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Bull market

LAS VEGAS – He used to ride in a rickety trailer attached to an old Dodge pickup truck. Last week, he arrived in the comfort of a sleek 18-wheeler.

He used to sleep in the company of dozens. Now he’s got his own place, with plans for a 3-acre retirement spread in the works.

He and his colleagues used to be sold by the pound. These days, he’s not for sale.

He is Mossy Oak Mudslinger, a 1,600-pound bull who is evidence that the cowboys aren’t the only ones cashing in on the rise of bull riding. Man and beast now share the marquee.

“There’s more than one star in this deal,” said Jody Newberry, a veteran rider.

Thousands of fans have descended on this city to root for the likes of Justin McBride, Adriano Moraes and Newberry as the sport’s top riders compete for big checks and bigger belt buckles at the $3.5 million Professional Bull Rider Finals. But plenty of fans gathering at Thomas & Mack Arena are rooting the beasts – the likes of Mossy Oak Mudslinger, Just A Dream and the aptly-named Big Bucks. The world’s best bulls are commanding very big bucks and attracting celebrity owners.

NFL quarterback Chad Pennington, comedian Larry The Cable Guy and singer Jewel are among those who jumped into the bull market. The main requisite: Deep pockets.

On an Internet auction earlier this year, a 4-year-old bull with little track record sold for $75,000. A trucking company mogul paid $500,000 for half-interest in Big Bucks. And though Mossy Oak Mudslinger is not for sale, his semen is available on a limited basis – for $3,500 per straw.

Between the sale of semen, the sale of offspring and prize money earned, Dillon Page said, Mossy Oak Mudslinger, a 9-year-old Brindle, has earned upwards of $500,000. Which is one reason the Pages keep the bull in a special pen and are setting aside a 3-acre spread for his retirement.

“He’ll have a special place with us until he dies,” said Dillon Page, 55, who operates the family bull breeding business with his son, H.D., on their ranch in Ardmore, Okla. “The only time he will leave that place is when he goes to the cow pasture to visit cows.’’

For the Pages, raising bulls started as a hobby. Then it became their salvation.

In 1994, 20 bull riders broke away from the leading rodeo association to start their own tour. About that same time, the Pages began to get serious about bulls. Both Dillon and his son rode bulls and always had an interest in raising them.

But they were a farming family, and their primary source of income was the peanuts. It was also the source of great consternation. Turns out the peanut business can be as unpredictable and terrifying as a bull ride.

One year, Dillon Page said, the family lost $250,000 on the peanut crop and found themselves $400,000 in debt.

“Fortunately, I had a good relationship with our banker,” Dillon said.

With the PBR tour gaining traction, the Pages made a decision: They tore up the peanut crops on their 1,100-acre farm along the Washita River, planted Bermuda grass for grazing and committed to the bucking bull business.

In 1999, they held their first annual auction and grossed $400,000 with the sale of 50 bulls and 50 cows. But one of the bulls was not for sale: It was a yearling named Washita Mudslinger.

In 2001, Washita Mudslinger was voted runner-up as the PBR’s Bull of the Year. The riders weren’t the only ones who took notice. So did Mossy Oak, an outdoor and hunting apparel company that offered the Pages $5,000 for the naming rights to the bull.

The check was cashed and the name was changed: Washita Mudslinger became Mossy Oak Mudslinger.

It was one of the first signs that corporate America might be interested in aligning itself with a niche sport trying to go mainstream. The PBR’s formula: Lights, camera, action.

A deal with the Outdoor Life Network (now Versus) helped the PBR build a fan base that tour officials now say exceeds 19 million. The PBR also trots out statistics that show bull riding is the world’s fastest-growing sport. As TV ratings and attendance increased, longtime stock contractor Gene Owen started seeing a new breed.

Not a new breed of bulls, but of owners.

“People that can afford to give $100,000 for a boat,” Owen said. “They’re the same people that can give $100,000 for a bull.”

