was opportunity there, no matter where you're from. And so how many teams are there? So there's 10 teams.

10 teams. We've got 10 teams now. We started with 8. Now we're up to 10. Yeah. It might be, might even be growing again. They're talking about putting two more of them. I feel they're saying.

Yeah. So, yeah, I mean, this thing... What is a franchise worth? Well, I know what I know. Here's what I heard. It was... When they first sold, it was between $3 and $6 million. The last time the word on the street,

the last two teams was $20-something million they sold for. So I don't know what the next two will sell for. And you have how many riders on your team? So you got 10 guys on your team, and you got five. that are your main main guys. How many

you're going to ride in an event? So five will ride. Five will ride. Friday night in Fort Worth we'll have five guys ride and then we'll have three on the bench.

Yep. And they can come in at any point necessary. Right. So like we get a guy beat up Friday night and we'll pull one of them guys in. Okay.

You know what I mean? And then we'll match them. And what you'll learn in bull riding. You're going up against an individual from the other team. Right. So you're playing almost one-on-one.

Exactly. I got you. And at the end of the game, whoever's got the most scores, the most points wins. So, I mean, some games, I mean, I've had it where we've had four-and-four ride. Actually, one time we had an event, we rode all five, and the other team rode four. But, like, in Greensboro, they wouldn't get in a bull road, and it come down to our last guy to win the game, and he rode him to win the game. Just riding, just staying on eight seconds, won the game.

Yeah. Because nobody could finish. Yeah, because sometimes that set of bulls, we have a stock director who's over the stock. And he tries to match them pretty even. So sometimes them pens are tough. Yeah. You know, like you'll call and say, man, we get two road here. We're going to be doing good, you know.

You ever see a guy that should have rode, you ever had to, you know, as a coach, you ever get on your guys for. Oh, yeah. For struggling when you feel like, man, you shouldn't have made that mistake. You got to call an ace and ace. Yeah, it is what it is. I mean, you've got to be tough. And that's our mentality of our team. You know, that's one thing I wanted to be old school, gritty.

I want Caroline Cowboys to be that team. Yeah. So we carry that. We've got to have tough skin. Outside of coaching this team, what else are you still doing? Man, we do our PBR event there at the ranch. Still doing it. And then we started a deal with bootboats.

Do you have a, are you, do you have a, a permanent arena for your, yeah, right in my front yard. Okay. Yeah, it's a little bigger now than the cornfield. The cornfield's already turned into a grandstand and all, you know, we, we got pretty nice arena there now. So it's a little different than the old days. We had to cedar post and the woven wire. Yeah. So, um, what is, uh, what, what, what is the, what, what is the,

the future of the PBR and bull riding. So I find, so I don't know how I say this, but when I got the opportunity to kind of peek into that world a little bit, I was pretty amazed by how dangerous it is, how tough it is, how, like, I don't think there's another level of macho or, or bravery, bravado, I don't think there's anything that I can say that I've ever been close to or experienced,

even in racing, that matches what I saw in bull riders. Maybe boxers, maybe. But when I got a chance to kind of peek behind the curtain a little bit, it is a it is a really big industry but it's on it's in this sort of bubble yeah and racing has always kind of been that way too we've we're we are badass in our bubble I agree it's hard for us to kind of get out of it get out of it get that respect you know we talk about going over you know overseas or up here Mexico race here race there and try to introduce ourselves

to people that have never seen us before. And it's not always a massive success. And we sort of have this, we sort of are critiqued as maybe as in terms of, a lot of people say we're not even a sport, right? They might look at us as kind of, with old boys from Carolina, you know, like simple-minded sort of, you know,

drive race cars. That's not a sport, you know. There's this argument about us being athletes and all that. So, I mean, we fight this sort of uphill battle to sort of claim some, some credibility and expand, you know, just sort of who's seeing us, who's watching us. And I feel like that that's always sort of been a similar case with rodeos in general, but also bull riding. It's like, man, if you, and I know this is like such a cliche, but if you saw it in person,

the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the ferociousness of the animal itself and the danger and the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the. that is being taken right after ride. It's so profound. It doesn't come across quite as well on television like most sports. You know, anything you're going to see in person is going to be more compelling. But, you know, what is the future? How do you introduce this to people who might love it, but just having it a shot? And I think you hit down the head.

It's tapping into mainstream America. You know, how we're going to do that. Like Lane and the movie. about Lane. Yeah. There's these moments that sort of get you all a big chunk forward. Yeah. You know what I'm saying?

