October 1, 2025 • 51 mins
Luke Dunkin is a former FLW Touring Professional who is now the voice of bass fishing for the Alabama Bass Trail and the National Professional Fishing League, the NPFL.
Hunter Baughman has been on the NPFL since day one and has the most amazing story that began when he was just nine months old.
Hunter shares a wild story about how a person wanted to show him where to fish.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:05):
Welcome back to Lines and Tyne. I'm Spencer Grades.
Speaker 2 (00:08):
I'm excited for you guys to meet a couple.
Speaker 1 (00:09):
Of my friends today in town for the NPFL, the
National Pro Fishing League, Luke Duncan and fisherman Hunter Bogman.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
This is going to be exciting.
Speaker 1 (00:20):
Hunter's got such an incredible story and then Luke is
just extremely charismatic and brings a lot to the table.
You know, you're you're changing it up a little bit.
You've been running express boat.
Speaker 2 (00:30):
It's it's a big old baby boat. Yeah, it's hot
as fast and bigle thamer like it takes for a part. Well,
it's running the two fifty it is. Yeah, so it's
sixty six sixty sixty six, sixty seven sixty eight.
Speaker 1 (00:41):
Fenn All, I don't know, man, I've never thought of fish.
Speaker 2 (00:44):
I'm not that guy. I'm not man. I've seen him drive.
He's that guy.
Speaker 1 (00:50):
You're a kind of hell on wheel.
Speaker 2 (00:52):
No, he's a bass gun, he is, he is. He's
a probably.
Speaker 1 (00:56):
Yeah, why do you like this beat?
Speaker 3 (00:58):
Someone?
Speaker 2 (00:59):
I don't know?
Speaker 3 (01:00):
Why not?
Speaker 2 (01:00):
I know I'm the same way.
Speaker 3 (01:04):
Seventy seventy.
Speaker 2 (01:07):
I got a lot of buddies like that. They're like,
why would you want to go sixty five if you
can go seventy five? Like, it doesn't make any sense.
Speaker 1 (01:13):
You gotta see it though, you jump on all these
Facebook groups.
Speaker 2 (01:16):
Oh boy, you guys sit there, get your heads. Hey man,
my boat on the top seventy four?
Speaker 1 (01:22):
What am I doing using a twenty.
Speaker 2 (01:23):
Three and a half pitch? Yama Hall team too? And
I tell yeah, you can go down those ra habit
holes for a day. What's eye Jack place? And dude,
they'll spend endless amounts of money. Well, I think I'm
just gonna flash that Yamaha. And I like that. There's
a lot of that going on now.
Speaker 1 (01:37):
Dad actually drives me nuts.
Speaker 2 (01:39):
Well, And I bet, I bet we've got a lot
of those in ABT. I bet we've got I bet
we got a lot of Listen, I'll tell I bet
we got something n PFL. I bet we got something.
Speaker 1 (01:48):
I'll tell you.
Speaker 2 (01:49):
I'll tell you a story about the ABT.
Speaker 1 (01:51):
So I run a Phoenix and it's got a two
fifty Yamaha, and I feel really good about it. And
I'm cruising this is on Neely Henry. I'm flying down
Neely Henry, and all of a sudden this boat from
behind me just goes like I'm sitting still, and I
look at the markings on that engine and I'm like
two fifty. Huh yeah, I know it's a different hole,
(02:11):
but two fifty.
Speaker 2 (02:12):
Yeah. When you get past sitting like, you feel like
you're sitting still, end up by a normal like like
you're saying two fifty. I fished high school term with
my kids the other day. I was about twenty something
and we were running like thirty miles. We were way
ahead of most of the field again, running sixty five.
You know, it's raining, which is and people and loaded
all of a sudden a phoenix with a two fifty almahol,
(02:35):
same deal, Like we're not even and goes out of
sight and I'm like, dude, you're running like eighty plus.
Speaker 1 (02:42):
At that point, I sat up on my steering wheel
like I was a jockey in the derby.
Speaker 2 (02:47):
I'm like smacking the back. Of course, I'm just oh well,
but I'm like where did he come? Because I had
looked several times over my shoulder because it's raining and
the river's pretty tight on Kentucky, like were we're out?
And I didn't want to. You know, there's a lot
of tight turns and stuff like, there have been nobody.
Nobody had been around forever, and then all of a sudden,
this dude just rips Bobby.
Speaker 1 (03:07):
Once he passed you, there was nobody.
Speaker 2 (03:09):
There was nobody, there was I didn't see anybody for
a very long time after that. But buddy, I'm like,
that's not a two fifty, all right, So let's get
into the podcast.
Speaker 1 (03:16):
Yeah, I've got a couple of guys that I want
you guys to really get to know a little bit.
My Hunter Bogman is going to jump in with us.
He is an MPFL pro. He's got such an incredible story.
I'm excited for you guys to hear a little more
about that. And then Luke Duncan, who you know. You
were a tournament fisherman for him.
Speaker 2 (03:33):
Serson.
Speaker 1 (03:33):
Now you've jumped behind the microphone and really kind of
made your niche there, which is good.
Speaker 2 (03:37):
You have a podcast as well, yes, sir, a low
budget live podcast. Yeah, low budget life, not so live
more times than not, because I'm I'm old and lazy
these days.
Speaker 1 (03:47):
But you're selling apparel like you have had a lot.
Speaker 2 (03:49):
Yeah, a lot, a lot of different things. Very fortunate
he's out there playing music. Yeah, yeah, I'm only in
my own mind.
Speaker 1 (03:57):
I had the ABT last year because it was the
first time I'd ever fished it in the North Division
and uh, and I just said to myself, I'm like,
if I can funk with Luke duncan. So every time
I went up there, you know, Luke, the first time
I went up on stage with Luke, he knew exactly
who I was. A kid, like, he'll talk and because
(04:20):
you know, you put the microphone something, It's like, hey,
how did you do it today?
Speaker 2 (04:25):
We fish fish, We fish real good today. Exactly. They're like, wait,
well we we we lost a couple and yeah, we'll
see you next time. So all of a sudden.
Speaker 1 (04:39):
And Luke says to everybody on the live stream, he goes, oh,
this guy will talk.
Speaker 2 (04:42):
You know.
Speaker 1 (04:43):
I was like, Buddy, I can't wait, and this is
this is Uh. The second event is right after the
bass Master Classic happened and you were down there and
you did a guest spot where you guys were playing
at some barger and Kay had told me the name
of one of the songs that they were playing. So
I went on the live stream and I was like,
you know what I listened to this morning just to
get myself fired up, and I mentioned the name of
(05:05):
the song and the band that has and I've never
seen him stop in his track.
Speaker 2 (05:08):
I was like, I have been set up. I have
been set up. It's rare that I get a curve,
but I got a curve.
Speaker 1 (05:16):
It's a cool moment, though, because I know that. You know.
When I go out to fish, I just want to
have a good time. I love the tournament scene. I
think it's really fun. I think that's why we all
get into it. Originally want to go have a good time,
try to win some money. But if I don't catch him,
I take the swindle approach. If I don't win on
the water, I'm gonna win on that stage. That's it
because I want people to go. Man, that guy was interesting.
(05:38):
He was funny.
Speaker 2 (05:39):
Remember that was on the FLW tour because I called
him way fewer times than I didn't, right, And so
I was the same way. And Gerald's one of my
close friends and mentors in life. So I was always like,
be sitting in the bag line with three fish, like, well,
got to come up with something to say because they're
danger and not going to ask me how I called them,
So I always had to come up with something, and
(06:00):
I think that's kind of what started everything that I do. Now.
You know, you kind of get quick on your feet
and come up with, you know, a little bit of
bs from time to time.
Speaker 1 (06:09):
So then, Hunter, I want to go over your story
because it'll it'll kind of parlay off of this, like
you getting into tournament fishing. But we had dinner the
other night with your wife and your daughters, and you
were telling me the story. At nine months old, you
had bacterial meningitis, that's right, And what ended up happening
when you got to the hospital other than your mom
giving you like some crazy form of CPR to get
(06:30):
your breathing in the back of the car.
Speaker 3 (06:31):
So yeah, I stopped breathing on the way there. But
one hundred and thirteen degree fever for a couple of days.
Wasn't supposed to live. If I lived, i'd be a vegetable.
Just a miracle, you know that that I'm alive. And
some really good doctors anyway, amputated it below both knees
and lost all my fingers on my left hand and
partial fingers on my right. But you know, when you're
(06:51):
like that, Luke, you don't have to You don't have
to have something crazy to say. We you on stage
because you're the short guy. Everybody remembers you.
Speaker 2 (06:57):
Everybody's like, what's this guy? And then they're like, oh,
catch a lot of bass most of the time.
Speaker 1 (07:03):
But how hard for that was that for you? Coming up?
Like you know, eighty A has become a little more
popular as time has gone on, Like we were just
talking about it. You coming to the radio station. I'm like, well,
let me get him closer to a ram.
Speaker 3 (07:14):
Yeah, you didn't even know where the ramp was.
Speaker 1 (07:15):
I didn't even know where it was. But your life,
like you constantly have to kind of look out for
things like that, where most of us are just like
we take it for granted.
Speaker 3 (07:24):
Yeah, I mean I do. I don't probably as much
as some do. I just kind of figured out a
lot of that. And That's what I've always done, is
just figured out what I need to do when you know,
but but you do, you catch yourself, Like I will say,
when we park the blue spot, like I could care
less if I park in a handicapped spot, but it
gives me room to open my door and nobody park
next to me where I get back in my truck,
(07:44):
and that's really the only reason I ever use one.
But you know stuff like that, I mean you, I
guess you think about it and don't even realize you're
thinking about it a lot of times.
Speaker 2 (07:52):
But I think it's impressive what you're able to do.
Speaker 1 (07:55):
I mean, you get out on the water and uh,
you wax they're at I mean.
Speaker 2 (08:00):
Sometimes but I watch your social media.
Speaker 1 (08:03):
I see you set the hook and it's like you're
jacking their jaws. I'm surprised those fish come back alive,
to be honest, because you hit him with crazy the fury, Dude,
the Fury.
Speaker 2 (08:14):
We covered Hunter the first ever day on NPFL Live,
so five years ago when we started lak you following,
I tell us Hunter is going to be on camera,
and he smashed him. That day was in the top ten.
I believe it has a great day. But I'm like,
and i'd never seen him fish. I've seen his social
media stuff and we get five hours with him over
his shoulder right, and he is just blistering that list
(08:34):
And it doesn't matter if it's a spinning rod, if
he's throwing his gig at him, whatever it is, he
is just absolutely just like you said, laying the wood
to him every time, and I'm like, what am I
doing with my life? This guy is.
Speaker 1 (08:46):
Your saw press process when you hook one?
Speaker 2 (08:51):
But money is.
Speaker 1 (08:53):
It literally to jack their faces as you treat every
fish like it's a frog fish at that times?
Speaker 3 (09:02):
Really though, seriously, I don't have the height the leverage,
So it's kind of like I shoot a compound bow too,
and I shoot seventy pounds, like I don't have the
draw length, and I feel like I have to make
up for it and wait for the speed. I feel
like the same thing with a fish, Like I don't have
the leverage of standing on my feet when I set
the hook, so I try to make up with the
hook scent.
Speaker 1 (09:22):
Are you literally just throwing your back as hard as
you can to try to get them up on the ride,
because it seems like every time you set the hook,
you're high up on that rod and that rod is
bent completely open. I mean every fish I think you
catches like a five pounder.
Speaker 3 (09:38):
Well, it's definitely not. Watch the next three days on
Logan Martin.
Speaker 2 (09:42):
Now he does fish the Arkansas around a little rock
a lot. I don't know that they're all five pound.
Speaker 3 (09:45):
Well they're like two pounds and we're really excited.
Speaker 2 (09:48):
We're proud of those, right, yeahn't at those.
Speaker 1 (09:50):
Well, it's really impressive to see kind of what you've
done in fishing. You want a Toyota series. Was that
a shock to you during that tournament to win it?
Speaker 3 (09:58):
Yeah, it was a shock. I've never seen that lake
before in my life. It was a it was a
really good week. It like it clicked in practice, but
it was I was a pound something out going into
I was gosh, I was in like twenty something going
into the second day and I caught almost eighteen pounds
and I'm like I remember Greg bo Hanni walked by me.
He said what do you have? I was like seventeen something.
(10:20):
He goes, Holy cow, and I was like, dude, I
think I'm leaving.
Speaker 2 (10:22):
It right now.
Speaker 3 (10:23):
End up being in forth. Yeah, it was a shock,
like to catch them because I'd had twelve the day before,
and I was like, well if I'm just tickled, like
if I catch another twelve, I'll have a good tournament.
I had nineteen and a half the last day. I
remember telling Mark mcguall. He walked out there and checked
my fish and I'm like, Mark, am I gonna win?
If I don't know it's gonna be closed?
Speaker 2 (10:44):
It's gonna of course.
Speaker 3 (10:47):
But yeah, I was like, oh gosh, I'm nervous now.
But yeah it did. Like you don't know, that's by
far the biggest win I've had, but you don't know
when they're coming. I won like a mister bast Arkansas
had no idea Like it was on Lake Millwood, where
eybody has twenty pounds, I had eighteen and one by
three pounds.
Speaker 1 (11:02):
I feel like, though, and Luke, you could probably back
this up with the FLW stuff. I hear more stories
about guys saying I showed up to the lake for
the very first time, I want it.
