PUEBLO, Colo. – This past weekend, Bones, two-time YETI World Champion Bull, passed away peacefully on the farm in North Carolina where he’d lived since 2011. He was 21 years old.

Bones had been retired since 2011after a career that was as remarkable as it was short.

He competed in the PBR for just four years, 2006-2010, with 43 total outs and just 34 on the premier series. In those 45 outs, he was ridden just four times for an average score of 91.88 points.

And, despite only competing for four seasons, Bones won two World Championships.

His first, in 2008, came after a tight battle with Troubadour at the PBR World Finals. Bones bucked off that year’s World Champion, Guilherme Marchi, in his final out to clinch the win.

“I thought it came as close as it can get between those top four bulls,” then-PBR Livestock Director Cody Lambert said at the time. “Even Copperhead Slinger was good, but Spit Fire, Troubadour, and All In were amazing. Bones was just a little better than they were.

“And he had to prove it with the top bull rider in the world on him.”

In 2010, Bones won his second world title, defeating eventual three-time World Champion Bull Bushwacker in the process – again dispatching Marchi in his final out en route to the title.

Bushwacker passed away last month at 18 years old.

“I knew he should really get a good score, but I didn’t know if it was going to be good enough to beat Bushwacker,” Bones’s stock contractor Tom Teague said at the time. “Bushwacker is a great bull, and I’d love to own him. I wish I owned him, but Bones did his number. I can’t ask him to do any more, and I may end up retiring him after this, I don’t know.

“He’s been two-time World Champion, and he’s a great animal.”

Teague did, in fact, retire his superstar bovine following his second world title win, inspired by the Steiner family.

In 1973, Bobby Steiner had turned 22 two weeks before winning the PRCA bull riding world championship. When asked what was next, Steiner replied, “I’m hanging up my rope.”

Three decades later, in 2002, Bobby’s son, Sid, won a world title as a steer wrestler and did the same.

When Teague called Lambert to inform him of his decision to retire Bones, Lambert explained that if Bones continued competing and won a third world title in four years, he’d go down as the greatest bull in PBR history.

“He’s a pretty damn good salesman,” Teague said at the time. “I had kindly made my mind up that if he did win it, I was going to retire him, and if he didn’t win, I probably would have retired him.”

“I can’t blame him,” said Lambert.

As it stands, Bones is widely considered the second-best bull in PBR history, falling short only to Bushwacker. Last summer, he was ranked No. 3 on the PBR Top 30. He received the Brand of Honor in 2014.

Bones is one of seven bulls to have won multiple World Championships and is one of just two to have won them non-consecutively (Bushwacker won in 2011 before going back-to-back in 2013-14). He was also the 1994-95 PRCA Bull of the Year and is one of just two bulls ever to have won titles in both the PBR and the PRCA (SweetPro’s Bruiser won the PRCA title in 2017 and PBR world titles in 2017-19).

Born March 31, 2003, they had to move Bones from the pasture with other calves to the barn, where he was alone because he wasn’t big enough to either defend himself or get enough to eat. He earned his name because he was a “bag of bones.” With each passing year he filled out into a muscular 1,550 pounds.

Bones’ mother was a daughter of White Water. His father was Bone Collector, also known for his jumping ability.

“I didn’t dream he’d turn out to become the bull he was,” Teague told Sports Illustrated. “And then, what more could you expect from a bull? I wanted him to go out on top. I love all my animals, but he was extra special to me. I put him in a special pasture at home. Fed him grain every day; gave him alfalfa and the best hay. Put a female in there to keep him company.”

While Teague had previously been part of five World Champion Bull titles – Little Yellow Jacket, 3, Mossy Oak Mudslinger, and Big Buck – Bones was the first and last World Champion Bull that Teague raised himself from a calf. Teague himself retired from the stock contracting business in 2014, the same year Bones received the Brand of Honor.

“He’s going out right,” Teague said in 2011. “I’m tickled to death with the way it ended, and it’s a great ending.”

Bones will be buried on the farm in North Carolina, right next to Little Yellow Jacket.

The PBR extends its condolences to the Teague family.

Photo courtesy of Andy Watson/Bull Stock Media