FORT WORTH, Texas ― Well, I was born in a small town /and I live in a small town / probably die in a small town / oh,those-communities…
In the early 1990s, John Mellencamp had a hit single singingabout the virtues of living in a "Small Town."
Of course, he was singing about his own hometown of Seymour,Ind., but he could have just as easily been singing about Latanier,La., which is a small, mostly Pentecostal burrow (pop 3,215) 10miles south of Alexandria, where Bubba Dunn wasborn and raised and will likely spend the rest of his life.
Unlike Mellencamp, who packed up and left the southern Indianafarm town in order to become an international rock star, Dunnwouldn't forego the virtues of Southern life along the Red Riverright in the heart of Louisiana in search of fame and fortune as aprofessional bull rider. The familiar family life was fortuneenough for Dunn.
The bull rider had a dislike for life on the proverbial rodeotrail.
"Sitting in a car or a van all day long and just driving," Dunnsaid. "I ain't going to say I done my share of it, but a bunch ofit and if you're going to live that lifestyle you have to staygone. I don't know. I could sit in the van and think of 10,000things I could be doing at home.
"I definitely didn't like the idea of being gone a month at atime. You'd go to one and you wouldn't come home. You'd hang out atso-and-so's house ― a buddy's house, wherever you were workingevents ― hang out there for a week and then go work two orthree and then come home. Man that crap didn't set well withme."
He wasn't keen on flying either.
No, it wasn't as though he had any fear of flying. Dunn simplydidn't want to be that far away from the ranch he grew up on andthe ranch he eventually took over.
As a matter of fact, when Norman Curry calledto invite him in 1995 to what would have been his first PBR eventin Charlotte, N.C., Dunn wasn't so sure that it was such a goodidea.
"He called me and he said, 'I want to invite you to come toCharlotte,'" recalled Dunn. "I said, 'Alright, well, what's there?'He said, 'A bull riding-a PBR bull riding.' I get to looking at amap and said, 'I'll have to call you back.' I got to looking on themap and thought, (darn), that's a long ways over there."
Curry called on a Tuesday and, according to Dunn, the cost of aflight for the upcoming weekend was "an astronomical figure."
On Wednesday, Dunn called Curry with his answer.
"I called him back and said, 'I don't believe I'll make thatone. If you get an opening somewhere else, call me,'" Dunn said. "Ijust declined that one."
Later that season, he accepted an invitation to compete inNashville, Tenn.
Dunn's career ― or the PBR portion of it anyway― began as nonchalantly as it would unceremoniously end afterthe 2000 season; but when he was riding bulls, he rode Promise Landfor a PBR-record 96.5 points and became the only man in history toride Bodacious to the whistle twice. In fact, he only got on himtwice and rode him easily each time.
"I got a late start in my career at the professional level,"Dunn said. "I hung around home too long, so ― I missed myprime. Mentally I wasn't really wanting to travel when I startedtraveling and, yeah, I think, I spent my days goingto ― ah, the PBR wasn't there yet in '91, '92, '93 andsomewhere in there ― to me ― was my prime.
"In 1995, (heck), I had to ride Bodacious to get invited to thePBR."
"I don't think the world really got to see what that man couldreally do," said two-time World Champion ChrisShivers. "He rode Bodacious twice and, I think, people gotto see spurts of him on TV, but I got to witness a lot of him inLouisiana when he did get on some pretty rank bulls that he couldreally ride when he was younger. I think he was a little bit lateto come into the PBR, but he was something special as far as a bullrider goes."
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Dunn grew up on a small ranch.
His daddy, Buddy, rode bulls and remembers seeing pictures ofhim on bareback horses. He once met some "old men" who told himstories. He only knows his daddy as a working man, who provided forhis family.
When he was 5, his daddy's two younger brothers ― Bill andRonnie ― started riding bulls. They gave little Bubba a cowbell to put on a rope of his own and he "was hooked then."
He got a bucking barrel and eventually Buddy took him to a localrodeo, where kids get on "wild, crazy cows."
"They didn't use flank ropes on them, and (they) would gothrough there like a balloon somebody had blowed up, so I startedgetting on them," Dunn said. "My daddy was really hardcore and ifone of them would come through there that would fight in the boxand all the other kids would run away from it, he'd call me overand say, 'Which one you getting on?' We picked the one we wanted.I'd say, 'I want that one right over there,' and he'd say, 'No, getyour (stuff) and come over here. You're getting on this one.' I waslike, oh, (darn), there's a reason nobody wants to get on it. It'strying to climb out of the chute ― that crazy-ass oldcow."
It was all or nothing at the Dunn ranch.
He'd get on 13, sometimes 14, head of cattle at the practice penand rode in local amateur events every Friday and Saturday nightagainst 20 to 30 other riders-most whom that were older and moreexperienced than him.
Dunn still won.
He was a natural.
"I was always riding something," he said. "I can remembergetting on in tennis shoes and a muscle shirt and just spurring thecrap out of them ole bulls. It wasn't nothing like the PBR bulls,but to us we were big timing it."
Open events led to local and regional events, and in 1987 hestarted competing throughout the state. He won the state title inOctober 1990.
Unfortunately, his daddy died shortly after.
"I don't know," said Dunn, pausing, "it set me back."
He wasn't yet 20 and he had already lost his mamma when he was16 years old. His younger brother was only 15 and both parents weregone.