Speaker 2 (11:10):
I think preconceived notions. That's what they talk about. The
local curse right home lake advantage hurts most anglers. And
I think the big wins and all the guys you
talked to and keeping up with this for years happened
when you least expect it. Why do you think that is?
Speaker 3 (11:23):
Though?
Speaker 2 (11:24):
I think you fish freer, right, Yeah, you got an
open mind, you don't you know, there's no preconceived notions
of oh, I've got fifty way points from where I've
been here fifty times right before, and you're fishing what
the lake gives you that week, you know. And I
think in the fall, like in that tournament, not to
not to speak for you, Hunter, but I think it
was so tough, and there were a lot of guys
(11:45):
that were really good on that lake that were in
that tournament, and their programs weren't working right.
Speaker 1 (11:52):
Bites Guys when they go out to a lake for
the first time, or if they have history there, that
they kind of settle into what's comfortable.
Speaker 3 (11:59):
Oh yeah, yeah, I think so. I mean that's like
you were talking about Little Rock. I mean, I pretty
much know where I'm going before I roll out of
the driveway, Like you know, there's a milk run, and
that's what I'm going to do. And a lot of
our stuff is three and four hours long, and I'm
just gonna run that and be consistent. I may not
win all of them, I'll be but man, a three
day tournament and those milk runs they don't last three days,
(12:20):
you know.
Speaker 2 (12:21):
And that's yeah, multi day tournaments too. Yeah, like you're saying,
it's a different game, yeah, and a different game.
Speaker 3 (12:25):
Like I've wanted. I've been on Brad from the beginning
of the n PFL, like I want to go to
Little Rock. I know it will probably never happened, but
then somebody was saying something about it this year, and
I'm like that I'd be a nervous trict, like because yeah, gosh,
to be at home and have to there's so much
that has to go. I've never had anything of that
level at home, but there's so much that has to
go into that me on your shoulders and be like
(12:47):
you think of all this stuff. I mean, it's it's
I remember watching Jason Christie win Grand in the FLW
and he was like, I remember when these trees were
a little bitty and I watched them grow up, and like,
there's so much knowledge a local guys to think about
and make their O decisions.
Speaker 1 (13:02):
But it does bite you.
Speaker 2 (13:03):
Eight hours is not long in a bast tournament. It
goes by so fast. Well when you're on them.
Speaker 1 (13:08):
When you're when you're most of my tournaments feel like forever.
Speaker 2 (13:13):
If I'm if I'm not saying, oh gosh, it's already,
I was going to say it's it's opposite for me.
I feel like it's blast off at daylight and then
it's lunch. When you're not catching them, you're like, whoa, whoa,
hang on, you got to be in two hours. I
don't have a limit.
Speaker 1 (13:26):
When you're in any sort of the team deal, and
one guy in the back of the boat is just
bitching about nothing's getting caught, and they always say the
fatal fatal phrase, Well somebody's catching them.
Speaker 2 (13:36):
It's like, I want that to be us. Yes, you know,
somebody's got them. Yeah, we get get to catch them.
Speaker 1 (13:42):
Back there, to go back to kind of Hunter's story
a little bit, all these challenges that you've had since
you were nine months old, how'd you get into fishing?
Speaker 3 (13:51):
Gosh, it's all my family did. I mean, you know,
recreation was hunting fish. I mean we ate all the
fish we caught, but you know, that's that's what we did.
We deer hunted and we caught fish. And like when
my dad had an off day, that's what he took
me to the woods or to the lake, you know.
So it's all I've ever known. Like I don't remember
going for the first time. We did a lot of
(14:11):
crappie fishing, but have a flat bottom of the eight horse,
like that was where I spent a lot of my
life until I was a teenager. But no, I just
I don't that's all I've known. Like if that's I
didn't know I was eating different, right, because that's how
I grew up. So then you don't know any different.
You're just you're going fishing.
Speaker 1 (14:29):
Was there a time, and this is highly personal, but
was there a time in your life in a fishing
tournament when you realized I'm different, Like what I'm doing
is much different than what everybody else is doing.
Speaker 3 (14:46):
No, not really, because I felt like I was always like,
don't get me wrong, when I started tournament fishing, we
got our tails kicked for like three or four years
for whatever might check. But I didn't feel like there
was anything to do physically. I felt like I was
like I didn't know what you know how to catch
a fish? But no, I think what clicked with me
(15:07):
is being away somewhere and somebody being like, hey, I
know you. I fished a tournament against you, and then
it's like, man, you kicked my ask remember you know
what I mean. That's where it's like, man, maybe I
can make a career out of this, Like I think
I've I've got a niche that very few people have.
Speaker 1 (15:26):
You know, man, we had such a cool moment the
other night, Luke. We were all sitting down at this
Mexican restaurant and you know, we're in pel City, Homo,
Logan Martin, and we're eating Mexican and this kid comes up.
I mean he was what fourteen years old?
Speaker 3 (15:40):
Hun probably Yeah.
Speaker 1 (15:41):
He just walks up and shows the utmost respect. He
waits until the conversation's kind of over, and then he goes, hey,
mister Hunter, I just want.
Speaker 2 (15:50):
To say good luck this week. That's awesome.
Speaker 1 (15:52):
But the look on Hunter's face was like do I
know this kid?
Speaker 2 (15:56):
Like?
Speaker 1 (15:56):
Do I owe you money?
Speaker 2 (15:58):
It was it was so cool.
Speaker 1 (16:00):
To witness that happened. Because you're not from Alabama, you're
not from Logan Martin, You're from Arkansas, and all of
a sudden, you got somebody coming up who sees you,
and for him, he's probably seeing like an idol of
his man.
Speaker 3 (16:12):
It's so extremely weird to me, you know, that anybody
would know who I am outside of people I know,
you know, but but it's it's very It's it's an
honor that people even care enough to know who I am.
Speaker 2 (16:24):
It's so cool.
Speaker 1 (16:25):
I had been driving by. Hunter and I have known
each other for a while, but I was driving by
this one area and I saw his boat and I
told my buddy in the truck, I said, I got
to yell him, this is wild because we're going to
try to We're going to try to do dinner later,
because we had talked before you got here about like, hey,
let's at least get together when you're here. And I
didn't think i'd see him on the water. I was
just gonna text him later. So I just pull up
(16:47):
and all of a sudden, I look down there's a
dude on the bank fishing. I never saw a vehicle.
Speaker 3 (16:52):
He's like between me and and Spencer. Spencer's like, you
want to go to dinner?
Speaker 2 (16:56):
And this guy's like he's like, who's talking?
Speaker 1 (16:59):
Like he can't, Like God is talking, Donner And he's
like yeah. But then we had to stop the conversation
because all these semis were driving by, like can't hear you?
Speaker 2 (17:09):
Hang on?
Speaker 1 (17:10):
And then he tells me did He's like, I got
it all on my go, bro?
Speaker 2 (17:15):
Did the other guy show up?
Speaker 3 (17:18):
I just idled back there and like I was had
to iddle a long ways. I was playing on my
phone and I nearly ran his line over, and I'm like,
I'm so sorry, and I spun to leave and he goes, no, no,
you're good, and I dropped the troll motor and we
speak for just a second, and all of a sudden,
somebody's above me screaming. He's going, He's like, what is It's.
Speaker 1 (17:36):
Like, this last forty five seconds of my life is
so bazaar. I had no idea.
Speaker 3 (17:39):
What you know?
Speaker 1 (17:40):
You brought up how he's bank fishing. You almost ran
over his line. That's become a real big problem with
the amount of tournaments that are out there, is what
level of respect do you give to somebody who's fishing
off a bank or fishing in a kayak when you're
in a tournament and you know you're trying to get
to that spot.
Speaker 3 (17:57):
Well, I wouldn't have went anywhere around him if I
had paid enough attention. But I was ten hours in
my day getting very zoned out on my phone when
I'm there.
Speaker 1 (18:05):
I just I hate like some of these videos that
I see. Well, man, you have pros and they sit
there and they go, hey, I don't come to your
job and blah blah, and I'm sitting there going, dude,
it's a public lake. Oh you're not going down to zero.
Speaker 2 (18:19):
I'll tell you of somebody some track. Yeah, I think
common practices. You just kind of get them room right, Like,
I don't care if you're fishing from a bank, you're
fishing from a pontoon, a kayak. If I'm in a tournament,
you're on a spot, you got just as much right
to be there. It's played on public waters. We talked
about it all time. It's one of the risks we
take right when you when you enter a tournament. You
never know what's gonna happen when you roll out, especially
on a Saturday, right like, we're gonna fish the Koosa
(18:40):
River this Saturday, beautiful Saturday in Alabama. There're gonna be
some bass boats out there. They're gonna be some pontoons,
wakeboard ky be told.
Speaker 1 (18:48):
Though, on the flip side, I'm not a real big
fan of the guy who wakes up with the sole
reason to go fish a spot or another pro Oh yeah,
that has only d you're out there fishing, you're having it.
Speaker 2 (19:02):
Those people definitely exist, unfortunately because they I don't know
if it's a competitive thing. They like to tell their buddies.
All I could have won this big pro tournament. Those
guys aren't that good of fishermen, that type thing. But
a guy sitting there, crappy fishing next to a bridge
off a bank, He's just enjoying his Saturday morning. Man,
I'm not and trying to catch a few for dinner.
Probably I'm not. I'm not trying to interfere with that
when I get so awkward with a Gunnersville. Gunnershill is
(19:24):
the world's worst because there are tons of causeways right,
and you've got tons of people that line those causeways
bank fishing. But to get in and out of most
of the major creeks, you have to go by them.
And I'm I'm petrified always because I'm like, I'm sorry,
I'm sorry, you're and they get almost a lot of
times on the bank, they get very upset that you're
(19:45):
even coming through there. Sure, but that that's trick. I'm
not pulling up to fish. I'm just trying to pass through.
But I've been in some situations where that gets kind
of tense.
Speaker 1 (19:52):
Gutters Fill is a different breed too, because it's a
spot specific it's an area specific lake compared to like
well I can run this pattern for sure, whatever.
Speaker 2 (20:01):
I mean sure if.
Speaker 1 (20:02):
You're in Seabold or if you're in South Saudi and
that's where the majority of boats are. I mean, that's
what they tell you. Is like, if you don't see
boats around you on Gunnersville you're fishing.
Speaker 2 (20:11):
You're lost most of the time. Yeah, you're lost. You're
either blowing a tournament out by twenty pounds or you're
dead last most of the time. You got to share
the story about that guy that was primy fishing.
Speaker 3 (20:21):
Oh yeah, so that you fallow. I caught most of
my fish on colverts high water, yeah, or fish, and
I rolled thirty miles to one down the lake like
because they were so far. I was running fifty dolls
(20:41):
a day, just try to get to all these. So
I rolled like thirty miles down the lake and I
pull in. There's a dude on a bucket sitting on
fishing this covert. I'm like, god, that comment, and I said, hey, man,
do you mind if I fish? Because he's like dropping
right here and I wanting to throw you out in
front of it. He said, what are you fishing for?
I said, bass, Okay, you're good, And so I start fishing.
(21:02):
And he's talking to me and he starts telling me,
have you ever fished that bank over there? And I'm like,
I'm sorry, sir, we can't have information, you know, the
whole spill and try to not make Himbay mad, you know.
And he he's like, okay, here in a man. He's like,
there's a brush file right there in front of you.
Now the lakes what nine feet high? Like there's so
much woods. And I said, I appreciate, I really can't
(21:27):
have any information. And he just kept on right out there,
right out there, like five or six times, right, So
he's like, please throw at it. So I finally just
throw and wind it back in. It's a jig like
I just hit the water and I wind in just
to appease him so he'll quit, right. We talked for
ment longer and I said, I said, all right, I'm
about to go your way. He goes, yeah, I gotta
(21:47):
go too. And he stands up and he's got a
gun holstered. Don't think a lot about it. He's in
the middle of the woods on side of the Internstate.
He pulls it right and he like and he picks
up and shoots in front of my boat and it
all happened so quick. I like, grab the troller motor,
but I was a little bit curious at what he
was doing.
Speaker 2 (22:08):
Yeah, what's happening?
Speaker 3 (22:11):
And he shoots and he looks at me. He shoots
out there where he've been pointing. He looked at me.
He goes brush pile and he turned on walk.
Speaker 1 (22:16):
Home like that's how he's.
Speaker 3 (22:22):
Away.
Speaker 2 (22:22):
Point like, what just happened at that point?
Speaker 1 (22:27):
Do you stay.
Speaker 3 (22:28):
Or I'm yeah, I'm like I'm going.
Speaker 2 (22:31):
He ran very fast away from there. The mercury was
crack well.
Speaker 1 (22:36):
I love the fact that you're both here and you know,
the m p f L is what you're fishing hunter,
and you do a lot of m seeing for, and
I mean you do it for everybody, a BT m
p f L. You got your podcast, you got all
that stuff. I want to talk about the differences in
some of these tournament trails because I feel like after
bass Master made their announcement of how they were going
to handle ford facing Sonar, I feel like they kind
(22:59):
of left a lot on the MPFL strictly, no sonar,
you can't have ford face ford facing, And then you
have Major League Fishing, which has always kind of been
the last couple of years. Uh, you can use it here,
you can't use it here, you know, do it by
the periods and all that kind of stuff. And then
bass Master was pretty much you can have it, just
have you know, limitations on screen size and how many
(23:19):
transducers you're allowed to have. I kind of wish that
they would have gone full bore and just given now
three platforms at a quote professional level, to where you
have one saying you can't use it.
