hoosierbass07

I saw a job listing once for a supervisor position at a Dicks warehouse near Indianapolis. Number one job of the supervisor was to keep unions from forming. Say what you want about about unions (support or don't), after I saw that I realized that store is nothing but a front for Chinese junk made in sweat shops. Granted, most stores might be like that. But to say the main requirement of the job is to keep unions from forming, ugh.

Oh, giving up on braid on my spinning reels. I've had two reels with braid the last couple of years and hate using them. Braid feels like I'm fishing blue bluejean material. It's like - this stuff is not fishing line, it feels like I'm fishing with a wire. So braid is off and new copolymer is going on.

One thing I am getting tired of is how they "hoss" almost every fish up on the boat. That makes it look really really really too easy. They need to find a way to get rid of all that "hossing". Get rid of braid or something.

Think I'm giving up on big jigs. Hardly caught any bass on jigs. Going to replace that with crankbaits and jerkbaits to go along with my Texas Rigged soft plastics. I can't believe I'm going to give jerkbaits a good try but I got thinking, I have caught a few bass on jerkbaits, at least more than big jigs, and jerkbaits are long and narrow, just like my all time favorite lure - the Yum-Dinger. Me thinks if a bass loves long and slender stick baits like the Yum-Dinger and Senko, maybe they will like a jerkbait when they are in the mood for a hard bait.

Here's the rule I would like to see. Keep the rules the same except, in the last period if you catch a bass that weighs more than any other bass caught that day, you automatically go to the top of the leader board, tied with the leader, or something similar to this. That way, when you have four or five competitors at the bottom with no hope of winning or making the cut-off, let them switch tactics and go for one giant bass and if its the largest of the day, they go to the top or near the top.

Definitely Ned Rig

It might be a waste of time to "grow the sport" considering fishing is closer to "hunting" than it is to sports like baseball and football and basketball. Half the world is female and most consider fish to be "icky" or slimy and not interested in the sport of professional bass fishing or fishing in general. The fishing shows come back on TV this weekend/next week and I saw the MLF Bass Pro Tour on the Sportsman Channel. I don't want to bash MLF too much because I'm a big fan but man, its starting to look like they want to be on every cable channel along with poker. The poker/texas hold'em book has come and gone. About ten/fifteen years ago or so I remember the book store carrying four or five different poker playing magazines when the fad was big. Now I don't think they carry any poker magazines and if they it's only one. That fad has come and gone. MLF better make sure they stick with being a real sport and not a fad. After seeing their broadcasts on The Discovery Channel I'm not sure what they want to be. Thankfully MLF comes back on the Outdoor Channel next week. Hopefully that broadcast will be the same old MLF that I really enjoy.

All of this has me worried MLF's ultimate goal is to become another cable reality TV show. My opinion on reality TV shows - they are all trash. Nothing wrong if any of you enjoy watching them. But I find them very trashy. Discovery Channel is now full of reality TV programming. The MLF events on Discovery have a non-tournament feel about them, like MLF is trying to hide the fact that it is a tournament, and instead it is men yanking of their fishing rods really really hard every scene. It will be interesting to see where MLF goes in 2020.

Ok, I'm a MLF fan. Maybe I should say - I'm an Outdoor Channel MLF fan. That is - I love the MLF events on The Outdoor Channel. When MLF starting up their Bass Pro Tour or whatever they call it and broadcast it online, I enjoyed what I saw online. I enjoyed their online broadcast. Now those Bass Pro Tour tournaments are being broadcast on the Discovery Channel. There is something really wrong with the Discovery Channel broadcast. The main problem - all it is is hook set after hook set. I'm not exaggerating! I've been recording their broadcasts on the Discovery Channel and tied to watch them the past few months but I can't make it thru a whole broadcast. I can't even stand ten minutes of the broadcast. There is hardly any fishing going on. The broadcast goes from one angler doing a hook set, then another angler doing a hook set, over and over, over and over........ Hopefully MLF will fix this broadcast problem next year.

But who has the momentum going into 2020 and the future? I think MLF has most of it. There's nothing wrong with a little bad blood in fishing anyway to spice things up a bit.

There must be a lot of hurting in pro bass fishing. First all the top guys leave BASS and swear allegiance to MLF. Then FLW is up for sale and MLF buys it. One problem I'm starting to notice with MLF is that they are starting to be on every other channel now. First Outdoor Channel, then CBS a few times during the summer weeks. Then Discovery Channel. Then CBS Sports Network. To be honest, MLF, even though I'm a fan, is starting to look like late night cable filler crap to fill up space on the cable networks simply to put lame commercials around. They really need to hold live tournaments like BASS and to their credit, that's what they did and as we can see now, are doing even more with them buying FLW. So, Boyd Ducket seems to know what he's doing so far.

Wow. So cool! To be honest, I've made little attempt to watch FLW. But do pay attention to MLF and I will pay attention to FLW if they become MLF.