Like Days of Thunder and things like that, right? So there's these moments where you sort of gain a lot of traction, you know, but then you'll have sort of a period of years where there's just sort of this planed out, you know, it's good. It's successful. But it's just sort of sitting on playing there. You know, I guess in your idea, what are the visions for the future? I feel like we hit a yellowstone.

It seemed like we see it a little bit here lately. A little bump. Yeah, a little bump, like what you're talking about, trying to get into mainstream America. But, you know, now that the UFC guys are owning the PBR now and the WWE and all that, and it's kind of mainstream America, you know, to me, the UFC, the fighting deal was kind of, but now it's big to me. I think it's, and it's, and by having them own our company now, I feel like that's,

that's to our advantage where we can make these guys more household names. Yes. You know what I mean? And I think it's going to take us to another level. I really do. And I feel like this team, and I think mainstream America taps into a team better. Yeah. You know, everybody wants to have a team.

Yep. You know, as it was in the bull riding, let's say you love Tough heat. And then Tough got hurt. Well, now you're out. Your guys hurt. Yeah. Now you can, in a team concept, man, you can find out why they're playing this guy. You really like that guy.

Oh, we're bringing in a new. There's so much more around it. I feel like this team thing and the mainstream American, who owns it right now, we got our foot headed in the right direction. Better than I've ever seen it. You know, it was just, I hope, in the prayer in 1992 when we put a thousand bucks up. Yeah. You know, we didn't have nothing.

Sure. But now, I feel like we're really starting to gather. Yeah. and get things heading in the right direction. I think there's something too. Also, unless you live in, unless you're really putting the effort in as a fan to follow the PBR, you won't know the individual stars until it's too late.

I see this in boxing all the time. I've always grew up being a boxing fan. And I have multiple times in my life, life learned of a particular successful boxer that I absolutely, you know, fall in love with and go, man, that's, that guys, he fights the way I like. He's, you know, whatever it is about his style. And you're like, damn, I like him. When's his next fight? And it's always, I always, a lot of times end up getting on the wagon in the back end of the year career. When they're sort of, you know, getting aged out and

it's like, dang, I wish I would have, you know, and you'll go back and do a little homework and you'll say, darn, man, I wish I would have known of this guy 10 years ago when he was kind of a rookie coming up or he wasn't known, he was on the undercard. And I just didn't get introduced to him. But I would have been this fan for a decade instead of these last three years, right?

And I see that as well. And sometimes in y'all's sport is, you know, we can, kind of, we don't really appreciate, like, J.B., you know, being from North Carolina, that was, that was, that was easy because he was from here, right? And we heard about him early. But had I been from Missouri, I might not have really never known about him until later in his career. And so I feel like that there's a real challenge.

And I find this, we're living this right now in NASCAR. It's like, how do we, I know Ryan, Blaney is a great dude. I know Jimmy Johnson was a fantastic person and fun to be around. But it was really, really hard to get mainstream America to know that, to recognize that, right, and embrace this guy before it was too late, right? And I think that's one of the most challenging things today with a lot of sport, even in any sport, football, baseball,

like we have to get these young guys that are that potential superstar in front of mainstream America early, right? I agree, make a star. Yeah, baking a star. Introducing them to mainstream America through publication, through, you know,

newspaper articles and magazines and whatever. You know, but the media lands. has changed so much. You know, if you got a, I remember for my, for me, uh, getting in the Rolling Stone in 2001 was like massive. That's big. Oh yeah. Like if that doesn't happen, I mean, I got, I did like 10 years worth of marketing media

work in one article, right? And that launched me into the stratosphere. Um, and so, and, you know, that, that begat cribs and, and, and, and, and, and, and, producing a band at the MTV musical. You know, one thing led to another, right? But that one, you got to get that one thing to launch off of it to a minute to the next. And that's what we kind of struggle with. And NASCAR is like, how do we get our, we put them in sitcoms.

We put them here, we put them there. And you just got to find something that connects with people. They need some more, they need another Dale Jr. Well, they're there. You know what I mean? They're there. But they got to get the recognition. Yeah.

They got to figure out how to tap into the, the, you know, the every man. And I feel like the fans want it. Like they, like, when I catch myself watching a new sport, like I want to cheer for some. I want to, I want to do some research on a young guy like you're talking about. Yeah. And I feel like we've got to do our part as promoting these guys.

