In bass fishing, certain things are difficult if not impossible to teach. However, it doesn’t make them any less important. Quite the opposite. Without a guidebook or rules, they are often the critical elements less analyzed and more left to the moment. One of these is stubbornness.
Among the professional ranks, perhaps no one has benefited more greatly or suffered more conspicuously from the yin and yang of being stubborn than 2022 Bassmaster Classic champion Jason Christie.
Self-admittedly stubborn, this Oklahoman doesn’t run from the label; he embraces it.
“Stubbornness is my greatest strength and my greatest weakness. I’m not saying it’s the right way; I’m just saying it’s my way, and I’ve had a damn successful career out of it.”
Even so, when it came to his Classic performances, he had grown tired of the inevitable references to Grand Lake in 2016 and Lake Hartwell in 2018 where, as a final-day leader, he couldn’t close either deal. These echoes of the past were reverberating even louder at the most recent Hartwell Classic in 2022 when Christie once again entered the final day as the tournament leader (albeit sharing the honor with Elite pro and future Progressive Insurance Bassmaster Angler of the Year Kyle Welcher).
“When the question is asked about staying in an area and dying there, my response is that you can also leave and go die somewhere else. You don’t know until after the event. I’ve fished a lot of tournaments where at 10:00 or 10:30 [a.m.], I didn’t know if it was going to happen. You just have to dig down a little deeper,” remarked Christie.
“Right now, I’m sitting on the banks of Lake Hartwell, where I won my first major event in 2011 [fishing an FLW tournament]. I remember the final day because I was in an area where I had caught 80% of my fish. But, at 11:00 [a.m.], I didn’t have a bite. I pulled up the trolling motor to head somewhere else, but I don’t know where I was going. As I sat down at the console, I knew I had led the tournament for three days out of this area. They were in there; I just needed to wait ’em out. So I walked back to the front, put the trolling motor down and caught a limit to win the event.”
Mind you, these comments were made a week before the 2022 Classic began, proving to be eerily prophetic. In a near replay of this 11-year-old memory, Christie found himself at 10:30 a.m. on Lake Hartwell pondering the very same question.
“I looked at my cameraman and said, ‘Damn, not again. We can’t do this again.’ Then, just like that, the thought was gone. Some kind of peace came over me, and from that point forward it was one bite at a time.”
As much as Christie can now rightfully claim ownership of being the most stubborn bass fisherman on the planet, every angler at every level wrestles with this issue. Whether it’s a question of staying or going, depth, technique, season or countless other considerations, one’s degree of stubbornness always comes into play.
The stubborn conundrum is an especially exasperating one: Too much or too little can deliver exactly the same results in situations that appear to be nearly identical. There are methods of dealing with the madness, but Christie says it all starts with knowing who you are and what lets you sleep at night.
“I think it’s just a difference in personalities. I used to stay with Edwin Evers a lot and he was totally different. The night before the tournament, I was the guy who would rig up five to eight rods, and he was the guy who would rig up 20. He always had a Plan A, Plan B, C, D, E and F. But that wasn’t for me. I’m a one rod or two rods on the deck, one plan kind of guy, and I’m going to try and make that work.
“You have guys like me and you have the other guys. They do a lot of different things. They’re the kind who can pick up the trolling motor, run down the lake and have just as much confidence in a new area. There are days when I’m like that, but I look back at the events I’ve won and most of those victories have come out of an area where I dug my toenails into the dirt and milked it for everything possible.”
Among his fellow Elites, Christie considers Greg Hackney “a perfect blend” of being stubborn and knowing when to give it up, someone blessed with a unique “sixth sense.” Hackney, however, is a bit more pragmatic.
“I used to force things more than I do now, and it’s because of getting burned in the past by being too stubborn. It is a fine line. Sometimes you need to be stubborn and sometimes you don’t,” observes Hackney, who made the last cut at the Hartwell Classic in 2022 but had a forgettable final day.
“The event where I have fared the worst is the Bassmaster Classic. It seems as though the decisions come easier when fishing the Elite Series. In the Classic, I’ve had a tendency to be overly stubborn, and one of the reasons is because it’s a winner-take-all deal. During the rest of the season, I seem to flow a little better. I make adjustments; I can move and leave stuff. I can go to places during the event because I think it’s right, even if I haven’t gotten bit there. At the Classic, I have a tendency to force my practice on the tournament.”