Speaker 2 (23:32):
You can kind of use it. You can use it
as much as you.
Speaker 1 (23:35):
Want, a lot of options, right, Like, yeah, give somebody
an option, because you have so many guys that are
coming up in high school and college where all they
know is Ford facing.
Speaker 2 (23:44):
It's true, very true.
Speaker 1 (23:45):
What's your opinions on how these organizations kind of lay
it out? What was the appeal of the MPFL compared
to an MLF for a bass master.
Speaker 3 (23:55):
I liked what the NPFL stood for when it first
started and what it still stands for. You know, it
was nothing to do with electronics when it started. It
was starting a new league, giving some guys like myself
a chance that hadn't qualified for one of these other
leagues but had the means to be able to do it, since.
Speaker 1 (24:11):
You try to qualify for the elites for the BPT.
Speaker 3 (24:14):
No, I fished toyotas, but I'd never A lot of
times I wouldn't fish a full series. I fished one
or too close to the house. And sure bfl's were
always the same thing for me. I think I fished
like thirty bfls and I fished two seasons of them.
Speaker 1 (24:27):
I mean, so, then why did you make the decision
to go for the MPFL, because I mean, that's that's
a seven to eight tournament deal.
Speaker 3 (24:34):
Yeah, it's six tournaments.
Speaker 2 (24:35):
Yeah, six.
Speaker 3 (24:36):
It's what I wanted to do, Like, I wanted to
be fish full time at some point. And when I
saw it advertised, I sent in an application. I was like,
well whatever, you know, I didn't at that point. I
built some backing through sponsors, but not a ton and
I sent it in and I remember exactly where I
was when Brad called me. He was like We had
like an hour long conversation and then he said you're in,
(25:00):
and I'm like, oh gosh. Which that was in twenty twenty.
We still had like almost a year before we started fishing,
and I said, all right, well, now I need to
see how much backing I really have, you know. And
big props for my parents. Actually, if they stepped up
the first year, they said, we'll help you one year
like starting a business, you know, we'll kickstart you, but
then you're gonna have figured out by a year two.
And I was able to but that it just it
(25:23):
kind of fit, you know, like it's I just hadn't
done the opens and it just hadn't worked out, and
it was it was a good fit. And since then
the electronics, the whole four facing deals come to existence.
I think I was telling you the other night dinner,
it doesn't really matter to me. Like I'm a Arkansas
river guy. I never thought I would a fun day
(25:45):
of fishing would be offshore. But I can tell you
right now, if I go home and go fun fishing,
it's with life Scope. I love it, love it, like
I won't do anything else for fun fishing.
Speaker 1 (25:54):
Yeah, I hear a life Scope is actually going to
get attacked by Congress soon, like on a national level.
But because they've already I mean there's already states that
are walking away from it and kind of saying like
we can't have this in this but as far as
the tournament scale of the tournament trail is considered. Where
there're no live scope, no forward facing, that just fits
(26:15):
your style better.
Speaker 3 (26:16):
Yeah, I mean I love doing it, but gosh, I
mean I've spent my I'm thirty eight, I spent twenty
years on the Arkansas River. Like I can definitely fish
without it. That's, you know, no issue. It doesn't matter
either way, I will say, And I've never I've never
done an interview and grapped about it anything like that.
Like I've I've been pretty quiet because I'm good. It
didn't matter to me. I'm here to fish. But I
(26:38):
will say last year, towards the end of the year,
when we knew it was probably gonna be banned this year,
there was a couple of tournaments I loved dragging a
little jigger around and I caught myself doing it and thinking, gosh,
I'm probably getting beat even though I'm catching averaged above
average fish. And it was almost like, I wish we
(26:59):
didn't have that to fishkins. But that's not whining, Like
I could have went and done it too. Pickwick was
a really good example because the first year we went
to Pickawick in July, I don't remember. It was like
ten pounds a day.
Speaker 2 (27:11):
May check and yeah I had gosh, I averaged like
twelve and a half pounds a day last year at
Pickwick and I couldn't figure the lifscope deal out.
Speaker 3 (27:20):
And that's my biggest downfall is Tensee River. But man,
I did it in little creeks and stuff with a jig,
and like I had, I would have been tickled with
that tournament the first time. And I know the fishery
is a little healthier, but I remember leaving there going, Man,
I think I fished a really good tournament. I got
my teeth kicked and finished in the sixties, I think
or seventies.
Speaker 2 (27:40):
And god, that's Pickwick for a lot of people, for sure.
Speaker 3 (27:43):
But that's kind of when I was like, I don't know,
a little break from it might be all right, but
I'll be honest, like I fished the river a lot
at home lately than these. And I went the other
day just because I hadn't picked the one off those
floating around in thirty foot of water in two months.
And it was fun.
Speaker 2 (27:57):
It's a good time. It's a good time for sure.
Speaker 1 (28:00):
So Luke is somebody who's been involved with FLW and
now am seeing as much as you do. What do
you think the perfect balance is for a ford facing
on a trail.
Speaker 2 (28:08):
I'll be honest, I liked the move bass Master made
because he'll tell you I've been involved with m PFL
since twenty twenty before we ever had our first tournament,
and when they came to me and said we're banning it,
the word band kind of makes me nervous when it
comes to the outdoors, you know, being an outdoors when
since I was, you know, a kid, and that was
my suggestion was, Hey, well let's not you know, let's
(28:29):
not just rip the band aid all the way off.
What if we did we have six terms be perfect?
What if you did three with three without and they
didn't want to do that. I feel like it was
the best decision for them, though as a brand, I
will I think you know, I.
Speaker 1 (28:41):
Are hearing band, like, I get what you're saying about band,
but that's not really what they're trying to do. They
were trying to be. They were trying to be as
they were, the third dog to the.
Speaker 2 (28:51):
Bull, that's right. They're also trying to be the first
to go. We're to try to get into the first,
and you've got to you've got to stand for something,
right And they were like, hey, this is going to
be our new and they jumped out before anybody else
made a decision September last year. This is going to
be what twenty twenty five and beyond's gonna look like.
Speaker 1 (29:07):
And they had to roll through some struggles.
Speaker 2 (29:11):
Yeah, and still, I mean it's it's been a struggle
for five years. Honestly, there's always changes right in the industry.
You said third dog to the bowl. To me, I
do like the mix of it because I'm not a
I really appreciate what some of the younger guys are
doing with it. I feel like it's an unfair argument
to say it's not fishing, or an unfair argument to
(29:32):
say they're not better, because my thing is. And He'll
tell you this, everybody's got everybody's got it. There's a
very small percentage of some of these guys though, that
are monumentally better than the rest. And that's the same
as Hunter is with a jig, or Gerald Swindle is
a skipping or Greg Hackney is at fishing cypertrio. So
it's a it's a skill set right now. And it's
(29:54):
like you said the younger guy. They grew up with it.
I can't fault them because it's how they learned to
bass fish. And I've got thirty years of doing other
things right before lipscope was a was a thing. So
I like the hybrid I schedule.
Speaker 1 (30:08):
I do like the way the bass Master did it.
Speaker 2 (30:10):
It was fun.
Speaker 1 (30:11):
I like the fact that they didn't say, like, well,
this lake, we're not going to do it like the
coin flip and having Yeah. But if you look at
how those the schedule laid out, every single one of
those lakes that they like, everybody knows other than Champlain.
Speaker 2 (30:25):
Champlaine will be the wild card for him next year,
but it's such a good lake they're still going to
catch up.
Speaker 1 (30:30):
Cool to see it that generates.
Speaker 2 (30:32):
Because it's just been dominated by livescope the last few years.
You know, I don't know where we're headed with any
of it. Obviously, none of us have a crystal ball.
I think it's an amazing technology. Is it hurting fisheries,
I don't know. I can't speak to that. We're seeing
the craziest waits we've ever seen you and I see
it on the ABT all the time.
Speaker 1 (30:48):
It's somebody else's back.
Speaker 2 (30:50):
But we see fisheries are are kicking out massive, massive weights, which.
Speaker 1 (30:56):
Is why I've always been a fan of ford facing
sonar because the rules clearly state go out and catch
the five fish that you can find.
Speaker 2 (31:05):
The rules. We'll playing within the rules as long as
it and that's my thing. As long as it's within
the rules of the organization, your fish, and then then
then let's go. Now.
Speaker 1 (31:11):
I did throw out an idea that I thought would
be good for a tournament trail and if bass Master
wanted to do this or any of the other ones
wanted to, I was all about, like, give an angler
every opportunity to go find fish, locate fish, catch fish
all throughout practice. Let them use s ford facing, three
sixty sides, scan down, scan two d you name it,
flashers if they want. But then tournament day all you
(31:34):
get is your map card, turn it off. Yeah, and
that's it.
Speaker 2 (31:38):
I think from a fan standpoint, they would enjoy a
tournament that's electronics free with no practice. Do you see
that a lot in comments? And that's kind of that
MLF the TV style of MLF right not fishes. Would
you want something like that?
Speaker 3 (31:53):
It wouldn't bother me. I don't know that i'd want
the electronics in practice though, Like if we're going to practice,
I think we just take it away. That's gonna mess
you up. I mean it could help at times, but
at times you're gonna be going back trying to catch
fish and you can't catch without them, That's true. I
mean I prepracticed here and in use livescope, you know,
and I marked a bunch of brush, but like, I
(32:13):
don't even hardly fish it because I'm like, I'm not
as effective fisherman before scow. But that's a crash and
I'm like, oh gosh, this is terrible. I think I'll
go back to the bank.
Speaker 1 (32:23):
And that's why it's a crapshoot because at least a bank,
you have somewhat of a boundary. If you're a fishing
a brush pile, Like let's say you're on Lake Laneer,
You're in sixty foot of water and there's a brush pile.
You don't really see that unless you're on live scope.
You can pick it up on side scan. But if
you're going to go into a tournament, try to fish
that brushpile like that would be asinine unless you knew
(32:43):
exactly how you were going to position and get them.
That's crazy. Sixty foot and you're just throwing a mino
overtop or trying to get down there with a jig.
Speaker 2 (32:52):
You spend a lot of time, and guys used to
they were good at that. But I could also get
around this country with a with an atlas yeah, right,
truck and not Google Google masks right and half on that.
But it's but now I'm like, man, I can't see anyway,
of course, and it was the size of it, yeah,
I mean I could get around, and now it's like,
if this thing's not working, I'm in trouble. I think
(33:14):
we're all kind of conditioned, especially fishing brush and certain things.
When you've had live scope for a few years, the
task of fishing brush sounds really daunting. If I can't
see my bait go right in it and what's going on,
I'll be.
Speaker 3 (33:26):
The first tell you I was terrible offshore fishman. I
still am. I mean, like, if I'm gonna go fish brush,
I'm fixing the drop of booty. I mean that's yeah.
Speaker 1 (33:36):
You know, there's a lot of guys in the comments
that would love to see that. They'd love to see
somebody go out with a marker and put it down
for sure, And my people used to do it.
Speaker 2 (33:46):
Yeah. Well, I think bass fishing it's it's always kind
of been meat and potatoes, right. I think that's the
easiest way to put it. People have to go throw
a spinner bait. They like to go throw a buzz bait,
throw a jig. That's how a lot of us grew
up bass fishing. So that is bass fishing to a
large majority of the fans. And so this new stuff
that has came, even a lot of the ones complaining,
(34:06):
I feel like they have it on their boats and
they're not effective with this. They like to grin unfortunately.
Uh but I think what's hurt us? I don't even
think the Livescope argument would be a thing, This is
my opinion, if if it wasn't so dominated by one technique,
the jigad minto I think if you had some some
(34:26):
more flair in there, somebody's doing something cool with a
top water, right, or they're throwing a crank bait, anything
like hard bait related. We see a jerk bait from
time time, but some of that kind of bread and butter,
old school stuff. And if every bait gallery, the top
ten galleries weren't just jig admena jiged mine. I think
you would not see the criticisms maybe from the fans or.
Speaker 1 (34:47):
The guys that catch those fish on the jig head
mino and there's no bait.
Speaker 2 (34:51):
It's just that empty huck. I mean, I've seen those pictures.
I think that's why I'll be impressive.
Speaker 1 (35:03):
You were talking about how a lot of guys have
the ford facing, but they just came up doing the
meat and potatoes. Ford facing has to be the biggest
change in fishing since the inception of fishing.
Speaker 2 (35:19):
Well, it's definitely the most divisive, I'll say that. Do
you think they can? You think it's the biggest change
though not to me, and I've talked about this a
lot and you'll probably back me up on this, but
being a kid that grew up on the Tennessee River,
the biggest change to me before this that changed everything
was mapping cards. Map chips changed everything because instead of
(35:42):
going out, it's like that paper map in the truck
we're talking about, right, Like I grew up fishing with
my dad, You're running around with a paper map, You're
lying enough stuff on the bank, like, well, I think
this is where this hump's at. Let's try to find this.
You don't have side imaging. That was another big one
when the when the side imaging hit with the map cards,
that changed everything.
Speaker 1 (36:00):
Let's look at the last fifteen years in professional fishing,
or the last fifteen years just in fishing. Most of
those technologies have changed rapidly. Yes, so maybe people are
feeling now Ford facing sonar is just another flashlight in
the face that what you knew from fishing with your
papa and what you knew from fishing with your dad
(36:23):
is not even remotely close to what fishing is now
and what it could potentially become.
