Brett Preuett is one of the most promising and accomplished young anglers in America.
He’s the reigning Carhartt Bassmaster College Series Classic Bracket champion, the 2013 FLW College Fishing National Champion, recently earned a master’s degree from the University of Louisiana at Monroe and will serve as the sole representative of the massive fraternity that college bass fishing has become when he competes in the 2015 Bassmaster Classic.
But if not for a game of backyard Wiffle ball the day after he graduated high school, and recently ‘finding himself’ in the front seat of a Ouachita Parish Sheriff’s car, Preuett’s vision for even greater things to come couldn’t possibly look so good.
Like most mornings, this day began early at the Ouachita Parish Sheriff’s Department with a hug for Miss Wilma and Miss Marilyn, then a “what do you need me to do for you today?” chat with Major Moore, Chief Mashaw, and Colonel Purvis, before spending the day shuttling patrol cars for a wash and shine or an oil change.
Preuett is a college kid performing menial tasks, but he’s also the hometown hero these days as he visits offices like Sheriff Jay Russell’s, where largemouth bass replicas decorate the walls.
It’s actually inmates who wash the vehicles Preuett shuttles. “I may get in trouble for it, but sometimes I take them a sausage biscuit or a honey bun to eat,” he admits, as quickly the heart of a tenacious competitor leaks out.
Talk of his parents brings forth more heart.
“My mom and dad have always been so supportive of my dreams,” says Preuett. “Mom would run behind the outfield fence to find the homerun balls I hit, and Dad has driven all the way to Pickwick to bring me a back-up trolling motor, and drove all night long to be there to watch me weigh in at Beaver Lake.”
Raised two hours south of Monroe in the town of Pineville, La., Brett Preuett hit a lot of home runs in high school, and thought he’d end up a Golden Eagle, not a Warhawk. He was an All State third baseman that hit a whopper .470 and planned to use his powerful right arm at Southern Miss following high school.
The day after he graduated high school, a meaningless game of backyard Wiffle ball changed the way Preuett would see the rest of his life. Literally.
“Being so competitive, I ran real hard to tag-out my buddy with the Wiffle ball and his elbow caught my eye,” explains Preuett. “It totally tore the optic nerve. I’ve been completely blind in my right eye ever since.”
In an instant, Preuett’s Division I dreams were dashed, and he had no idea what life had in store next. Seemingly by default, he followed a girlfriend to the University of Louisiana at Monroe, and buoyed by angling skills learned as a kid growing up on cypress-filled Latt Lake, began filling free weekends by competing in small tournaments around Monroe.
At that same time, the popularity of college bass fishing was taking off on campuses across America.
“Jake Ormond, Paul Clark and myself contacted Chief Ellerman, who was an avid bass fisherman, as well as the campus Chief of Police at the time, to see if he’d help us start a bass fishing team at ULM,” explains Preuett.
Ellerman agreed to serve as the team’s official advisor, and using a red shad worm and faulty trolling motor, on 2,700-acre Poverty Point Reservoir, “Founding Father” Preuett won the very first ULM tournament.
However, it was a bag of Zoom green pumpkin magic Speed Craws that began to make Preuett feel the presence of something taking a hold of him.
Before he and Paul Clark drove to Beaver Lake to compete in the national championship, a stranger gave them a bag of Speed Craws at a gas station in Monroe. Preuett stuffed the bag of lures in his jacket pocket and forgot about them until two weeks later as they throttled across stingy Beaver Lake. “I reached into my pocket, felt those Speed Craws, showed them to Paul, he tied one on to a Shaky Head, and caught the 5-pounder that led to our win,” says Preuett.
Eighteen months later, and a second national championship to his credit, Preuett sits parked in the sunset dripped driveway of his rundown rented duplex on Fink’s Hideaway Road. A camouflaged Jon boat sits flipped over in the front yard, his bass boat sits under the carport, and an empty keg hides in the shadows of his outboard.
The radio is on, and Blake Shelton is singing, “I prayed, prayed, prayed — for a sign, sign, sign.” Preuett and I hear the lyrics, swap a fast grin, but purposely avoid eye contact. Corneas are saturated; knowing something bigger than bass fishing and the both of us is coming out of those speakers.
“Up until a few months ago, I had always been the partying kind,” he says. “I had won a national championship, but I also knew that my college days were about to end, and I had a lot of anxiety about that. Not to mention, I was feeling cash-strapped, and having mechanical issues with my boat,” admits Preuett. “I had even betrayed a close friend’s trust, and that’s the one that bothered me most.”
“I started thinking about what strong Christians like my Grandma and Aunt B had told me. They always believed I had a gift to inspire people, but I knew deep down that I had no right to inspire anybody if I didn’t change the way I was living,” admits Preuett.
“I was delivering a vehicle for the sheriff’s department with my friend and co-worker, John Hurd. I knew John was a strong Christian, and I just started sharing my struggles with him,” says Preuett. “I broke down and prayed. I cried right there in that cop car asking God to change my life.”
“I’m not saying I won’t drink a beer with you, but I’ll tell you this without a shadow of a doubt — I’m a calmer person, I don’t melt down on the water anymore when I hook myself in the head or lose my best lure to a big striped bass,” he grins.
“I know now there’s a reason for everything that’s happened in my life, including the loss of sight in my right eye. And while I can’t tell you He wants me to be a pro fisherman, I can tell you I’ll follow His lead. I’m not on Brett’s path anymore, I’m on His.”
“Now my heart has changed. Thank you, Lord, for your amazing grace. And I’ll walk by faith.”
– a song written by Preuett’s close friend and former ULM fishing team member Blake Deron.
