Eagle-eyed Drew Cook extended his lead today, and takes a 7 pound, 10 ounce margin into the weekend. That’s huge, but not insurmountable, particularly at a trophy factory like Santee, and especially with the expected weather change. He’s catching his fish by looking at them and that could be tough tomorrow with the predicted heavy winds.
He benefitted from the fact that Day 1’s second- and third-place anglers only caught four fish apiece, and fell to 10th and 21st, respectively.
Meanwhile, lots of mid-range anglers from Day One whacked ‘em on Day Two. It might be too little too late, but if Cook falters at all tomorrow or Sunday there are plenty of pros ready to take his place. Here are my takeaways from Friday’s competition:
Was it Better? The answer depends who you ask. Consensus yesterday was that Friday would be even better than Thursday. Some who struggled on Day One showed out on Day Two, and vice versa. While there were no 30-pound bags slapped on the B.A.S.S. scales, the number of 20-pound bags increased, from 14 to 30. However, not many anglers achieved that feat on both days. In addition to Cook, the others were Brandon Palaniuk (2nd, 48-15), Greg Hackney (3rd, 48-01), and Cory Johnston (6th, 44-06)
VMC Monster Bag of the Day – ”Veteran Rookie” Josh Douglas didn’t start his Elite career the way he wanted, finishing 54th at the St. Johns and 81st at the Harris Chain. Thanks to today’s 28-02 limit, he’s caught more through two days at Santee (43-10) than he did in four days of fishing in Florida (41-06). More importantly, he’s moved into 7th place. I predicted yesterday that someone would make a big move from outside the cut and he was the one – rising from 49th to 7th.
Cut Weight Math – Yesterday I cited the (2X+1) formula that usually determines the cut weight to Day Three, and noted that would put us at 32-04 for the top half of the field. That was pretty close – it turned out to be 33-01, somewhere between (2X+1) and (2X+2).
See But Don’t Be Seen – Ever since Dean Rojas had his record-setting day and event in 2001, it’s been a foregone conclusion that if you want to be consistently competitive on tour you can’t completely forego sight fishing. That’s trickled down to the weekend guys, too, and most of us at least attempt to make it work in the springtime. What I forgot until watching footage this morning is how good the pros are at it. While I have to be a short pitch away to see the bed and gauge what the fish is doing, they have a greater sense of everything going on while a full cast away. Watching Drew Cook keep his distance this morning I was – not surprisingly – reminded of how far away Preston Clark was from the beds when he won in 2006.
Higher Ground – As we work our way through the spawn, we’ve seen plenty of anglers – vertically challenged and not – standing on their graphs to get a better view of beds. That’s a great advertisement for the brackets’ durability, but moreover it shows the need for altitude. How soon until some boat manufacturer or accessory developer comes up with a way to integrate this into boat design? Perhaps a hydraulic riser, like a stadium rock drummer getting elevated out of the pit up onto the stage.
Speaking of shortcomings – In the 1960s, there was a saying that went, “Don’t trust anyone over 30.” I was shocked to learn that Brandon Palaniuk has never weighed in a “dirty thirty” pound limit in BASS competition. If anything that shows the normalization of massive weights in tournaments. A generation ago, 30 pound bags for five fish were virtually unheard of, and 20 pounds was something to celebrate. The former remains fairly rare, but not hen’s tooth rare. The latter is still a great achievement, but it simply doesn’t raise eyebrows anymore – these bags show up every tournament. Ever since Rojas cracked 40 at Toho and the Elites visited Falcon in ’08, we’ve had new measuring sticks. Frankly, I’m surprised that we’ve “only” had one 30-pound bag this week.
Breaking Down Assumptions – Prior to Bassmaster LIVE, we made all sorts of assumptions about anglers – e.g., “He’s the most versatile out there” or “He’s all in on the flipping stick” – that we can now disprove visually. If there’d been no camera coverage of him, I’d have assumed Todd Auten was catching all of his fish on a vibrating jig (and it indeed was reported that he’d caught a few that way). When we got to see him, though, he was throwing an old-school spinnerbait, and then picked up a spinning rod. “Is that the first time we’ve even seen Todd Auten with a spinning rod in his boat in 20 years?” Zona asked.
Quote of the Day (Struggle Edition) — “I was looking for a chicken to sacrifice….They say that works in these parts.” Hank Cherry, who could not get the fish he found “stacked like cordwood” to bite. After catching 26-14 on Day One, he caught less than half that amount on Day Two, with a 12-09 bag.
Quote of the Day (Bounceback Edition) – “I love coming to places where you get rewarded for fishing for big ones.” Chris Zaldain, who more than doubled his Day One weight of 11-10 with a Day Two catch of 24-12.