Chopping Tournament Winnings

[Bartableman7]

Just curious...as it surely tough to make a living as a professional bass fisherman... do the best fisherman make deals to split up the winnings after the tournament?  Most tournaments are top heavy on the pay outs, especially the Classic.  Other tournament sports do this all the time.  Or is this a big secret that should not be talked about?  Thanks for any info.

[James Niggemeyer]

On 1/7/2021 at 11:45 PM, Bartableman7 said:

Just curious...as it surely tough to make a living as a professional bass fisherman... do the best fisherman make deals to split up the winnings after the tournament?  Most tournaments are top heavy on the pay outs, especially the Classic.  Other tournament sports do this all the time.  Or is this a big secret that should not be talked about?  Thanks for any info.

The start of my competition at the front of the boat in pro level tournaments was around ‘95.  Over the years I have heard of anglers working together like that but to my knowledge it is something that happens frequently.  Maybe for a specific event or one season?   Because the larger checks in the payout are for top 5 your not really increasing your chances of getting part of the larger payout within a field of 100 to 150.  At the highest level of competition they pay approximately 1/2 the field and the checks outside the top 10 or so are somewhat the same so it doesn’t really seem to make much sense outside of that.  Actually, because the cost to compete is expensive it makes more sense not to have to split winnings when you finish in the money. I maybe wrong but that is what I know personally.