Yeah. You know, that next superstar or whoever it is because, I mean, I love to cheer on a guy, you know, but you got to be able to get there and find that information. on him. Yeah. It's hard to find. That's right. Well, man, this has been a fun conversation.

I love talking about the sort of business side of it. I've always, again, like going back to, I know dad and you guys were friends and I know Tommy Teague and all those guys. I know I've heard these names and all this stuff around in my life for years way back when I was a kid. but when I got with the bud deal and Bud Light was part of the PBR, they would bring three, four of them bull riders to some of these events. They'd have National Sales Convention.

They'd be 5,000 bud bottlers and then all of Budweiser's so-called talent. Yeah. And so I'd spend three or four nights with Ross and them guys raising hell in some town, right? And then, you know, we got to be such good buddies that they came, they came and hung out with me, went out on the lake, you know, ride on the boat and stuff. And I'll tell you one time, this was a peak crazy with hanging out with the bull riders. We did some, they like to fight. They like to fight each other.

Now, not like beating each other up, but like at the end of the night, somebody's going to get challenged to fight and wrestle. Yeah. And so, and, and we were, but anyways, we were driving down the road. We're going to the, we're going to the lake. We're going to get on the boat. I'm going to take them out on the boat. We're going to ride around.

There's a sandbar. We might tie up. There's a bunch of drinking and people and all kinds of fun to be had. And we're in the car, in the truck going to the boat, Marina. And a couple of them's riding in the bed of the pickup truck. And we, like, we're on an, we're on I-77, we're going down to interstate. and we're 20 minutes from the house. We get off the interstate.

We're going down this little four-lane highway. And they had had a bottle of Jack Daniels in the back. And when they emptied that bottle of Jack Daniels between, they had drank this bottle of Jack Daniels by themselves in this 20-minute ride to the marina. And they threw it out the back of the truck onto the ground on this four-lane road. And it's in the middle of the day. And there's cars and people everywhere. And I'm like, what are y'all doing?

I'm like, y'all are crazy. They had no fear whatsoever. They lived one way, and it's wide open. And I don't think the ones that are doing it today are any different. To climb on that bull and you have to be fearful of nothing whatsoever. But anyways, we had a lot of fun. Yeah, well, that crew that you're talking about, they were different. Well, they different, different.

They were even different from most of the rest of them. You don't have me. Like, them guys you're talking about, you just didn't ever know what Ross and them, because they would come to my house and stay before they, and they said, we're going to Dale Jr. They might be in the middle of the night. I know. They're going to Dell right now?

They're going to go wake him up or what? Like, you didn't never know. But Ross and them, I was telling us funny stories. So one day Ross and Justin and them was there, and this guy shows up and his name was Crazy Greg it was Travis Bristano's cousin

and I said hey we're going to teach him how to ride bulls I said you're going to teach him how to ride yeah he's going to come down from Maryland he's going to ride yeah so I said all right so we go over and we load up some bulls and he gets on and whatnot

we put him on a few bulls well make this story short we get done I thought all right we're done well I have my PBR event and a motorcycle pulls up in my driveway. And I look out there and it's crazy Greg. And he's back. I said, what are you doing?

Did you come watch the bull ride? No. Ross and Justin said for me to come see you that you'll take care of me. I'm entered into bull riding. My gosh. In the PBR. He entered. I said, all right.

I said, if you got any equipment, nope. They said you'd take care of me. So we got him on. He crashed. I mean, we wiped him out. You know, it wasn't good. He bit it. And I get back to my house.

I'm up all night. You know, we're getting the vent closing it out. He's on my couch. And the next morning, he writes me a big old letter, how much he preached that he gets back on a motorcycle and rides back to Maryland. One ride? Yeah, one ride. And he just threw him off.

Oh, my God. But that's just ross of them. You know what I mean? You just don't never know what's going to be started up. They try to talk me into going and riding. They're like, oh, what you're just? on this easy thing you know you'll do it easy i'm like man i kind of wanted to do it i always i mean i'm never ever going to do it now but back in my 30s you know you're kind of thinking like there's a

couple things in my life i need to experience oh you would have done it and right i've been to them racetracks i've seen what y'all do i you y'all would do it i hate i didn't you would have yeah i'm sure it's uh you guys are a different breed there ain't no doubt i don't agree you guys are the different breed we are you know we're crazy but then maybe i like maybe like you I said, I was just around a couple of the craziest ones, which I think that's right. No, you was. That Ross of them, that's a different group. Ross is still around.