Speaker 2 (36:28):
And it terrifies people. Just listen. You're in the music world.
You know. People don't like change, man. They don't like
new country versus what was in the nineties versus what
was in the seventies. You know what I mean?
Speaker 1 (36:39):
You know what, the same people that like Whalen were
calling George Straight a hack and the like George Strait
are calling Garth Brooks a hack. I mean, now he's
getting called a hack for other things. You know, But
you're right, I mean, change is obviously a part of
it and what we have is now with social media,
it's gasoline on the fire.
Speaker 2 (36:57):
Everybody just wants squeaky wheels. Squeaky wheel They go round
and round and round, and they got a lot of
time on their hands. Would see there at a lot
of a lot of time on their hands.
Speaker 1 (37:07):
One of the things that I wanted to kind of
get into with you guys is we have a lot
of people who listen to the podcast and they're kind
of just getting into fishing and tournaments.
Speaker 2 (37:16):
Might kind of freak them out a little bit.
Speaker 1 (37:18):
If you could take five baits and have them on
your deck no matter where you go in the country,
what are they?
Speaker 2 (37:24):
Man, I'm going a wacky worm of any kind because
you're gonna get bites. I'm always gonna throw a jig,
which I feel like that's what this guy's going to say.
For sure, some kind of top water based on the
time of the year, but definitely ten months out of
the year most places you can throw a top water
unless you're up north. That gives me three. I'm throwing
some kind of crank bait like a DT six. Rapple
of DT six gets a lot of bites, just a
(37:45):
little small profile crank bait, and then I would have
to say a shaky head. If I'm just going bass
fish and just try to catch some fish, you got
to break you ahead with a finet. I mean, just
just getting bites if you're if you're just getting into it, man,
get getting on the water and getting a bite is
the most important thing.
Speaker 1 (38:00):
You have a pretty good mix of finesse and power, yeah,
which I think a lot of guys, you know, they
kind of get hung up in one way or the other.
Speaker 2 (38:09):
Like I'm a power fisherman hunter. What are the five.
Speaker 3 (38:11):
Gosh, I don't know that I can argue, well that
that's a pretty good lineup.
Speaker 1 (38:16):
Would you put a drop shot in over a shaky head?
Speaker 3 (38:19):
I don't think so, do you.
Speaker 2 (38:22):
Well, No, I will, I will, I will say it
was it wasn't alternate. I will say I was thinking
dropshot a little bit.
Speaker 3 (38:28):
But the other thing A lot takes his rig. Yeah,
don't say that's not I think the shaky head comes in.
Speaker 1 (38:34):
Yeah, that gives you so much true reaction of what's
happening under the water, for sure, because if you got
the right head and you're dragging over rock and you
come over a piece of wood, and you know, my
favorite bite for a lot of a lot of shaky
head fishermen is you come over some rock and it
drops off that ledge and that's where the fish is
sitting and they wallop it. I love it. It's like
(38:55):
feeling a vacuum, just pulling your bait in and then
you know that you're gonna whack them. I like your list,
I really do. I think the dropshot is the only
other one that you could put on.
Speaker 2 (39:06):
Well it's a bike get Yeah, there's no doubt. I mean,
my kids, if they were in here right now, they
would say, drop shot, drop shot, drop shot, drop shot. Whacky.
They're here right now, my boy. But they're fifteen and eighteen,
and they're all about that dropshot life because they get bites,
you know. I mean, you just drag it around.
Speaker 1 (39:22):
A lot of people Hunter have said that you're a
phenomenal skipper. You can get under docks better than anybody.
Is that the technique that you truly love the most
or is there one technique that you're just like, man,
I love doing this.
Speaker 3 (39:36):
I don't know that it is skipping. I think I
think the hype maybe the issue was the skipping.
Speaker 2 (39:41):
That's a lot to do with that.
Speaker 3 (39:42):
I'm really not that great. I spent about fifteen minutes
getting a back lads shout yesterday because I hit a dock.
Speaker 1 (39:49):
See it happens to everybody, it does.
Speaker 3 (39:51):
Yeah. Yeah, my favorite would be a little finessgy Again,
it's not really, it's just everywhere. Like I don't really
drag the Compact yet, but I don't. I'm kind of weird,
like I don't drag it, but I don't swim it.
I just kind of hop it lit fall, hop it
(40:12):
lit fall.
Speaker 1 (40:13):
I mean it's paid off. So I wouldn't say that's
it works very well.
Speaker 3 (40:17):
But that's very closely followed by a Hollibody frog. Go.
I love throwing a frog.
Speaker 2 (40:21):
I would say, out of five years of covering you
on NVFL, yeah, you're all about a frog.
Speaker 3 (40:25):
But we just know we'd an opportunity, like you know,
you can throw the jig about it. The frog is
limited where you get the shin got its places, Yeah,
where it shines, it's limited.
Speaker 1 (40:35):
Well, Jay Lee has always said that, you know he
went out. I think he took a year and he
was trying to catch a frog. Is deep into the
years as he could, and he was catching him. I
mean when it was like not even close to frog
and weather. Are you somebody that loves locking a frog
in your hand and just going to task or do
you really look at water tamp water clarity time of year?
(40:56):
Are you that dialed in with how you like to fish?
Speaker 3 (40:59):
Yeah? I mean it. Yeah, yeah, it has to be right,
I guess, because here's one thing, like, if I'm fishing
water will I've always said this, especially when it gets
hot and pressured, like at home on Argansas River, it's
really tough. I feel like a frog fish will eat
a jig, but a jigfish won't eat a frog. Okay,
(41:21):
so why not just pitched a little jig around and
hop it out because you're gonna catch the same fish
that would aid a frog, But you're not gonna catch
it if you're throwing a frog and it would aid
a gig.
Speaker 2 (41:30):
There's so much less effort that a fish has to
go through to get it. Yeah, that's perfect sense.
Speaker 1 (41:35):
But there's so much less effort a fish has to
go through to get a jig.
Speaker 3 (41:38):
Yeah, that's like this time you're at home. I pretty
much don't ever throw top water like I have a
spook for if they come up schooling. Other than that,
I'm gonna start my day with a jig because I
feel like that'll get more bikes.
Speaker 1 (41:51):
Man, why is the spook so good?
Speaker 2 (41:54):
It's loud and obnoxious and looks like a bait fish
anything that looks like it's trying to get away from
them at the right time they do not like. It's
such a like.
Speaker 1 (42:01):
I hate to say this because it is probably one
of the best top waters of all time. It's such
a dumb looking bait like there is no flash to it.
It's literally just a tube with round to head.
Speaker 2 (42:11):
And I've caught as many on a clear just like
straight clear one as I have the beautiful ones that
catch your eye when you walk in the tackle store,
so like it been in a water clarity obviously, but
but yeah, I mean it's just that motion in the sound.
Speaker 1 (42:23):
There's a guy that was in FLW pro for years,
Kim Carver out of Georgia. I've known him for years.
Speaker 2 (42:29):
He won.
Speaker 1 (42:32):
Yeah, he's a fri, he's a machine okay, and he's
an awesome dude.
Speaker 2 (42:37):
Well, I went fishing with him when I was living.
Speaker 1 (42:39):
In Georgia and I got on his boat and he
opens up his box of spooks. There isn't paint left
on any of them. If I said to him, like, hey,
can I get a bone color, he'd be like, uh, yeah,
this is it. And I mean it's worn all the
way down and it hits the same exact way fish
hit it, the same exact way. He's throwing braid that
looks like a telephone corps. I mean it's thick, and
(43:01):
he's like, Man, if I'm not going to catch him
on this, I won't catch them. I learned from guys
like that, and it blows my mind, like they get
so comfortable and so confident in how they fish that
they can catch them with like yeah a ten gan.
Speaker 3 (43:15):
M oh, yeah, it's right, it's all yeah. Confidence is
a big deal. I've never been to a lake in
the US that han' etn that an't caught a fish
on the green jig. Like there's some hering lakes that
they don't eat that real good on, but I've caught
a fish on it. I might put it up after that,
but I've made it a point to never go to
a lake that they wouldn't eat, Like that's.
Speaker 1 (43:35):
Just my confidence. When you're practicing for a tournament, you
start getting bites. Do you cut that specific bait off
and then hold it for the tournament or are you
somebody where you're like, I've got four or five of
these jigs, I think they'll all act the same. How
crazy in tune do you get with your baits?
Speaker 3 (43:51):
Oh? No, like a jig especially, man, I've got a
hundred right now, Like I break five a day off.
Speaker 1 (43:55):
I feel like, so just know so you don't get
picky on like this one feels like it's really working. Well, No,
I'm You're not Aaron Martin going.
Speaker 3 (44:04):
Through I'm not counting strand I may be missing stuff,
but I'm not picking like people tweak their stuff. And
I'm like, all right, I think I'll die on right
out of the package.
Speaker 1 (44:16):
What's the craziest for I call it Frankensteining baits that
you've done and it's caught fish.
Speaker 3 (44:24):
I used to throw a jig football jig with a
drop shot makes a jig the way I've never called
two at once. I've tried something, but you never know
whether to set the hook for the drop shot or
like set the hook for the gig.
Speaker 1 (44:37):
So I lost a lot of it based on you.
Speaker 2 (44:39):
I know how you're saying it doesn't matter.
Speaker 1 (44:43):
Regardless as a tournament fisherman, Luke, when you were kind
of doing your thing best Frankenstein.
Speaker 2 (44:49):
Ba Man, I used to throw schooling fish, one of
my favorite things in the world. I used to throw
a spook with a piece of mono. So it was
way before we threw anything on break back then, So
I thought the spook on monos. It was a lot
of stretch, but a little tag of mono off my
back hook on the spit with a fluke on it
with his little zoom super Fluke Junior, So it looked
(45:10):
like they're kind of chasing each other and you'd catch
two at a time sometimes. But but yeah, it was
just kind of unders donkey. Yeah, but almost in reverse too,
because there's front runner. Remember the old Norman front runner
was this little bait that goes in front of a
top order of your choice. But this is why I
would do this behind it. Yeah, that was just a
random uh I used to the hell lot. I was
in college.
Speaker 1 (45:30):
Spro does these uh frog tournaments on different lakes and
they have one Huntersville line. A couple of years ago
they had to go back and rework their rules because
dudes were Carolina rigging fraud.
Speaker 2 (45:39):
Yep, I remember that, yeah, and they were smashing them.
Guys were punching frogs too, with big ways because you
have to use a frog but spro frog only. But
the frog bite wasn't all.
Speaker 1 (45:52):
It had to be worked like a traditional frog on top.
Speaker 2 (45:55):
They just said they've changed it now though, right, I mean,
they've got to be a top lot or you can change.
Speaker 1 (46:01):
You can't change the legs. All you can do is trim.
Speaker 2 (46:03):
You can't change the color. It's got to be completely
out of the package. Guys buzzbaits in front of them, like,
but you know, putting buzz bait blade guys will get creative.
But Carolina one of them got one, if I remember,
right on a Carolina rig on one of the famous
ledge spots on Gunnersville, like twenty two pounds like Carolina.
He's like, I'm out here this can you imagine a bass? Yeah,
(46:27):
a frog comes floating by on a Carolina.
Speaker 1 (46:30):
They say they don't have hands. They're gonna be like,
I'm gonna eat that.
Speaker 2 (46:33):
I'm gonna I'm probably I've never seen that down here. Yeah,
it's exactly right. I love that though.
Speaker 1 (46:38):
I think that there should be more tournaments where you
can get creative. You know, a lot of guys talk
about the tournament schedule and they're like, well they got
this and they got that. Well you bash master used
to do this kind of thing, and man, I'd love
to see some tournaments again where you had ten pounds
of tackle that you had to bring, it'll only bring
three rods, Like maybe doing those is kind of offshoots
(46:58):
would be kind of cool for sure.
Speaker 3 (47:00):
And you can bet talking about the rules, you can
hand any tournament fishermen set of rules and they're going
to push it. Absolutely.
Speaker 2 (47:07):
That's a fact every time. Little gray area? Is that
what you're talking about here? There's some gray areas every
fisher atney. Yeah, yeah, pretty much a lot of them.
A lot of the ones that win the most money.
I feel like are really could really they could get
you out.
Speaker 1 (47:22):
Of something, and you gotta be detail oriented. There's a
lot of guys where they'll go out and they'll throw
the same exact thing as somebody else. But the difference
in twelve pound tests a ten pound tests, it's a fact.
Speaker 2 (47:33):
It's a fact. What's the old saying it's hard to
catch somebody else's fish? As well, like the confidence, Like
you mentioned, it's the biggest thing in fishing. I see
that from either my own experience or covering tournament's. Confidence
is the number one best lure in your tackle bars.
Speaker 3 (47:48):
It is.
Speaker 2 (47:48):
I don't care. I mean you put a certain thing
Like Jason Christie. You're talking about him winning at Grand Lake.
I was in that tournament and on the co anger side,
but I got to witness I fished with Ishmunro one
day two and I witness Jason Christie in his element.
We were withinside of him and dude, everybody knew where
he was catching fish and he's flipping bushes. Nobody was
going to catch those fish like like Jason CHRISTI. It
(48:11):
was just me up the other day that video where
he was talking about how oh Shannon, Yeah yeah, so yeah.