Noted fellow stock contractor Jerry Nelson, “It’s almost like NASCAR. Write a check and, hell, you can just show up and be the owner of the car. It’s about getting this way in the bull business … Hell, you just show up on race day and hear your named shouted out.”

The name recognition is just as good for the PBR as it is for the owners. So at times they’ve shouted out names such as Jewel, the singer; Bernie Taupin, the songwriter; and Ron White and Larry Engvall, comedians. All are listed among PBR bull owners.

But it was the likes of Nelson and other multimillionaire businessmen who helped drive the market higher and faster than the Dow Jones index.

Nelson, who made a fortune selling oil field equipment and spent a fortune on his breeding business, is reaping profits. Earlier this year, he sold half-interest in prized bull Big Bucks for $500,000 and a Peterbilt truck from Tom Teague, a truck leasing mogul from North Carolina.

“More and more people are looking for the superstar,” Page said. “I think everyone thinks that a star has a better shot at producing one.”

Instead of scouring cattle auctions, those searching for superstars started tracking breeding lines. That was good news for the Page family.

In 2001, Mossy Oak Mudslinger’s semen sold for $200 a straw. This year, Page said he got $3,500 a straw. And that’s just the start of the bonanza.

Last year, Page sold half a dozen heifers out of Mudslinger’s bloodline for $20,000 apiece. Three of Mudslinger’s off-spring are competing in special events featuring bulls between the ages of 2 and 4 and culminated with a $200,000 first-prize check earlier this week. The Pages take in at least $10,000 in sponsorship money from Mossy Oak and have sponsorship deals for two other bulls that bring in $35,000.

During the Finals, a seven-day competition that ends Sunday, bulls earn $1,275 each time they buck and $3,000 if they buck today in the championship round, reserved for the top 15 riders. Other bonuses are available, but the search for a superstar appears to be driving new owners and driving up prices.

Mudslinger isn’t the only one who has earned a sterling reputation. So have Dillon and his son, H.D., who have been named PBR Stock Contractors of the Year for six consecutive years. Oh, and that first auction from 1999 when the family hauled in $400,000? At their annual auction this year, Page said his family grossed $1.4 million.

The Dodge pickup truck they once used to haul Mudslinger has been put out to pasture, too. This year, Page paid $100,000 for the 18-wheeler to go along with a $50,000 18-wheeler he bought for his son last year.

And earlier this week, Pages won something money can’t buy when Mudslinger was named Bull of the Year. It was the first time any of their bulls had won the honor. Good timing. Dillon Page noticed Mudslinger was hobbling like, well, Dillon himself, and so this would be his final season.

The last ride came Saturday night.

Mudslinger had been ridden three times in his last eight outs, and Dillon Page worried when he saw his bull would be matched up against Guilherme Marchi, No. 1 in the PBR standings and favored to win the gold buckle Sunday.

All that money Mudslinger has won did nothing to soothe Page’s nerves. He started worrying at 7 a.m. when he went to feed Mudslinger, who looked only half-interested when Page filled the feed bin with eight pounds of grain and shoveled about 15 pounds of hay into the pen.

The bull looked bloated, and after a successful ride Friday night, Marchi looked strong.

“I think Marchi will ride him,” Page said hours before the big matchup. “I was hoping we’d draw one of those guys we had a good shot of bucking off.”

On the final ride of the night, Dillon Page watched from the stands with about 50 friends and relatives as Marchi climbed aboard the bull that saved the Pages from potential financial ruin. Marchi nodded. The gate swung open. Mudslinger turned back to the left, his hind legs shooting high into the air.

Around they spun, Marchi and the bull.

The clock creeped closer to eight seconds, the required time a rider must stay on a bull for a qualified score.

Then, as suddenly as a struggling peanut farmer turned into a thriving bull owner, the bull hurled Marchi to the dirt.

Page cheered. So did hundreds of others who, knowing this was Mossy Oak Mudslinger’s last official ride, were rooting for the bull.

Once again, the bull whose rise has paralleled that of the sport was money in the bank.