Glaucus

Never. You have dogs, cats, and horses, and then you have pigs, cows, and chickens; I place bass in the dogs, cats, and horses category: they're friends, not food. If I was a starving man, however.....

Not gonna lie every time I see this thread I think of a broken tip

Smashing squarebills into rocks and getting hammered on the deflection. Yo Yo retrieve for lipless crankbaits. Killing a spinnerbait after bumping brush/wood. Working a whopper plopper like a popper in certain situations.

Generally true but a size 25 Pflueger on a ML especially with a technique like the Ned is absolutely perfect imo. However almost never use a rod long than 6'9 or 6'10 and my ML Ned rod is 6'6. Used for yaking and wading for river smallmouth.

Nope, you're at no disadvantage. I don't mess with M or XF actions. They feel terrible. All MF and F.

A Pflueger in your price range. Size 25. You want the lightest line you can get away with and the slower the reel the better. 30 is too big for this technique.

This isn't common, but it's far too common. Exactly why I have some animosity about it. This behavior is criminal and dangerous.

I commented on one of his videos once with a very minor and respectful criticism and he flipped out and cussed me out.

The only heavy bait I use for Smallies is the Whopper Plopper.

Not the best to fish subsurface trebles in these conditions. You could choose a squarebill that doesn't dive as deep, or fish a lipless because you get to determine the depth. However one of the things that makes a squarebill so good is it bouncing off of rocks and wood.

And the rivers being open is meaningless when they're extremely flooded. Feels.

The right answer, and it comes from one of the best. Listen to this.

I typically only use the Tatula. Love them. Puts me out of middle ground territory.

I'm looking at a company's spinnerbait and worm rod. Problem is, on a spinnerbait rod, I want a 6.3:1 reel (26.3 IPT); on a worm rod, I want a 7.3:1 reel (30.5 IPT). I'll be using this rod for spinnerbaits, chatterbaits, and Texas rigs. There is no middle ground to compromise with here. It's one or the other. Which reel would you go with?

I've heard good things about it too, but the selections are so minimal that when I was browsing them I found that none of them fit the bill for anything I needed.

I'm down in the Bloomington area. We're seeing some melt. Forecast looks to be in the 40s for an extended period of time heading into March. The rivers have remained open.

Getting so close...

They're all still trash. They look and perform great for a very brief period of time. I got the Zebco Bullet when it first came out. Within 2 months it had fallen apart. My wife and son have burned through 5 or 6 of the New Platinum 33s. They simply do not hold up. I've never had a casting or a spinning reel flat out break, and I've certainly never had one stop performing right after just a few weeks of use. Last year we got my wife on spinning gear and this year we're working on casting gear. My son is stepping up too. I'm sure some people have success stories with these modern spincast reels, but not us. I can post a photo of a box of these junked out in our garage. I can't recall ever even breaking a rod while fishing, just the tip of one via a screen door coming home after a day of fishing. I'm good on my gear. Stay away!

The main complaint I see is that they're overpriced for what they are and that value wise a 100-150 dollar rod makes more sense.

Gators.

Me. I lift everything from 1/16oz to 3/4oz.

It depends on where I'm fishing (lake, pond, river), what time of year it is, and what I'm targeting (LMB, SMB). Baits that never let me down are... Senkos Ned Rig Squarebills Lipless Crankbaits Whopper Plopper Chatterbaits

Daiwa, Shimano, Pflueger (for spinning) Daiwa is my favorite for everything.

The President is more like a Silver Max. Pflueger Trion is probably the Black Max.

LMB: M/F spinning, M/MF casting, MH/F casting. SMB: ML/F spinning, M/F spinning, M/MF casting.