I was talking to his wife about that because I'm like,
I would have been mortified because he was have you seen.
Speaker 1 (48:24):
The video hunter?
Speaker 2 (48:25):
Yeah, So he gets.
Speaker 1 (48:29):
He's like, I'm the most athletic guy in this count.
Speaker 2 (48:32):
I'll hit my arm on Jason. You know, he's basketball like, dude,
He's you don't get him going about basketball like he
he coached forever, he played forever, and then he coached,
and yeah, he was so insulted by that.
Speaker 3 (48:42):
It was amazing.
Speaker 1 (48:44):
It was such a good video because then everybody starts
talking about like, well, how athletic are bass fishing? Oh yeah,
and it's like, well, ask Jason Christie. I'll tell you
that they're all athletes.
Speaker 2 (48:53):
He was shook by that. It was amazing. And I'm
not in a lot of TikTok trends, you know. I'm
an old dude. I don't know. And my wife was like, oh,
you haven't seen those. Those those are everywhere and she's like,
we started to do one with you the other day
by the pool, and I'm like you better, Like, no,
I would take a lot of.
Speaker 1 (49:08):
The The big one right now is people try to
rage bait you so.
Speaker 3 (49:13):
Off.
Speaker 2 (49:14):
Oh yeah, and they get you go. People do a
good job of that with me a lot of time.
Hard whether it's the I was gonna say, ye know,
whether it's the internet or my kids at my house.
I'm my my freshman in high school. He says, I'm
rage bating you dad all the time. Like that's that's
in his vocabulary. I had to look at it. No,
(49:34):
he has not, he has not.
Speaker 1 (49:36):
I'm is he saying six seven?
Speaker 2 (49:39):
They say six seven a lot, and they say chopped
like they were talking about a uh some girl at
their high school was chopped and I had to ask
what that was and says, she's not that good looking.
And I'm like, well, that's very mean for you guys
to say, but chopped, chopped that is oh yeah, we
say cooked a lot at my house. That's mass cooked
bro bro. And I'm like flocking and all, oh yeah,
(50:02):
oh yeah, I mean we all I can't keep up.
Speaker 1 (50:05):
You're thirty eight, I'm forty three.
Speaker 2 (50:08):
Okay.
Speaker 1 (50:08):
So like when we were in high school, we all
had turns. Yeah girl with chopped, we.
Speaker 2 (50:13):
Just go the girls whatever. Yeah, butterfight Yeah that was one. Yeah.
Yeah we uh you know. I was in the nineties
attitude era of the WWF man. We said all kinds
of student stuff we heard on Monday Night roll. We
were doing some of those in school exactly.
Speaker 1 (50:31):
My mom actually was the teacher and she had to
ban wrestling T shirt I guarantee you because kids would
come in and they'd act like the Undertaker, try to
I'll drive somebody. My mom said these are all technical moves,
like you can't do that. The litt Johnny Camp come
in and get the diamond cutters from Dallas to Diamond.
Speaker 2 (50:48):
Page or whatever. The fact that my little brother is
still with us today after the trampoline beatings he took
from me and my friends, just like, all right, we're
gonna try this figure four leg lock. All right, sere
right here, dude, or the sharpshooter Brett Hart. He does this.
It's cool. We just stamp out and we're just you know,
giving him the business on the trampoline. He was four
years folders. It was a lot of fun. It's been
(51:10):
awesome to have you guys on the podcast.
Speaker 1 (51:12):
Make sure you download Lose podcasts and make sure you
check out Hunter as he continues to go for glory
and hopefully get a win here the West.
Speaker 3 (51:21):
That's the go
Welcome back to Lines and Tyne. I'm Spencer Grades.
Speaker 2 (00:08):
I'm excited for you guys to meet a couple.
Speaker 1 (00:09):
Of my friends today in town for the NPFL, the
National Pro Fishing League, Luke Duncan and fisherman Hunter Bogman.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
This is going to be exciting.
Speaker 1 (00:20):
Hunter's got such an incredible story and then Luke is
just extremely charismatic and brings a lot to the table.
You know, you're you're changing it up a little bit.
You've been running express boat.
Speaker 2 (00:30):
It's it's a big old baby boat. Yeah, it's hot
as fast and bigle thamer like it takes for a part. Well,
it's running the two fifty it is. Yeah, so it's
sixty six sixty sixty six, sixty seven sixty eight.
Speaker 1 (00:41):
Fenn All, I don't know, man, I've never thought of fish.
Speaker 2 (00:44):
I'm not that guy. I'm not man. I've seen him drive.
He's that guy.
Speaker 1 (00:50):
You're a kind of hell on wheel.
Speaker 2 (00:52):
No, he's a bass gun, he is, he is. He's
a probably.
Speaker 1 (00:56):
Yeah, why do you like this beat?
Speaker 3 (00:58):
Someone?
Speaker 2 (00:59):
I don't know?
Speaker 3 (01:00):
Why not?
Speaker 2 (01:00):
I know I'm the same way.
Speaker 3 (01:04):
Seventy seventy.
Speaker 2 (01:07):
I got a lot of buddies like that. They're like,
why would you want to go sixty five if you
can go seventy five? Like, it doesn't make any sense.
Speaker 1 (01:13):
You gotta see it though, you jump on all these
Facebook groups.
Speaker 2 (01:16):
Oh boy, you guys sit there, get your heads. Hey man,
my boat on the top seventy four?
Speaker 1 (01:22):
What am I doing using a twenty.
Speaker 2 (01:23):
Three and a half pitch? Yama Hall team too? And
I tell yeah, you can go down those ra habit
holes for a day. What's eye Jack place? And dude,
they'll spend endless amounts of money. Well, I think I'm
just gonna flash that Yamaha. And I like that. There's
a lot of that going on now.
Speaker 1 (01:37):
Dad actually drives me nuts.
Speaker 2 (01:39):
Well, And I bet, I bet we've got a lot
of those in ABT. I bet we've got I bet
we got a lot of Listen, I'll tell I bet
we got something n PFL. I bet we got something.
Speaker 1 (01:48):
I'll tell you.
Speaker 2 (01:49):
I'll tell you a story about the ABT.
Speaker 1 (01:51):
So I run a Phoenix and it's got a two
fifty Yamaha, and I feel really good about it. And
I'm cruising this is on Neely Henry. I'm flying down
Neely Henry, and all of a sudden this boat from
behind me just goes like I'm sitting still, and I
look at the markings on that engine and I'm like
two fifty. Huh yeah, I know it's a different hole,
(02:11):
but two fifty.
Speaker 2 (02:12):
Yeah. When you get past sitting like, you feel like
you're sitting still, end up by a normal like like
you're saying two fifty. I fished high school term with
my kids the other day. I was about twenty something
and we were running like thirty miles. We were way
ahead of most of the field again, running sixty five.
You know, it's raining, which is and people and loaded
all of a sudden a phoenix with a two fifty almahol,
(02:35):
same deal, Like we're not even and goes out of
sight and I'm like, dude, you're running like eighty plus.
Speaker 1 (02:42):
At that point, I sat up on my steering wheel
like I was a jockey in the derby.
Speaker 2 (02:47):
I'm like smacking the back. Of course, I'm just oh well,
but I'm like where did he come? Because I had
looked several times over my shoulder because it's raining and
the river's pretty tight on Kentucky, like were we're out?
And I didn't want to. You know, there's a lot
of tight turns and stuff like, there have been nobody.
Nobody had been around forever, and then all of a sudden,
this dude just rips Bobby.
Speaker 1 (03:07):
Once he passed you, there was nobody.
Speaker 2 (03:09):
There was nobody, there was I didn't see anybody for
a very long time after that. But buddy, I'm like,
that's not a two fifty, all right, So let's get
into the podcast.
Speaker 1 (03:16):
Yeah, I've got a couple of guys that I want
you guys to really get to know a little bit.
My Hunter Bogman is going to jump in with us.
He is an MPFL pro. He's got such an incredible story.
I'm excited for you guys to hear a little more
about that. And then Luke Duncan, who you know. You
were a tournament fisherman for him.
Speaker 2 (03:33):
Serson.
Speaker 1 (03:33):
Now you've jumped behind the microphone and really kind of
made your niche there, which is good.
Speaker 2 (03:37):
You have a podcast as well, yes, sir, a low
budget live podcast. Yeah, low budget life, not so live
more times than not, because I'm I'm old and lazy
these days.
Speaker 1 (03:47):
But you're selling apparel like you have had a lot.
Speaker 2 (03:49):
Yeah, a lot, a lot of different things. Very fortunate
he's out there playing music. Yeah, yeah, I'm only in
my own mind.
Speaker 1 (03:57):
I had the ABT last year because it was the
first time I'd ever fished it in the North Division
and uh, and I just said to myself, I'm like,
if I can funk with Luke duncan. So every time
I went up there, you know, Luke, the first time
I went up on stage with Luke, he knew exactly
who I was. A kid, like, he'll talk and because
(04:20):
you know, you put the microphone something, It's like, hey,
how did you do it today?
Speaker 2 (04:25):
We fish fish, We fish real good today. Exactly. They're like, wait,
well we we we lost a couple and yeah, we'll
see you next time. So all of a sudden.
Speaker 1 (04:39):
And Luke says to everybody on the live stream, he goes, oh,
this guy will talk.
Speaker 2 (04:42):
You know.
Speaker 1 (04:43):
I was like, Buddy, I can't wait, and this is
this is Uh. The second event is right after the
bass Master Classic happened and you were down there and
you did a guest spot where you guys were playing
at some barger and Kay had told me the name
of one of the songs that they were playing. So
I went on the live stream and I was like,
you know what I listened to this morning just to
get myself fired up, and I mentioned the name of
(05:05):
the song and the band that has and I've never
seen him stop in his track.
Speaker 2 (05:08):
I was like, I have been set up. I have
been set up. It's rare that I get a curve,
but I got a curve.
Speaker 1 (05:16):
It's a cool moment, though, because I know that. You know.
When I go out to fish, I just want to
have a good time. I love the tournament scene. I
think it's really fun. I think that's why we all
get into it. Originally want to go have a good time,
try to win some money. But if I don't catch him,
I take the swindle approach. If I don't win on
the water, I'm gonna win on that stage. That's it
because I want people to go. Man, that guy was interesting.
(05:38):
He was funny.
Speaker 2 (05:39):
Remember that was on the FLW tour because I called
him way fewer times than I didn't, right, And so
I was the same way. And Gerald's one of my
close friends and mentors in life. So I was always like,
be sitting in the bag line with three fish, like, well,
got to come up with something to say because they're
danger and not going to ask me how I called them,
So I always had to come up with something, and
(06:00):
I think that's kind of what started everything that I do. Now.
You know, you kind of get quick on your feet
and come up with, you know, a little bit of
bs from time to time.
Speaker 1 (06:09):
So then, Hunter, I want to go over your story
because it'll it'll kind of parlay off of this, like
you getting into tournament fishing. But we had dinner the
other night with your wife and your daughters, and you
were telling me the story. At nine months old, you
had bacterial meningitis, that's right, And what ended up happening
when you got to the hospital other than your mom
giving you like some crazy form of CPR to get
(06:30):
your breathing in the back of the car.
Speaker 3 (06:31):
So yeah, I stopped breathing on the way there. But
one hundred and thirteen degree fever for a couple of days.
Wasn't supposed to live. If I lived, i'd be a vegetable.
Just a miracle, you know that that I'm alive. And
some really good doctors anyway, amputated it below both knees
and lost all my fingers on my left hand and
partial fingers on my right. But you know, when you're
(06:51):
like that, Luke, you don't have to You don't have
to have something crazy to say. We you on stage
because you're the short guy. Everybody remembers you.
Speaker 2 (06:57):
Everybody's like, what's this guy? And then they're like, oh,
catch a lot of bass most of the time.
Speaker 1 (07:03):
But how hard for that was that for you? Coming up?
Like you know, eighty A has become a little more
popular as time has gone on, Like we were just
talking about it. You coming to the radio station. I'm like, well,
let me get him closer to a ram.
Speaker 3 (07:14):
Yeah, you didn't even know where the ramp was.
Speaker 1 (07:15):
I didn't even know where it was. But your life,
like you constantly have to kind of look out for
things like that, where most of us are just like
we take it for granted.
Speaker 3 (07:24):
Yeah, I mean I do. I don't probably as much
as some do. I just kind of figured out a
lot of that. And That's what I've always done, is
just figured out what I need to do when you know,
but but you do, you catch yourself, Like I will say,
when we park the blue spot, like I could care
less if I park in a handicapped spot, but it
gives me room to open my door and nobody park
next to me where I get back in my truck,
(07:44):
and that's really the only reason I ever use one.
But you know stuff like that, I mean you, I
guess you think about it and don't even realize you're
thinking about it a lot of times.
Speaker 2 (07:52):
But I think it's impressive what you're able to do.
Speaker 1 (07:55):
I mean, you get out on the water and uh,
you wax they're at I mean.
Speaker 2 (08:00):
Sometimes but I watch your social media.
Speaker 1 (08:03):
I see you set the hook and it's like you're
jacking their jaws. I'm surprised those fish come back alive,
to be honest, because you hit him with crazy the fury, Dude,
the Fury.
Speaker 2 (08:14):
We covered Hunter the first ever day on NPFL Live,
so five years ago when we started lak you following,
I tell us Hunter is going to be on camera,
and he smashed him. That day was in the top ten.