An Academy moved in here and a few months later the Gander Mountain closed down. Academy has a good selection of lures but overall I consider Academy to be an over sized Walmart fishing and outdoor section. Interestingly, the Academy near me sits a little higher up than their parking lot and it sort of looks like you are walking up/into a temple, subconsciously in your mind. I always wonder if the designers had that in mind when they designed it.

Some popular opinions I disagree with: 1. Crankbaits are great bass fishing lures. Nope! They are a low percentage lure acording to Bill Murphy's In Pursuit of Giant Bass and I have to agree with that. And he nails it right on the head - the reason everybody thinks crankbaits are a great lure is because so many bass fishermen use them so yes, they are bound to catch some bass. 2. Monofilament is old line. Nope! Mono is the best line you can use! Fluro is too stiff and braid is easy to see in the water. 3. You need a baitcaster for bass fishing. NOPE! When I started bass fishing I used two spinning reel and I caught a lot of bass. All my big bass all caught with the spinner reels. I have never caught a big bass with my baitcaster.

When I got into fishing I watched some of their videos before they became the Googan squad or whatever they call themselves. Then I saw one of them do a video about being a military Vet in the Iraqi/Afghanistan occupation, then shooting guns and calling their video Hillary Clinton's Worst Nightmare or something like that. Sorry, I don't want to see stupid videos like that when I want to watch fishing videos. Guns are OK and I respect military veterans, but keep the immature titles away from me. Still, the fishing industry is pretty low key with little energy. It would probably be smart for the fishing industry to tap into the Googan squad. We have to remember, video gaming is very addicting and keeps kids and adults from going outside and exercising. If the Googan squad can encourage younger people to go outside and do things, in the end that's a positive.

I visited the Bass Pro Shops in southern Indiana, across the river from Louisville KY, for the first time over the weekend. Wow, what a nice store. I was impressed. I spent over $50.00 but could have easily spent over $300.00 I'm definitely going back. And come February, instead of going to the Indy Boat and Travel show and look at the over priced boats, I'll skip that and head south to the Bass Pro Shops!

Yum-Dinger Junbug is my number one lure of all time. Always have those things with me: kayak fishing, john boat fishing or bank fishing, always have my number one bass catcher lure with me.

Your not alone. I fish where there are a lot of runt/small bass and those things love to swallow texas rigged Yum-Dingers/etc... What's interesting, I don't think I've ever throat/gut hooked a large sized bass. Only the dinks get throat/gut hooked.

I'm slowly fishing less and less since I picked up recurve archery. I can shoot my recurve before work, in the winter, on windy days, on days and seasons I can't go fishing. I mostly fish clear water strip pits that are tough to fish. Only going to catch one to two really giant bass a year and that's with fishing a lot, every weekend. So, do I go fishing and strike out again or keep trying to perfect my form and shoot the perfect arrow over and over and over and over? My recurve bow has moved to my number one hobby/sport. Still, I do go bass fishing.

So much anger towards MLF. Maybe this, maybe that... Maybe they should just keep on doing what they are doing. Its totally different fishing. It's not Bassmaster or FLW. MLF does not want to be Bassmaster if I understand Boyd Duckett right. And with the MLF format you get to know the competitors better.

I have a spinning reel with five pound line I want to use for bass fishing, and a baitcaster with sixteen pound line I've used somewhat this spring, among lots of other reels. Anyway, if I put a Roboworm and split-shot on the five pound line and use a big jig on the baitcaster with sixteen pound line, which one will catch the most large bass and largest bass? My bet is on the five pound line. Oh, and I'll take any big bass on six pound Sufix Elite Mono. I think Charlie Brewer realized this a long time ago. But I should say, I mostly fish very clear water strip pits that are steep and deep.

When I got into bass fishing and didn't know anything, all I used was six pound and eight pound and ten pound mono, made tons of casts Texas ringing everything with super sharp brand new gamakatsu extra wide hooks, and caught a lot of bass bank fishing and kayak fishing including a few giant bass. Then got a little bored with all the small fish I was catching, started using heavier line and baitcasters and - less fish caught and NO big bass caught. Short story - here in Indiana and I bet 99% of the country, light line wins. Ten pound should be my limit, and I should use eight pound and six pound 99% of the time.

I don't care. MLF is still way funner than anything else. Also, since nearly all the top pros left BASS so quickly, that's got to say something. Those pros don't look too dumb to me. They have to deal with a big truck, big boat, gear, traveling around the country, they know how to handle money. All of them moving looked like they were more than happy to get away from BASS.

I have zero problems with motor/peddle too. I would love to get a motor driven kayak. But when it comes to tournaments, keep the motor driven kayaks in their own division. I guess I'm sort of OK if you have to stick pedal with paddle kayaks.

I think I posted something about this topic a few years ago. I'm on your side - keep them separated! It is totally unfair for the paddlers to compete against the kayaks with motors and even the peddle driven kayaks.