What Hackney faced on the final day of the 2022 Classic was actually an easy choice between being stubborn or not.
“There was really no need for me to fish for 12 or 15 pounds. I don’t care to finish anywhere but first, and the only chance I had to win was catching over 20 pounds. Call me stubborn, but in the Classic you really don’t have a choice. I wasn’t going to punt.”
Despite categorizing his skill in making the right moves as an unteachable “gut experience,” Hackney nevertheless offers a partial checklist of what encourages or discourages stubbornness.
• Lures versus areas: “What I wouldn’t force is the bait. I don’t have any trouble changing lures. The bait doesn’t make me stubborn; an area would.”
• Techniques: “Although I’m very good at flippin’, pitchin’ and punchin’, I have very few wins that way. Most all of my wins have come offshore — deep. That’s the funny thing about it. I’m considered a shallow-water guy. The big reason is that we go to places I’ve never been before and it’s easier for me to find fish quickly with those methods. There are certain techniques I can do with my eyes closed, so I do think being really good at something will make you want to force it.”
• Practice versus patterns: “Practice puts you in the right area or points you in the right direction. At the Classic, you just hope you figure it out on the last official practice day or the first day of the tournament. If you find a pattern, catch multiple fish by running around, duplicate your success — this is more the kind of deal that makes me stubborn.”
• Seasons: “You can be stubborn during summer and winter because the fish are not moving as much.”
• Big fish: “Big ones will make you stubborn. They mean more to you. Now, I’m not talking about personal bests, but bass from 3 3/4 to 7 pounds. If you go somewhere and catch an absolute giant, a fish that is not common to those waters, it means absolutely nothing. That’s a fluke.”
Perhaps what we admire most about Christie and Hackney is that beneath their sometimes gruff exteriors exist more Zen-like, soul-deep inner selves that chew up barbed wire and spit out tenpenny nails. They don’t ignore hard lessons and, perhaps best of all, don’t seem to mind the scars. Their best friend and toughest critic is the guy who looks back from the mirror.
So, after finally exorcising his Classic demons, would Christie’s heart-palpitating, 5-ounce victory, in any way, soften his stubborn streak? Would we see a softer side to Christie?
“I am who I am. That’s just the way I fish. I’m set in my ways, and I believe you have to do certain things to win. That’s just me,” said Christie the morning after hoisting his Classic hardware amid a cloud of confetti.
“Yesterday is about as soft as you’re ever going to see.”
The Technology conundrum
For any bass fisherman, professional or amateur, the new age of electronics has changed the game of being stubborn. Instead of a vague notion of what you have in front of you, an angler knows exactly what is going on.
As a Canadian on the Elite Series and someone more comfortable offshore than beating the bank, 2023 Bassmaster Classic champion Jeff Gustafson considers his Garmin LiveScope and Humminbird MEGA 360 to be trusted companions. They tell him the truth. But, to paraphrase Jack Nicholson’s character in A Few Good Men, sometimes it’s hard to handle the truth.
“Being able to disregard what you’ve seen onscreen, move on and find biters — this is what you have to do. It’s a lot easier said than done,” says Gustafson, who dearly loves fishing for spotted bass.
“They can be so easy to catch at times, but brutal hard at others. If you pitch your bait down there and the fish turn the other way — if they don’t race over to it — you probably have a problem.”
So, here’s the question: Do you stay longer now than before if you’re not catching them?
“Yes,” admits Gustafson, “but it’s different on different bodies of water. I’ve had it roast me both ways. You see a boulder in 28 feet, the fish are down there but they don’t want to bite. There is the thought that if I can catch two of them, I’ll cash a check or make a cut. It makes it hard to leave.”
The new era of fishing electronics has not made being stubborn any easier to negotiate. Before forward-facing sonar, the general rule was, “Don’t leave fish to find fish.” Now, things have changed.
“Sometimes,” Gustafson says, “you have to recognize what you’re seeing and just roll.”