I believe it has a great day. But I'm like,
and i'd never seen him fish. I've seen his social
media stuff and we get five hours with him over
his shoulder right, and he is just blistering that list
(08:34):
And it doesn't matter if it's a spinning rod, if
he's throwing his gig at him, whatever it is, he
is just absolutely just like you said, laying the wood
to him every time, and I'm like, what am I
doing with my life? This guy is.
Speaker 1 (08:46):
Your saw press process when you hook one?
Speaker 2 (08:51):
But money is.
Speaker 1 (08:53):
It literally to jack their faces as you treat every
fish like it's a frog fish at that times?
Speaker 3 (09:02):
Really though, seriously, I don't have the height the leverage,
So it's kind of like I shoot a compound bow too,
and I shoot seventy pounds, like I don't have the
draw length, and I feel like I have to make
up for it and wait for the speed. I feel
like the same thing with a fish, Like I don't have
the leverage of standing on my feet when I set
the hook, so I try to make up with the
hook scent.
Speaker 1 (09:22):
Are you literally just throwing your back as hard as
you can to try to get them up on the ride,
because it seems like every time you set the hook,
you're high up on that rod and that rod is
bent completely open. I mean every fish I think you
catches like a five pounder.
Speaker 3 (09:38):
Well, it's definitely not. Watch the next three days on
Logan Martin.
Speaker 2 (09:42):
Now he does fish the Arkansas around a little rock
a lot. I don't know that they're all five pound.
Speaker 3 (09:45):
Well they're like two pounds and we're really excited.
Speaker 2 (09:48):
We're proud of those, right, yeahn't at those.
Speaker 1 (09:50):
Well, it's really impressive to see kind of what you've
done in fishing. You want a Toyota series. Was that
a shock to you during that tournament to win it?
Speaker 3 (09:58):
Yeah, it was a shock. I've never seen that lake
before in my life. It was a it was a
really good week. It like it clicked in practice, but
it was I was a pound something out going into
I was gosh, I was in like twenty something going
into the second day and I caught almost eighteen pounds
and I'm like I remember Greg bo Hanni walked by me.
He said what do you have? I was like seventeen something.
(10:20):
He goes, Holy cow, and I was like, dude, I
think I'm leaving.
Speaker 2 (10:22):
It right now.
Speaker 3 (10:23):
End up being in forth. Yeah, it was a shock,
like to catch them because I'd had twelve the day before,
and I was like, well if I'm just tickled, like
if I catch another twelve, I'll have a good tournament.
I had nineteen and a half the last day. I
remember telling Mark mcguall. He walked out there and checked
my fish and I'm like, Mark, am I gonna win?
If I don't know it's gonna be closed?
Speaker 2 (10:44):
It's gonna of course.
Speaker 3 (10:47):
But yeah, I was like, oh gosh, I'm nervous now.
But yeah it did. Like you don't know, that's by
far the biggest win I've had, but you don't know
when they're coming. I won like a mister bast Arkansas
had no idea Like it was on Lake Millwood, where
eybody has twenty pounds, I had eighteen and one by
three pounds.
Speaker 1 (11:02):
I feel like, though, and Luke, you could probably back
this up with the FLW stuff. I hear more stories
about guys saying I showed up to the lake for
the very first time, I want it.
Speaker 2 (11:10):
I think preconceived notions. That's what they talk about. The
local curse right home lake advantage hurts most anglers. And
I think the big wins and all the guys you
talked to and keeping up with this for years happened
when you least expect it. Why do you think that is?
Speaker 3 (11:23):
Though?
Speaker 2 (11:24):
I think you fish freer, right, Yeah, you got an
open mind, you don't you know, there's no preconceived notions
of oh, I've got fifty way points from where I've
been here fifty times right before, and you're fishing what
the lake gives you that week, you know. And I
think in the fall, like in that tournament, not to
not to speak for you, Hunter, but I think it
was so tough, and there were a lot of guys
(11:45):
that were really good on that lake that were in
that tournament, and their programs weren't working right.
Speaker 1 (11:52):
Bites Guys when they go out to a lake for
the first time, or if they have history there, that
they kind of settle into what's comfortable.
Speaker 3 (11:59):
Oh yeah, yeah, I think so. I mean that's like
you were talking about Little Rock. I mean, I pretty
much know where I'm going before I roll out of
the driveway, Like you know, there's a milk run, and
that's what I'm going to do. And a lot of
our stuff is three and four hours long, and I'm
just gonna run that and be consistent. I may not
win all of them, I'll be but man, a three
day tournament and those milk runs they don't last three days,
(12:20):
you know.
Speaker 2 (12:21):
And that's yeah, multi day tournaments too. Yeah, like you're saying,
it's a different game, yeah, and a different game.
Speaker 3 (12:25):
Like I've wanted. I've been on Brad from the beginning
of the n PFL, like I want to go to
Little Rock. I know it will probably never happened, but
then somebody was saying something about it this year, and
I'm like that I'd be a nervous trict, like because yeah, gosh,
to be at home and have to there's so much
that has to go. I've never had anything of that
level at home, but there's so much that has to
go into that me on your shoulders and be like
(12:47):
you think of all this stuff. I mean, it's it's
I remember watching Jason Christie win Grand in the FLW
and he was like, I remember when these trees were
a little bitty and I watched them grow up, and like,
there's so much knowledge a local guys to think about
and make their O decisions.
Speaker 1 (13:02):
But it does bite you.
Speaker 2 (13:03):
Eight hours is not long in a bast tournament. It
goes by so fast. Well when you're on them.
Speaker 1 (13:08):
When you're when you're most of my tournaments feel like forever.
Speaker 2 (13:13):
If I'm if I'm not saying, oh gosh, it's already,
I was going to say it's it's opposite for me.
I feel like it's blast off at daylight and then
it's lunch. When you're not catching them, you're like, whoa, whoa,
hang on, you got to be in two hours. I
don't have a limit.
Speaker 1 (13:26):
When you're in any sort of the team deal, and
one guy in the back of the boat is just
bitching about nothing's getting caught, and they always say the
fatal fatal phrase, Well somebody's catching them.
Speaker 2 (13:36):
It's like, I want that to be us. Yes, you know,
somebody's got them. Yeah, we get get to catch them.
Speaker 1 (13:42):
Back there, to go back to kind of Hunter's story
a little bit, all these challenges that you've had since
you were nine months old, how'd you get into fishing?
Speaker 3 (13:51):
Gosh, it's all my family did. I mean, you know,
recreation was hunting fish. I mean we ate all the
fish we caught, but you know, that's that's what we did.
We deer hunted and we caught fish. And like when
my dad had an off day, that's what he took
me to the woods or to the lake, you know.
So it's all I've ever known. Like I don't remember
going for the first time. We did a lot of
(14:11):
crappie fishing, but have a flat bottom of the eight horse,
like that was where I spent a lot of my
life until I was a teenager. But no, I just
I don't that's all I've known. Like if that's I
didn't know I was eating different, right, because that's how
I grew up. So then you don't know any different.
You're just you're going fishing.
Speaker 1 (14:29):
Was there a time, and this is highly personal, but
was there a time in your life in a fishing
tournament when you realized I'm different, Like what I'm doing
is much different than what everybody else is doing.
Speaker 3 (14:46):
No, not really, because I felt like I was always like,
don't get me wrong, when I started tournament fishing, we
got our tails kicked for like three or four years
for whatever might check. But I didn't feel like there
was anything to do physically. I felt like I was
like I didn't know what you know how to catch
a fish? But no, I think what clicked with me
(15:07):
is being away somewhere and somebody being like, hey, I
know you. I fished a tournament against you, and then
it's like, man, you kicked my ask remember you know
what I mean. That's where it's like, man, maybe I
can make a career out of this, Like I think
I've I've got a niche that very few people have.
Speaker 1 (15:26):
You know, man, we had such a cool moment the
other night, Luke. We were all sitting down at this
Mexican restaurant and you know, we're in pel City, Homo,
Logan Martin, and we're eating Mexican and this kid comes up.
I mean he was what fourteen years old?
Speaker 3 (15:40):
Hun probably Yeah.
Speaker 1 (15:41):
He just walks up and shows the utmost respect. He
waits until the conversation's kind of over, and then he goes, hey,
mister Hunter, I just want.
Speaker 2 (15:50):
To say good luck this week. That's awesome.
Speaker 1 (15:52):
But the look on Hunter's face was like do I
know this kid?
Speaker 2 (15:56):
Like?
Speaker 1 (15:56):
Do I owe you money?
Speaker 2 (15:58):
It was it was so cool.
Speaker 1 (16:00):
To witness that happened. Because you're not from Alabama, you're
not from Logan Martin, You're from Arkansas, and all of
a sudden, you got somebody coming up who sees you,
and for him, he's probably seeing like an idol of
his man.
Speaker 3 (16:12):
It's so extremely weird to me, you know, that anybody
would know who I am outside of people I know,
you know, but but it's it's very It's it's an
honor that people even care enough to know who I am.
Speaker 2 (16:24):
It's so cool.
Speaker 1 (16:25):
I had been driving by. Hunter and I have known
each other for a while, but I was driving by
this one area and I saw his boat and I
told my buddy in the truck, I said, I got
to yell him, this is wild because we're going to
try to We're going to try to do dinner later,
because we had talked before you got here about like, hey,
let's at least get together when you're here. And I
didn't think i'd see him on the water. I was
just gonna text him later. So I just pull up
(16:47):
and all of a sudden, I look down there's a
dude on the bank fishing. I never saw a vehicle.
Speaker 3 (16:52):
He's like between me and and Spencer. Spencer's like, you
want to go to dinner?
Speaker 2 (16:56):
And this guy's like he's like, who's talking?
Speaker 1 (16:59):
Like he can't, Like God is talking, Donner And he's
like yeah. But then we had to stop the conversation
because all these semis were driving by, like can't hear you?
Speaker 2 (17:09):
Hang on?
Speaker 1 (17:10):
And then he tells me did He's like, I got
it all on my go, bro?
Speaker 2 (17:15):
Did the other guy show up?
Speaker 3 (17:18):
I just idled back there and like I was had
to iddle a long ways. I was playing on my
phone and I nearly ran his line over, and I'm like,
I'm so sorry, and I spun to leave and he goes, no, no,
you're good, and I dropped the troll motor and we
speak for just a second, and all of a sudden,
somebody's above me screaming. He's going, He's like, what is It's.
Speaker 1 (17:36):
Like, this last forty five seconds of my life is
so bazaar. I had no idea.
Speaker 3 (17:39):
What you know?
Speaker 1 (17:40):
You brought up how he's bank fishing. You almost ran
over his line. That's become a real big problem with
the amount of tournaments that are out there, is what
level of respect do you give to somebody who's fishing
off a bank or fishing in a kayak when you're
in a tournament and you know you're trying to get
to that spot.
Speaker 3 (17:57):
Well, I wouldn't have went anywhere around him if I
had paid enough attention. But I was ten hours in
my day getting very zoned out on my phone when
I'm there.
Speaker 1 (18:05):
I just I hate like some of these videos that
I see. Well, man, you have pros and they sit
there and they go, hey, I don't come to your
job and blah blah, and I'm sitting there going, dude,
it's a public lake. Oh you're not going down to zero.
Speaker 2 (18:19):
I'll tell you of somebody some track. Yeah, I think
common practices. You just kind of get them room right, Like,
I don't care if you're fishing from a bank, you're
fishing from a pontoon, a kayak. If I'm in a tournament,
you're on a spot, you got just as much right
to be there. It's played on public waters. We talked
about it all time. It's one of the risks we
take right when you when you enter a tournament. You
never know what's gonna happen when you roll out, especially
on a Saturday, right like, we're gonna fish the Koosa
(18:40):
River this Saturday, beautiful Saturday in Alabama. There're gonna be
some bass boats out there. They're gonna be some pontoons,
wakeboard ky be told.
Speaker 1 (18:48):
Though, on the flip side, I'm not a real big
fan of the guy who wakes up with the sole
reason to go fish a spot or another pro Oh yeah,
that has only d you're out there fishing, you're having it.
Speaker 2 (19:02):
Those people definitely exist, unfortunately because they I don't know
if it's a competitive thing. They like to tell their buddies.
All I could have won this big pro tournament. Those
guys aren't that good of fishermen, that type thing. But
a guy sitting there, crappy fishing next to a bridge
off a bank, He's just enjoying his Saturday morning. Man,
I'm not and trying to catch a few for dinner.
Probably I'm not. I'm not trying to interfere with that
when I get so awkward with a Gunnersville. Gunnershill is
(19:24):
the world's worst because there are tons of causeways right,
and you've got tons of people that line those causeways
bank fishing. But to get in and out of most
of the major creeks, you have to go by them.
And I'm I'm petrified always because I'm like, I'm sorry,
I'm sorry, you're and they get almost a lot of
times on the bank, they get very upset that you're
(19:45):
even coming through there. Sure, but that that's trick. I'm
not pulling up to fish. I'm just trying to pass through.
But I've been in some situations where that gets kind
of tense.
Speaker 1 (19:52):
Gutters Fill is a different breed too, because it's a
spot specific it's an area specific lake compared to like
well I can run this pattern for sure, whatever.
Speaker 2 (20:01):
I mean sure if.
