Knabe, I know what you are talking about. I like to see cattle that have some thickness behind their shoulder, as I find these cattle are easier fleshing. Tight hearted cattle seem to always be tough looking especially here where we live with our winters being so nasty at times. I think the heart region is one of the most important areas in an animals body. The heart and lungs both function in this area.... and these two organs are kinda important to life itself.... so they better have some room to work in.
In regards to Leroy, I think he has adequate thickness behind his shoulder, as he is about the easiest fleshing bull we have ever had. What I think this picture shows is that he does have some shoulder, which sometimes make them look like they are a little narrow in the heart region. The real discussion should be about the angle of the shoulder rather than the amount of the shoulder. I also think that in order to determine whether a bull has too much shoulder, you have to learn what the proper angle of this region is supposed to look like. It could well be that what you think is too much shoulder is just an indication of a bull with better than average muscle.
In some ways, I think that many really good bulls are overlooked because people think they will be hard calving cow killers because they have some shoulder. This can be the case if the angle of the shoulder is wrong. A few years ago, I saw 75 lb Red Angus calves being delivered at a neighbours farm by c- section. When I saw the bull he was using, I understood part of the problem. This bull was very straight shouldered and also very wide between the eyes.
We all need to remember that muscle is added proportionally to all parts of an animal. What this means is that if you are selecting for improvement in muscle in one area of the animal, you will also be adding muscle to all other areas of an animal. This also means that an animal with a larger ribeye area, for example, will have more shoulder than an animal with less ribeye area. Again, remember the angle of the shoulder can change how this looks as well. The shoulder is the only major joint in the animal that is not held in place by a ball and socket joint. All that holds the shoulder in place are two large muscle masses on each side of the shoulder blade. So.... if you try to add some muscle to your cattle, you automatically will add more muscle to major muscles that are on each side of the shoulder. I am sure that some pretty good bulls oftentimes are overlooked because they are considered to be too heavy shouldered. In reality, some of these bulls may not calve any harder than a bull that appears to have less shoulder. In my opinion, this is why we are seeing so many feminine looking herd sires in ALL breeds. Many of these bulls look more like steers than they do bulls. Personally, I think some of these steery looking bulls are not producing daughters that are near as fertile, or have near as much longevity and total maternal traits as those bulls that are masculine and look like they have been on steroids. Masculinity does not translate necessarily into hard calving. Some of the worst " cow killer" sires I have seen have had literally no shoulder to speak of, had refined heads, and shoulders that were laid into their bodies. These "nice shouldered" bulls had a very poor angle to their shoulder, and just had less meat in them, and this made people think they would calve easily. Wrong!!