I haven't heard from him guys in a while. He's a coach. He's a coach of Missouri. Do you and him hit alone? Oh, heck yeah. Y'all don't talk shit. Oh, now we talk about time. But Ross, they're winning right now.

Are they? Yeah, we're third. Ross's, their team's wins. I haven't seen Ross in over a decade. I can't imagine. I know he got married, got settled. He's doing good. Oh, yeah.

He's a little more laid back. I cannot, I cannot envision an old settled down calm Ross Cole. He's a lot more than he was. Now, I think he'd fight at a drop of a hat if he had to. Hey, that's still leaving. He won't get mad at this. We went to a local bar and, I mean, I go to this bar. This is 20, 25 years ago.

I go to this bar every Wednesday. and the whole town did. So like all the NASCAR industry and everybody, we go to this bar every Wednesday. So I know people in there. I know the bouncer. I know everybody. And, you know, we don't mess around.

We just go in, drink our beer, go home. And so I take Ross and we eat there five minutes. And he's staring at the door. And ain't really nobody there yet. We get there early. And he's 20 or so people in the bar. He's staring at the door, staring at the door. And I'm like, I'm like, Ross, what?

He's like, I'm going to ask that bouncer to fight tonight. I was like, what? He's like, yeah, me and him's going to go. He's a big boy. I think I'm going to ask him to fight. And, I mean, he would not leave that guy alone all night long. He wasn't trying, he didn't, like, go up to him and talk crap or try to instigate. He just kept telling him, Mike, I want to fight you, man.

I want to fight you tonight. And I'm like, God, holy, this guy is just crazy. He just had that energy. It was like if he couldn't be riding a bull, he needed some sort of thrill somewhat similar. And I guess, you know, picking a fight with the biggest guy at the bar. He can back it up. He could.

I've seen him in action. I bet so. Yeah, he'll back it up. That's all I can say. All right, Jerome. It's been a lot of fun, man. Thanks for coming through. If y'all haven't taken an opportunity to listen to this cowboy life

on the dirty-mo media feed, you should check it out, hear these kind of stories and even more with Jerome and Tiffany. Thank you so much. We do, man. Every Thursday, y'all come and check it out. We appreciate you to have it. We'd love to have you. Need come of the ranch.

Let's do it. All right, buddy. Appreciate you. Yes, sir. Thank you. Jerome Davis on the Dale Jr. Download. All right, everybody. That was fun talking to Jerome Davis about, you know, about his life.

And obviously his experience is a bull rider. and his injury and how he's kind of, you know, carried on with his life beyond that. But also, I'm really thankful for the kind of understanding of the PBR business, how it was created and, you know, what the industry might be a little bit like. I'm really kind of fascinated with that because I had the opportunity to get to know some of those guys back in the day. I don't know, Hemingway says that there are, he had some kind of a quote about the only real sports in the world were bull fighting and boxing and, or bull, and I think bull fighters, bull riders are in the same vein. And maybe he said it was bull riding.

I don't know, but I need to look that up. I should know Hemingway's quotes being spending so much time in Q. but I've always thought about bull riders in general as in this and they're in the own category when it comes to sport and risk and danger racing was was similar if you go back to the 60s and 70s even racing a stock car at ridiculous speeds was I would say equally is dangerous, but we've made our sport so safe over the years where I don't know that bull riders have the same luxury.

And the dangers that they face with that bull and the unpredictability of every single ride hasn't changed. And so I just have always admired their toughness and, you know, what, Jerome's sitting here telling me, man, I just wanted it. I'm like, what is it that you want? You know, you're coming back from injuries and you climb back on that next bull,

and you just want it. You just keep doing it because you want it. And I'm like, man, after a while, I would get thrown off enough bulls. I would, my wanting it would probably change. But they're just impressive. And they're kind of in, like I said, they're in their own world.

you know, kind of separate from reality a little bit. You know, they kind of, they got to live this unique lifestyle. 1,000% in most cases, 1,000% committed to, to the role of being a cowboy and riding bulls. A lot of things, there's a lot of similarities. A lot of things in life take a backseat to the commitment they have to their opportunity to ride bulls and live that life as long as they possibly can. And so it's something I really admire and I'm thankful to have the opportunity to sit with Jerome and talk about it. So I hope you really enjoyed the conversation. Thank you for joining us here in the Arby's studio. Don't forget about Arby's new meat in three box. You get more

meal for your money at Arby's. We have the meets. We'll see you tomorrow. Check out Dirtymo Media on Instagram, Facebook, X, and TikTok.