"Here I am in the world by myself is the way I felt," said Dunn,which goes a long way in understanding why he never wanted to leavehome in the first place. "I felt like I was responsible. I had tostep up and take the reins. We had a place and what are you goingto do, let it go to the birds? That's home."
His older sister took on a motherly role for his youngerbrother.
In the meantime, Dunn worked the ranch by himself.
He didn't ride bulls for almost two years.
But he was so good that when he finally climbed back in thebucking chute, he won the Louisiana state title in '92 '93 and '94,which is the same year he won the state all-around title. In spiteof having a PRCA permit and an invitation to travel with Curry, hedidn't mind staying close to home.
"They charted planes and all that crap," Dunn said. "I wentabout as hard as I was going to go and said, 'to (heck) with this.I'm going home.' I wasn't made to live on no blacktop."
Eventually he took the call from Curry and made his way to thePBR.
Although he competed only as often as he wanted to ― hismost complete years were 1997 and 1999 ― he still has threescores ranked in the Top 25 all time.
"Three rides, huh," said Dunn, unaware of the longstandingaccomplishment. "What were they?"
Of course, there's the 1999 event in Tampa, Fla., when he rodePromise Land for 96.5 points and later that yearhe had tied the previous record of 96 points when he rodeRed Wolf in Charlotte.
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Yes, he did finally venture as far east as North Carolina.
That same event, which surprisingly he did not win, he also rodeHollywood for 95 points. He's the only rider in the 20-year historyof the PBR to record scores of 96 and 95 points in the sameregular-season event and not win.
However, he was rewarded with his only event win ― thencalled the Bud Lite Cup Series ― in Tampa for his efforts onPromise Land.
"I knew I had made a good ride, at the time, but I didn't reallythink it was going to be something that special," Dunn recalled,"but, I mean, I knew I had made a good ride. I don't know, it waslike it wowed everybody else more than it wowed me.
"I just got to the whistle and done everything I could to do it.That's the way I rode bulls. I wasn't a guy that just sat still upthere. If it was a good bull or a rank bull I had to be spurringhim to get him rode."
He kicked loose on a January night in Florida and made a ridethat nearly 15 years later illustrates how influential his stylewould be for a youngster named Chris Shivers. The fellow Louisiananative, who looked up to Dunn as a hero and mentor, patterned hisflashy style after him.
"Bubba was a guy that knew how to ride rank bulls," saidShivers, whose rookie year in the PBR was in 1998. "He was a guythat was flashy and he used his feet a lot. He was a guy that madebulls really look good. That's where, I think, I got most of myaction from. I didn't want to just sit there and be real still andjust make the whistle. I wanted to be 90 and he was a guy that Ifelt like that was the way he approached things, so that's thedirection I went in.
In any case, just as Michael Gaffney doesn'tfeel as though his 96.5 points on Little YellowJacket was worth all those points, Dunn is stillunconvinced as well.
Nevertheless, he wasn't about to give back those points then andhe's certainly not going to do so now.
He remembers being in the locker room when the riders gatheredround longtime PBR production crew member Jay Prestin to look atthe draw for the final round. Dunn said he felt as though he had atendency to "draw in circles," meaning if he drew a rank bull oncehe was likely to draw him three and four times.
Promise Land was different.
He had never been on him prior to then.
Dunn was looking forward to the matchup ― "I said, 'That'llwork. We can win first on him'" ― and knew Promise Land wasalso in his prime.
"That sucker was huge," Dunn said. "I was like this is likegetting on the hood of a truck.
"I hit my head out there. I was on the back of my neck and itkind of stunned me. I got right up, but it kind of stunned me and Iwalked back over to the bucking chutes and I knew I had made thewhistle. Ole (Cody) Lambert, he was a back judgeand he jumped off the back of the bucking chutes, down into the penthere, and he walks up to me. I'm trying to get my hat back on andhe said, 'That's the best damn bull ride I ever seen.' I justlooked at him and was like, 'Really?'
That's the response he had when Lambert called him earlier thisyear.
When the co-founder and longtime livestock director phoned Dunnwith the news of his induction into the Ring of Honor, Dunn, 44,had no idea what the call was about when he answered.
At the time, Dunn and his wife, Kristy, were entertaining someguests in their Louisiana home when Lambert called.
"I was floored there for a second," Dunn said. "I talk to Cody,but not very often and I thought he was calling to talk about somebulls. He said, 'I just got off a conference call and me and theguys' ― I don't know who the guys are anymore ― and hesaid, 'We decided we're going to give a ring to both you and Chrisat the same time.'
"I said, 'Well, great.'"
It makes it that much more special said Shivers.
"Being inducted into the Ring of Honor with him just makes it alittle more special," said Shivers, 34, who later added, "I thinkthat should be pretty special for the state of Louisiana. We weretwo guys that represented the state pretty well. … We're prettygood people and pretty good bull riders too and that's somethingthat I'm proud of."
Asked what his old man would think and Dunn said, "I don't knowthat daddy would say anything. He'd probably just sit there andhe'd probably tear up a little. That's what he done when he watchedme win my first Louisiana championship.
"He wasn't a guy who was going to run out there and brag on youand pat you on the back and tell you, you done good or anythinglike that. He sure as hell wasn't fixing to make you feel like youreally done something. He was always going to be that guy to leavea room to make you try harder."
Like father, like son.
Bubba Dunn, who with Shivers will become only the 37th and 38thriders to be inducted into the Ring of Honor on Tuesday night at aceremony in Las Vegas, makes everyone around him try harder.
Follow Keith Ryan Cartwright on Twitter @PBR_KRC