Cesar de la Cruz - Finding the Light

I went through a real dark time after 2014, the last year I made the National Finals Rodeo. I finished the 2014 regular season in the fifteenth spot—the bottom of the pack. I was roping with Tom Richards, a header from Arizona and a great guy. I didn’t have a very good Finals. I know that team roping is tough and that I can only control so much, but when I mess up a team-roping run, I put my partner’s livelihood and my livelihood in jeopardy. I don’t like letting people down. I don’t like it at all. I was fed up after my performance at the 2014 NFR. I had made the Finals nine times and had yet to win the world title. I got real down on myself. Looking back, I understand now why people warned me about my temper, said I should relax and let things go. My partner Colter Todd once told me, “Cesar, when you mess up, I don’t have to get mad at you. You do a good job of it for the both of us.” I thought maybe it was my ropes and my horses, so I got rid of everything. I sold a good horse and found a different rope sponsor. In the team-roping game, when you get rid of your stuff, the headers see that. The headers are looking at all the great heelers out there. They want to rope with them. The headers can see that you don’t have the horses you used to have or the confidence, and you lose partners. Now that the light is back in my life, I see things more clearly. I’ve been taking everything back to the basics. For me, the basics start with family. “Little Crappy Arena” I come from a long line of cowboys from southern Arizona. My grandparents, Vic and Yolanda Aros, were both raised by cowboys. They still live on the same few acres in South Tucson that my grandpa, a World War II veteran, bought with money he earned working as an electrician. Vic and Yolanda raised four children there: George, Zenaida, Julie and Victor. Long ago, Vic built an arena on those dusty acres and pursued his passion for horses and team roping, while the city grew up around them. Today, there’s a bar next door and a trailer park across the street. The story goes that one day, when my Uncle George talked back to my grandpa, Vic threatened to not let him rope. George spun around and said, “Good! I don’t want to rope in this little crappy arena anyway.” In 2008, my grandpa planted a steel sign out front that reads: “The Little Crappy Arena, Home of NFR Team Roping Qualifiers George Aros, Cesar de la Cruz, Victor Aros.” That sign reminds me of the Hat Creek Cattle Company sign from Lonesome Dove, my favorite show of all time. I think of Gus McCrae and his partner Woodrow Call as old-school, hard-ass cowboys. I put my grandpa Vic in that category, too. He’s hard-working and proud of his humble beginnings and all that he and his family have accomplished.

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