Senko lover

Edit: Haven’t seen BASSTrakk this bad in a while ?

James Elam might salavage my team. I’ll see what tomorrow brings. Honestly waaaaay too busy to even think about bassmaster today

A. Bobby Lane B. John Cox C. James Elam D. Luke Clausen E. Marty Giddens. Fun fact: I’ve done a lot of stalking and looking at past tournament results over the last two years of this. I’ve never seen a non-elite resume as stacked as Marty Giddens. He has a phenomenal record all across the country. Another fun fact: I’ve been keeping an eye on Bobby Lane’s classic record for the last few years. There was no way I wouldn’t have him on my team this year. Look up his stats in the classic. Let the games begin!!

I defer to those with much more experience in the sport than I have for an authoritative answer. But one thing I have noticed from learning about the history of professional fishing is the rise of versatility. There was a bass master article about this at some point. In order to survive in the Elite series right now, you have to be versatile. Back in the day, there were people that only fished a spinnerbait or only fished deep or only fished shallow. Today there are anglers that have specialties (Bill Lowen likes fishing shallow, Hank Cherry throws a jerk bait all the time, etc.) but it seems like every tournament you have guys with 35 rods rigged up covering every bait at every depth. Junk fishing and versatility have taken over specialties. That's changed the game. There's a crazy amount of behind-the-scenes work that goes into an Elite tournament. Unless you're Boyd Duckett, most of the guys can't afford to fly to tournaments. They drive extremely long distances in a truck to get there. After they set up, they spend two days staring at their electronics on the water for 12 hours a day. They rig up rods and baits at night and don't get much sleep during practice. If they make the cut on day two, there's a total of four days of fishing. That's a strain on anyone, let alone someone who's not in their physical prime. My grandparents are around Rick Clunn's age and a 7 hour road trip puts them on the couch for two days. For the record, he won an Elite series tournament on the St. John's river in 2016 at the age of 69. That's a testament not only to his skill and experience but it also says that he's in great shape. Don't count him out

hey man I'm still trying to be like you when I grow up though

I'm still here, although I don't read through the forums as much as I used to. I've had to prioritize some things in life lately; I haven't even been fishing in several months. I moved out, started college, and am working 30 hours a week so I don't have the time to do a lot of things I wish I was doing.

Part of me wants to pick conservatively for the Classic to help me climb out of this hole a little bit. But honestly, that's really boring. I'm finding some cool stuff and I think I'll have a fairly unique roster. I don't fish to make cuts and I'm not starting now. Go big or go home however, I will regret not picking Casey. I had him for the last classic on hartwell, which I believe was my first fantasy event and he obviously won the whole thing.

Congratulations to Takahiro Omori on his wire-to-wire victory! Congrats are also in order to Cecole for a truly phenomenal entry and topping our group this week. Good luck not picking Casey Ashley in the classic and let's see how we do on the big championship.

dude the winnings are rolling in. I got a helicopter lure from Roland Martin, a banjo minnow from Overstock Tackle, a Blockbuckster gift card, a Disney Princess rod and reel from zebco, and I hear Jacob Wheeler is sending me the big L he got this week too edit: @OCdockskipper I forgot; I'll have you know that for 2015 Guntersville I had like 4 in the top 6 and came so close to winning that I actually left my prize groups because I wasn't legally allowed to win them lol

I love a lot of old Westerns, but if you can count the more recent "No Country for Old Men" as a western it's one of the better movies you'll ever see.

None of my guys made it which means I get a head start on digging up some straight fire for the classic

I keep wishing there was bad cell signal on this lake so that I could update BASSTrakk at the end of the day and all my guys killed it

that's fishing, man. He'll be back. I think last year I would have been down about it but I'm honestly too busy to worry about fantasy this year so it is what it is .

I don't know which was worse, looking at bass master last night after work or logging in to you guys roasting me for my utterly dismal failure of a day one this morning looking back through my performance over the last two years....I think yesterday is my worst day of fantasy ever. Hey, I guess it can only get better from here (?).

I got: Wheeler: one of the best anglers in the world, fished out of his mind last year and low ownership. Jaye: local stick, grew up fishing Martin Tharp: Loves jig fishing, came out swinging with a jig for the season opener last year on Cherokee when everyone else was fishing the little fluke rig. Vinson: Also grew up fishing Martin Shryock: I'm really stoked to see Hunter join his brother on the elites, one of my favorite anglers. He's really good; we'll see how he does against the most stacked field in the world. Not my usual lineup but we'll see how it goes. It's far too early in the day to be worrying about the basstrakk standings. My guys to watch out for/almost picked were: McClelland, Kriet, Hank Cherry, Steve Kennedy and Dave Lefebre.

I've never really been that into FLW as an organization or their fantasy fishing. I find the website is annoying and 10% of the anglers dominate 90% of the competition (okay, maybe not quite that bad but you probably know what I'm talking about.) If you're looking for strategies when picking a roster, considering the following: -Styles of fishing used at the venue for this time of year (Lake Martin is gonna be jigs, jerk baits, and shakeyheads most likely. That's the only free advice I'll give you) -People who are good at these styles of fishing. -People who have home advantage at the lake or similar lakes (which doesn't always help and is a gamble) -People with a proven track record of consistently ranking in the top 50 -People who don't have a high ownership If you can find someone who completes all of these things, then that's probably about as close as you're going to get to a "safe" bet. I don't always include all of those factors, but they cross my mind for each player. Sometimes I rely heavily on previous experience and dig up old tournaments held on the lake. I've even gone so far as to go through the entire tournament history of each angler in each roster and look at their performance on a particular lake/region. But sometimes it hurts you to rely heavily on stats and history. That's when you need a good feel for the people who are going to be in the AOY race, the people who are fishing out of their mind. Jump on their train before they blow up and you'll be rewarded. Other times you pick a star studded player on their home lake and end up in the 90s or 100s. That's the name of the game. Fantasy fishing is a lot of percentages, a lot of guesswork, a lot of snubs or blessings from Lady Luck, but most of all a lot of fun .

There's nothing more embarrassing than trying to explain fantasy fishing to normal people

For those who are new to this group, you're more than welcome to release your picks before the event BUT there's a lot of fun tension that builds up through the season as rivalries increase and we try to dethrone specific people. So keep it in mind that you may want to wait until the tournament starts to release your lineup. But do whatever you want to

The hype is freaking real, best of luck to all of you. I'm so ready for another season. Lowkey I've spent all winter looking at the nice jigs I won from @buzzed bait last year. Kinda boring tbh

Let's keep this one going. I can't freaking wait!

I use Rage Craws almost every time I go fishing. The Cut'R worm is also a pretty underrated bait but I've had some good success with it.

Not surprised, not happy about it. Strike King is my favorite fishing brand, so I hope they don't go downhill in any way. Otherwise those dang rage craws will be 20 bucks a bag now haha.

Then I tie on a Ned Rig

I have a lot of his jigs or heads second hand from trading with members here and they rock!!

Depends on if it's a pond I know or a pond I've never fished before. My regular haunts, I know them so well that I have a good feel for what's going on and if there's a bite happening or not. Give me about an hour and I usually will make a decision to stay or not. If it's a pond I haven't fished before, I'll fish until I have to go home.