Ten Rides, One Whistle
Bushwacker and J.B. Mauney met ten times between 2011 and 2014. Nine buckoffs. One 95.25-point night in Tulsa that ended a 48-out unridden streak — and after it, nobody made the whistle on Bushwacker again.
Every sport has one rivalry that outgrows the scoreboard. In bull riding it ran from January 2011 to January 2014, and the recorded data lays it out one trip at a time: the greatest bucking bull of his era against the rider who simply would not stop drawing him.
| Date | Where | Bull score | Result |
|---|---|---|---|
| Jan 18, 2011 | Anaheim, CA | 47.75 | Buckoff |
| Mar 28, 2011 | Kansas City, MO | 45.25 | Buckoff |
| May 28, 2011 | Decatur, TX | 46.00 | Buckoff |
| Oct 22, 2011 | Las Vegas, NV — World Finals | 47.50 | Buckoff |
| Mar 3, 2012 | Arlington, TX | 46.00 | Buckoff |
| Sep 16, 2012 | Springfield, MO | 47.00 | Buckoff |
| Aug 17, 2013 | Tulsa, OK | 46.75 | RIDDEN — 95.25 |
| Aug 25, 2013 | Nashville, TN | 46.50 | Buckoff |
| Sep 21, 2013 | Biloxi, MS | 46.75 | Buckoff |
| Jan 24, 2014 | Oklahoma City, OK | 46.75 | Buckoff |
All ten recorded meetings, from the ride-level data. Bushwacker averaged 46.63 across them — above his own career average of 46.11, which is itself the territory of world champions.
What the one whistle interrupted
When Mauney made the whistle in Tulsa on August 17, 2013, he ended a streak of 48 consecutive unridden outs stretching back to November 2009. In the recorded data, only three men ever rode Bushwacker — and after Tulsa, in his final 20 career outs, nobody rode him again. He left the sport in October 2014 exactly the way he'd spent most of it: unridden.
The night itself is worth reading twice in the data. The ride scored 95.25 — and Bushwacker still marked 46.75 on the trip. He didn't get ridden because he had an off night; he was better than his career average in defeat. That's the detail the highlight reels don't carry: the score sheet says both athletes showed up.
Ten percent
The rivalry's real measure is the asymmetry. Across every other bull in the recorded data, Mauney made the whistle on 42% of his trips — 203 rides in 483 recorded outs, one of the most effective careers in the record. Against Bushwacker: one in ten. The same rider, a quarter as successful, and he kept coming back — six straight buckoffs over three seasons before the one that landed.
And Bushwacker's side of the ledger barely moved. He won the world title in 2011, took it back in 2013 despite the Tulsa ride — the championship average is built to absorb a single result — and retired with the 2014 title, a 97.0% career buckoff rate, and a high mark of 48.5, one of only 26 outs in the entire record to reach 48.
Why this is the matchup that matters
One ride in ten is what greatness against greatness actually looks like in the data — not domination, but a single crack in four years of stone. Every bull's page here carries this same ledger against every rider he's faced; most rivalries just never get ten chapters. When one does, the record keeps every line of it. Bushwacker's page has all 76.