Casper drops to second at NFR

By Ted Harbin, TwisTed Rodeo

ARLINGTON, Texas – It’s not often that a cowboy can earn money at the National Finals Rodeo and not be happy about it.

That’s exactly what happened Thursday for saddle bronc rider Wyatt Casper, who rode Andrews Rodeo’s Brutus for 82.5 points to finish sixth in the eighth go-round, earning $4,231. Meanwhile, his closest competitor for the world-title race, Ryder Wright, won the round and pocketed $26,231.

With that, Wright moved into the lead in the world standings, while Casper, a Clarendon College alumnus, fell to second, $9,253 behind the leader with two nights remaining in the 2020 ProRodeo season.

“I should have ridden that horse a little better,” Casper said of Brutus. “That is a really strong, fast horse, and I did all I could to hang on to him the first couple of jumps. He was on his A game, and I wasn’t. I was s touch behind, then he had those moves, and I was trying to hold on to them. Finally, I could let go and do a little bit of swinging.”

Based on a 100-point scale, the horse earns half the points by how well it bucks. The cowboy earns points by spurring the animal from the neck to the cantle of the saddle in rhythm with the animal’s bucking motion.

“It’s tough, because you can really feel those moves on a horse like that,” he said. “To not hang one side and then the other side is pretty tough. You are trying to go at him every jump, trying to get as many points as you can. I was really lucky to get this horse down. That’s all I was really going for tonight was to stay in the average. Luckily, we got him down.”

Casper is second in the average race with 602.5 points on seven rides. Wright has ridden all eight horses for a cumulative score of $698.5. Even if Wright is bucked off one of the next two nights, he’ll still hold the aggregate advantage. There are several ways for Casper to ride off with the world title, and part of that happens in the go-rounds.

“I have nothing to lose at this point, so I’m going to go for the go-rounds and see what happens,” Casper said.

Wednesday night, Casper rode Calgary Stampede’s Y U R Friskey for 85.5 points to finish in a tie for sixth place in the seventh go-round of the National Finals Rodeo.

“I hadn’t had very good luck the last couple nights, so I stopped looking at that. I’m just going to stick to having fun. If it goes our way, it goes our way. There’s not a whole lot I can do about it if I don’t draw the best horses.”

While he collected cash – $2,115 for sharing the same score with the No. 2 man, Ryder Wright – it wasn’t what he was hoping for with the Canadian bucking horse.

“I’ve been on it at Fort Worth this year, and I was 88.5,” Casper said. “It didn’t go quite as good, but he felt a little stronger than what he did the last time. I was pretty lucky to get by him. He kind of got me bucked off by the fourth jump. I got sat back down, and it felt good.”

Casper was just 82.5 points Tuesday night and finished a few spots out of the money.

“I felt like that horse (Tuesday) night was probably at the bottom of the pen,” he said regarding the random draw out of the 15 horses that were bucked in the round. “We’re just trying to keep getting horses down. It will fall where it falls.”