Speaker 1 (20:02):
You're in Seabold or if you're in South Saudi and
that's where the majority of boats are. I mean, that's
what they tell you. Is like, if you don't see
boats around you on Gunnersville you're fishing.
Speaker 2 (20:11):
You're lost most of the time. Yeah, you're lost. You're
either blowing a tournament out by twenty pounds or you're
dead last most of the time. You got to share
the story about that guy that was primy fishing.
Speaker 3 (20:21):
Oh yeah, so that you fallow. I caught most of
my fish on colverts high water, yeah, or fish, and
I rolled thirty miles to one down the lake like
because they were so far. I was running fifty dolls
(20:41):
a day, just try to get to all these. So
I rolled like thirty miles down the lake and I
pull in. There's a dude on a bucket sitting on
fishing this covert. I'm like, god, that comment, and I said, hey, man,
do you mind if I fish? Because he's like dropping
right here and I wanting to throw you out in
front of it. He said, what are you fishing for?
I said, bass, Okay, you're good, And so I start fishing.
(21:02):
And he's talking to me and he starts telling me,
have you ever fished that bank over there? And I'm like,
I'm sorry, sir, we can't have information, you know, the
whole spill and try to not make Himbay mad, you know.
And he he's like, okay, here in a man. He's like,
there's a brush file right there in front of you.
Now the lakes what nine feet high? Like there's so
much woods. And I said, I appreciate, I really can't
(21:27):
have any information. And he just kept on right out there,
right out there, like five or six times, right, So
he's like, please throw at it. So I finally just
throw and wind it back in. It's a jig like
I just hit the water and I wind in just
to appease him so he'll quit, right. We talked for
ment longer and I said, I said, all right, I'm
about to go your way. He goes, yeah, I gotta
(21:47):
go too. And he stands up and he's got a
gun holstered. Don't think a lot about it. He's in
the middle of the woods on side of the Internstate.
He pulls it right and he like and he picks
up and shoots in front of my boat and it
all happened so quick. I like, grab the troller motor,
but I was a little bit curious at what he
was doing.
Speaker 2 (22:08):
Yeah, what's happening?
Speaker 3 (22:11):
And he shoots and he looks at me. He shoots
out there where he've been pointing. He looked at me.
He goes brush pile and he turned on walk.
Speaker 1 (22:16):
Home like that's how he's.
Speaker 3 (22:22):
Away.
Speaker 2 (22:22):
Point like, what just happened at that point?
Speaker 1 (22:27):
Do you stay.
Speaker 3 (22:28):
Or I'm yeah, I'm like I'm going.
Speaker 2 (22:31):
He ran very fast away from there. The mercury was
crack well.
Speaker 1 (22:36):
I love the fact that you're both here and you know,
the m p f L is what you're fishing hunter,
and you do a lot of m seeing for, and
I mean you do it for everybody, a BT m
p f L. You got your podcast, you got all
that stuff. I want to talk about the differences in
some of these tournament trails because I feel like after
bass Master made their announcement of how they were going
to handle ford facing Sonar, I feel like they kind
(22:59):
of left a lot on the MPFL strictly, no sonar,
you can't have ford face ford facing, And then you
have Major League Fishing, which has always kind of been
the last couple of years. Uh, you can use it here,
you can't use it here, you know, do it by
the periods and all that kind of stuff. And then
bass Master was pretty much you can have it, just
have you know, limitations on screen size and how many
(23:19):
transducers you're allowed to have. I kind of wish that
they would have gone full bore and just given now
three platforms at a quote professional level, to where you
have one saying you can't use it.
Speaker 2 (23:32):
You can kind of use it. You can use it
as much as you.
Speaker 1 (23:35):
Want, a lot of options, right, Like, yeah, give somebody
an option, because you have so many guys that are
coming up in high school and college where all they
know is Ford facing.
Speaker 2 (23:44):
It's true, very true.
Speaker 1 (23:45):
What's your opinions on how these organizations kind of lay
it out? What was the appeal of the MPFL compared
to an MLF for a bass master.
Speaker 3 (23:55):
I liked what the NPFL stood for when it first
started and what it still stands for. You know, it
was nothing to do with electronics when it started. It
was starting a new league, giving some guys like myself
a chance that hadn't qualified for one of these other
leagues but had the means to be able to do it, since.
Speaker 1 (24:11):
You try to qualify for the elites for the BPT.
Speaker 3 (24:14):
No, I fished toyotas, but I'd never A lot of
times I wouldn't fish a full series. I fished one
or too close to the house. And sure bfl's were
always the same thing for me. I think I fished
like thirty bfls and I fished two seasons of them.
Speaker 1 (24:27):
I mean, so, then why did you make the decision
to go for the MPFL, because I mean, that's that's
a seven to eight tournament deal.
Speaker 3 (24:34):
Yeah, it's six tournaments.
Speaker 2 (24:35):
Yeah, six.
Speaker 3 (24:36):
It's what I wanted to do, Like, I wanted to
be fish full time at some point. And when I
saw it advertised, I sent in an application. I was like,
well whatever, you know, I didn't at that point. I
built some backing through sponsors, but not a ton and
I sent it in and I remember exactly where I
was when Brad called me. He was like We had
like an hour long conversation and then he said you're in,
(25:00):
and I'm like, oh gosh. Which that was in twenty twenty.
We still had like almost a year before we started fishing,
and I said, all right, well, now I need to
see how much backing I really have, you know. And
big props for my parents. Actually, if they stepped up
the first year, they said, we'll help you one year
like starting a business, you know, we'll kickstart you, but
then you're gonna have figured out by a year two.
And I was able to but that it just it
(25:23):
kind of fit, you know, like it's I just hadn't
done the opens and it just hadn't worked out, and
it was it was a good fit. And since then
the electronics, the whole four facing deals come to existence.
I think I was telling you the other night dinner,
it doesn't really matter to me. Like I'm a Arkansas
river guy. I never thought I would a fun day
(25:45):
of fishing would be offshore. But I can tell you
right now, if I go home and go fun fishing,
it's with life Scope. I love it, love it, like
I won't do anything else for fun fishing.
Speaker 1 (25:54):
Yeah, I hear a life Scope is actually going to
get attacked by Congress soon, like on a national level.
But because they've already I mean there's already states that
are walking away from it and kind of saying like
we can't have this in this but as far as
the tournament scale of the tournament trail is considered. Where
there're no live scope, no forward facing, that just fits
(26:15):
your style better.
Speaker 3 (26:16):
Yeah, I mean I love doing it, but gosh, I
mean I've spent my I'm thirty eight, I spent twenty
years on the Arkansas River. Like I can definitely fish
without it. That's, you know, no issue. It doesn't matter
either way, I will say, And I've never I've never
done an interview and grapped about it anything like that.
Like I've I've been pretty quiet because I'm good. It
didn't matter to me. I'm here to fish. But I
(26:38):
will say last year, towards the end of the year,
when we knew it was probably gonna be banned this year,
there was a couple of tournaments I loved dragging a
little jigger around and I caught myself doing it and thinking, gosh,
I'm probably getting beat even though I'm catching averaged above
average fish. And it was almost like, I wish we
(26:59):
didn't have that to fishkins. But that's not whining, Like
I could have went and done it too. Pickwick was
a really good example because the first year we went
to Pickawick in July, I don't remember. It was like
ten pounds a day.
Speaker 2 (27:11):
May check and yeah I had gosh, I averaged like
twelve and a half pounds a day last year at
Pickwick and I couldn't figure the lifscope deal out.
Speaker 3 (27:20):
And that's my biggest downfall is Tensee River. But man,
I did it in little creeks and stuff with a jig,
and like I had, I would have been tickled with
that tournament the first time. And I know the fishery
is a little healthier, but I remember leaving there going, Man,
I think I fished a really good tournament. I got
my teeth kicked and finished in the sixties, I think
or seventies.
Speaker 2 (27:40):
And god, that's Pickwick for a lot of people, for sure.
Speaker 3 (27:43):
But that's kind of when I was like, I don't know,
a little break from it might be all right, but
I'll be honest, like I fished the river a lot
at home lately than these. And I went the other
day just because I hadn't picked the one off those
floating around in thirty foot of water in two months.
And it was fun.
Speaker 2 (27:57):
It's a good time. It's a good time for sure.
Speaker 1 (28:00):
So Luke is somebody who's been involved with FLW and
now am seeing as much as you do. What do
you think the perfect balance is for a ford facing
on a trail.
Speaker 2 (28:08):
I'll be honest, I liked the move bass Master made
because he'll tell you I've been involved with m PFL
since twenty twenty before we ever had our first tournament,
and when they came to me and said we're banning it,
the word band kind of makes me nervous when it
comes to the outdoors, you know, being an outdoors when
since I was, you know, a kid, and that was
my suggestion was, Hey, well let's not you know, let's
(28:29):
not just rip the band aid all the way off.
What if we did we have six terms be perfect?
What if you did three with three without and they
didn't want to do that. I feel like it was
the best decision for them, though as a brand, I
will I think you know, I.
Speaker 1 (28:41):
Are hearing band, like, I get what you're saying about band,
but that's not really what they're trying to do. They
were trying to be. They were trying to be as
they were, the third dog to the.
Speaker 2 (28:51):
Bull, that's right. They're also trying to be the first
to go. We're to try to get into the first,
and you've got to you've got to stand for something,
right And they were like, hey, this is going to
be our new and they jumped out before anybody else
made a decision September last year. This is going to
be what twenty twenty five and beyond's gonna look like.
Speaker 1 (29:07):
And they had to roll through some struggles.
Speaker 2 (29:11):
Yeah, and still, I mean it's it's been a struggle
for five years. Honestly, there's always changes right in the industry.
You said third dog to the bowl. To me, I
do like the mix of it because I'm not a
I really appreciate what some of the younger guys are
doing with it. I feel like it's an unfair argument
to say it's not fishing, or an unfair argument to
(29:32):
say they're not better, because my thing is. And He'll
tell you this, everybody's got everybody's got it. There's a
very small percentage of some of these guys though, that
are monumentally better than the rest. And that's the same
as Hunter is with a jig, or Gerald Swindle is
a skipping or Greg Hackney is at fishing cypertrio. So
it's a it's a skill set right now. And it's
(29:54):
like you said the younger guy. They grew up with it.
I can't fault them because it's how they learned to
bass fish. And I've got thirty years of doing other
things right before lipscope was a was a thing. So
I like the hybrid I schedule.
Speaker 1 (30:08):
I do like the way the bass Master did it.
Speaker 2 (30:10):
It was fun.
Speaker 1 (30:11):
I like the fact that they didn't say, like, well,
this lake, we're not going to do it like the
coin flip and having Yeah. But if you look at
how those the schedule laid out, every single one of
those lakes that they like, everybody knows other than Champlain.
Speaker 2 (30:25):
Champlaine will be the wild card for him next year,
but it's such a good lake they're still going to
catch up.
Speaker 1 (30:30):
Cool to see it that generates.
Speaker 2 (30:32):
Because it's just been dominated by livescope the last few years.
You know, I don't know where we're headed with any
of it. Obviously, none of us have a crystal ball.
I think it's an amazing technology. Is it hurting fisheries,
I don't know. I can't speak to that. We're seeing
the craziest waits we've ever seen you and I see
it on the ABT all the time.
Speaker 1 (30:48):
It's somebody else's back.
Speaker 2 (30:50):
But we see fisheries are are kicking out massive, massive weights, which.
Speaker 1 (30:56):
Is why I've always been a fan of ford facing
sonar because the rules clearly state go out and catch
the five fish that you can find.
Speaker 2 (31:05):
The rules. We'll playing within the rules as long as
it and that's my thing. As long as it's within
the rules of the organization, your fish, and then then
then let's go. Now.
Speaker 1 (31:11):
I did throw out an idea that I thought would
be good for a tournament trail and if bass Master
wanted to do this or any of the other ones
wanted to, I was all about, like, give an angler
every opportunity to go find fish, locate fish, catch fish
all throughout practice. Let them use s ford facing, three
sixty sides, scan down, scan two d you name it,
flashers if they want. But then tournament day all you
(31:34):
get is your map card, turn it off. Yeah, and
that's it.
Speaker 2 (31:38):
I think from a fan standpoint, they would enjoy a
tournament that's electronics free with no practice. Do you see
that a lot in comments? And that's kind of that
MLF the TV style of MLF right not fishes. Would
you want something like that?
Speaker 3 (31:53):
It wouldn't bother me. I don't know that i'd want
the electronics in practice though, Like if we're going to practice,
I think we just take it away. That's gonna mess
you up. I mean it could help at times, but
at times you're gonna be going back trying to catch
fish and you can't catch without them, That's true. I
mean I prepracticed here and in use livescope, you know,
and I marked a bunch of brush, but like, I
(32:13):
don't even hardly fish it because I'm like, I'm not
as effective fisherman before scow. But that's a crash and
I'm like, oh gosh, this is terrible. I think I'll
go back to the bank.
Speaker 1 (32:23):
And that's why it's a crapshoot because at least a bank,
you have somewhat of a boundary. If you're a fishing
a brush pile, Like let's say you're on Lake Laneer,
You're in sixty foot of water and there's a brush pile.
You don't really see that unless you're on live scope.
You can pick it up on side scan. But if
you're going to go into a tournament, try to fish
that brushpile like that would be asinine unless you knew
(32:43):
exactly how you were going to position and get them.
That's crazy. Sixty foot and you're just throwing a mino
overtop or trying to get down there with a jig.
Speaker 2 (32:52):
You spend a lot of time, and guys used to
they were good at that. But I could also get
around this country with a with an atlas yeah, right,
truck and not Google Google masks right and half on that.
But it's but now I'm like, man, I can't see anyway,
of course, and it was the size of it, yeah,
I mean I could get around, and now it's like,
if this thing's not working, I'm in trouble. I think
(33:14):
we're all kind of conditioned, especially fishing brush and certain things.
When you've had live scope for a few years, the
task of fishing brush sounds really daunting. If I can't
see my bait go right in it and what's going on,
I'll be.
Speaker 3 (33:26):
The first tell you I was terrible offshore fishman. I
still am. I mean, like, if I'm gonna go fish brush,
I'm fixing the drop of booty. I mean that's yeah.
Speaker 1 (33:36):
You know, there's a lot of guys in the comments
that would love to see that. They'd love to see
somebody go out with a marker and put it down
for sure, And my people used to do it.
Speaker 2 (33:46):
Yeah. Well, I think bass fishing it's it's always kind
of been meat and potatoes, right. I think that's the
easiest way to put it. People have to go throw
a spinner bait. They like to go throw a buzz bait,
throw a jig. That's how a lot of us grew
up bass fishing. So that is bass fishing to a
large majority of the fans. And so this new stuff
that has came, even a lot of the ones complaining,
(34:06):
I feel like they have it on their boats and
they're not effective with this. They like to grin unfortunately.
Uh but I think what's hurt us? I don't even
think the Livescope argument would be a thing, This is
my opinion, if if it wasn't so dominated by one technique,
the jigad minto I think if you had some some
(34:26):
more flair in there, somebody's doing something cool with a
top water, right, or they're throwing a crank bait, anything
like hard bait related. We see a jerk bait from
time time, but some of that kind of bread and butter,
old school stuff. And if every bait gallery, the top
ten galleries weren't just jig admena jiged mine. I think
you would not see the criticisms maybe from the fans or.
Speaker 1 (34:47):
The guys that catch those fish on the jig head
mino and there's no bait.
Speaker 2 (34:51):
It's just that empty huck. I mean, I've seen those pictures.
I think that's why I'll be impressive.
Speaker 1 (35:03):
You were talking about how a lot of guys have
the ford facing, but they just came up doing the
meat and potatoes. Ford facing has to be the biggest
change in fishing since the inception of fishing.
Speaker 2 (35:19):
Well, it's definitely the most divisive, I'll say that. Do
you think they can? You think it's the biggest change
though not to me, and I've talked about this a
lot and you'll probably back me up on this, but
being a kid that grew up on the Tennessee River,
the biggest change to me before this that changed everything
was mapping cards. Map chips changed everything because instead of
(35:42):
going out, it's like that paper map in the truck
we're talking about, right, Like I grew up fishing with
my dad, You're running around with a paper map, You're
lying enough stuff on the bank, like, well, I think
this is where this hump's at. Let's try to find this.
You don't have side imaging. That was another big one
when the when the side imaging hit with the map cards,
that changed everything.
Speaker 1 (36:00):
Let's look at the last fifteen years in professional fishing,
or the last fifteen years just in fishing. Most of
those technologies have changed rapidly. Yes, so maybe people are
feeling now Ford facing sonar is just another flashlight in
the face that what you knew from fishing with your
papa and what you knew from fishing with your dad
(36:23):
is not even remotely close to what fishing is now
and what it could potentially become.
Speaker 2 (36:28):
And it terrifies people. Just listen. You're in the music world.
You know. People don't like change, man. They don't like
new country versus what was in the nineties versus what
was in the seventies. You know what I mean?
Speaker 1 (36:39):
You know what, the same people that like Whalen were
calling George Straight a hack and the like George Strait
are calling Garth Brooks a hack. I mean, now he's
getting called a hack for other things. You know, But
you're right, I mean, change is obviously a part of
it and what we have is now with social media,
it's gasoline on the fire.
Speaker 2 (36:57):
Everybody just wants squeaky wheels. Squeaky wheel They go round
and round and round, and they got a lot of
time on their hands. Would see there at a lot
of a lot of time on their hands.
Speaker 1 (37:07):
One of the things that I wanted to kind of
get into with you guys is we have a lot
of people who listen to the podcast and they're kind
of just getting into fishing and tournaments.
Speaker 2 (37:16):
Might kind of freak them out a little bit.
Speaker 1 (37:18):
If you could take five baits and have them on
your deck no matter where you go in the country,
what are they?
Speaker 2 (37:24):
Man, I'm going a wacky worm of any kind because
you're gonna get bites. I'm always gonna throw a jig,
which I feel like that's what this guy's going to say.
For sure, some kind of top water based on the
time of the year, but definitely ten months out of
the year most places you can throw a top water
unless you're up north. That gives me three. I'm throwing
some kind of crank bait like a DT six. Rapple
of DT six gets a lot of bites, just a
(37:45):
little small profile crank bait, and then I would have
to say a shaky head. If I'm just going bass
fish and just try to catch some fish, you got
to break you ahead with a finet. I mean, just
just getting bites if you're if you're just getting into it, man,
get getting on the water and getting a bite is
the most important thing.
Speaker 1 (38:00):
You have a pretty good mix of finesse and power, yeah,
which I think a lot of guys, you know, they
kind of get hung up in one way or the other.
Speaker 2 (38:09):
Like I'm a power fisherman hunter. What are the five.
Speaker 3 (38:11):
Gosh, I don't know that I can argue, well that
that's a pretty good lineup.
Speaker 1 (38:16):
Would you put a drop shot in over a shaky head?
Speaker 3 (38:19):
I don't think so, do you.
Speaker 2 (38:22):
Well, No, I will, I will, I will say it
was it wasn't alternate. I will say I was thinking
dropshot a little bit.
Speaker 3 (38:28):
But the other thing A lot takes his rig. Yeah,
don't say that's not I think the shaky head comes in.
Speaker 1 (38:34):
Yeah, that gives you so much true reaction of what's
happening under the water, for sure, because if you got
the right head and you're dragging over rock and you
come over a piece of wood, and you know, my
favorite bite for a lot of a lot of shaky
head fishermen is you come over some rock and it
drops off that ledge and that's where the fish is
sitting and they wallop it. I love it. It's like
(38:55):
feeling a vacuum, just pulling your bait in and then
you know that you're gonna whack them. I like your list,
I really do. I think the dropshot is the only
other one that you could put on.
Speaker 2 (39:06):
Well it's a bike get Yeah, there's no doubt. I mean,
my kids, if they were in here right now, they
would say, drop shot, drop shot, drop shot, drop shot. Whacky.
They're here right now, my boy. But they're fifteen and eighteen,
and they're all about that dropshot life because they get bites,
you know. I mean, you just drag it around.
Speaker 1 (39:22):
A lot of people Hunter have said that you're a
phenomenal skipper. You can get under docks better than anybody.
Is that the technique that you truly love the most
or is there one technique that you're just like, man,
I love doing this.
Speaker 3 (39:36):
I don't know that it is skipping. I think I
think the hype maybe the issue was the skipping.
Speaker 2 (39:41):
That's a lot to do with that.
Speaker 3 (39:42):
I'm really not that great. I spent about fifteen minutes
getting a back lads shout yesterday because I hit a dock.
Speaker 1 (39:49):
See it happens to everybody, it does.
Speaker 3 (39:51):
Yeah. Yeah, my favorite would be a little finessgy Again,
it's not really, it's just everywhere. Like I don't really
drag the Compact yet, but I don't. I'm kind of weird,
like I don't drag it, but I don't swim it.
I just kind of hop it lit fall, hop it
(40:12):
lit fall.
Speaker 1 (40:13):
I mean it's paid off. So I wouldn't say that's
it works very well.
Speaker 3 (40:17):
But that's very closely followed by a Hollibody frog. Go.
I love throwing a frog.
Speaker 2 (40:21):
I would say, out of five years of covering you
on NVFL, yeah, you're all about a frog.
Speaker 3 (40:25):
But we just know we'd an opportunity, like you know,
you can throw the jig about it. The frog is
limited where you get the shin got its places, Yeah,
where it shines, it's limited.
Speaker 1 (40:35):
Well, Jay Lee has always said that, you know he
went out. I think he took a year and he
was trying to catch a frog. Is deep into the
years as he could, and he was catching him. I
mean when it was like not even close to frog
and weather. Are you somebody that loves locking a frog
in your hand and just going to task or do
you really look at water tamp water clarity time of year?
(40:56):
Are you that dialed in with how you like to fish?
Speaker 3 (40:59):
Yeah? I mean it. Yeah, yeah, it has to be right,
I guess, because here's one thing, like, if I'm fishing
water will I've always said this, especially when it gets
hot and pressured, like at home on Argansas River, it's
really tough. I feel like a frog fish will eat
a jig, but a jigfish won't eat a frog. Okay,
(41:21):
so why not just pitched a little jig around and
hop it out because you're gonna catch the same fish
that would aid a frog, But you're not gonna catch
it if you're throwing a frog and it would aid
a gig.
Speaker 2 (41:30):
There's so much less effort that a fish has to
go through to get it. Yeah, that's perfect sense.
Speaker 1 (41:35):
But there's so much less effort a fish has to
go through to get a jig.
Speaker 3 (41:38):
Yeah, that's like this time you're at home. I pretty
much don't ever throw top water like I have a
spook for if they come up schooling. Other than that,
I'm gonna start my day with a jig because I
feel like that'll get more bikes.
Speaker 1 (41:51):
Man, why is the spook so good?
Speaker 2 (41:54):
It's loud and obnoxious and looks like a bait fish
anything that looks like it's trying to get away from
them at the right time they do not like. It's
such a like.
Speaker 1 (42:01):
I hate to say this because it is probably one
of the best top waters of all time. It's such
a dumb looking bait like there is no flash to it.
It's literally just a tube with round to head.
Speaker 2 (42:11):
And I've caught as many on a clear just like
straight clear one as I have the beautiful ones that
catch your eye when you walk in the tackle store,
so like it been in a water clarity obviously, but
but yeah, I mean it's just that motion in the sound.
Speaker 1 (42:23):
There's a guy that was in FLW pro for years,
Kim Carver out of Georgia. I've known him for years.
Speaker 2 (42:29):
He won.
Speaker 1 (42:32):
Yeah, he's a fri, he's a machine okay, and he's
an awesome dude.
Speaker 2 (42:37):
Well, I went fishing with him when I was living.
Speaker 1 (42:39):
In Georgia and I got on his boat and he
opens up his box of spooks. There isn't paint left
on any of them. If I said to him, like, hey,
can I get a bone color, he'd be like, uh, yeah,
this is it. And I mean it's worn all the
way down and it hits the same exact way fish
hit it, the same exact way. He's throwing braid that
looks like a telephone corps. I mean it's thick, and
(43:01):
he's like, Man, if I'm not going to catch him
on this, I won't catch them. I learned from guys
like that, and it blows my mind, like they get
so comfortable and so confident in how they fish that
they can catch them with like yeah a ten gan.
Speaker 3 (43:15):
M oh, yeah, it's right, it's all yeah. Confidence is
a big deal. I've never been to a lake in
the US that han' etn that an't caught a fish
on the green jig. Like there's some hering lakes that
they don't eat that real good on, but I've caught
a fish on it. I might put it up after that,
but I've made it a point to never go to
a lake that they wouldn't eat, Like that's.
Speaker 1 (43:35):
Just my confidence. When you're practicing for a tournament, you
start getting bites. Do you cut that specific bait off
and then hold it for the tournament or are you
somebody where you're like, I've got four or five of
these jigs, I think they'll all act the same. How
crazy in tune do you get with your baits?
Speaker 3 (43:51):
Oh? No, like a jig especially, man, I've got a
hundred right now, Like I break five a day off.
Speaker 1 (43:55):
I feel like, so just know so you don't get
picky on like this one feels like it's really working. Well, No,
I'm You're not Aaron Martin going.
Speaker 3 (44:04):
Through I'm not counting strand I may be missing stuff,
but I'm not picking like people tweak their stuff. And
I'm like, all right, I think I'll die on right
out of the package.
Speaker 1 (44:16):
What's the craziest for I call it Frankensteining baits that
you've done and it's caught fish.
Speaker 3 (44:24):
I used to throw a jig football jig with a
drop shot makes a jig the way I've never called
two at once. I've tried something, but you never know
whether to set the hook for the drop shot or
like set the hook for the gig.
Speaker 1 (44:37):
So I lost a lot of it based on you.
Speaker 2 (44:39):
I know how you're saying it doesn't matter.
Speaker 1 (44:43):
Regardless as a tournament fisherman, Luke, when you were kind
of doing your thing best Frankenstein.
Speaker 2 (44:49):
Ba Man, I used to throw schooling fish, one of
my favorite things in the world. I used to throw
a spook with a piece of mono. So it was
way before we threw anything on break back then, So
I thought the spook on monos. It was a lot
of stretch, but a little tag of mono off my
back hook on the spit with a fluke on it
with his little zoom super Fluke Junior, So it looked
(45:10):
like they're kind of chasing each other and you'd catch
two at a time sometimes. But but yeah, it was
just kind of unders donkey. Yeah, but almost in reverse too,
because there's front runner. Remember the old Norman front runner
was this little bait that goes in front of a
top order of your choice. But this is why I
would do this behind it. Yeah, that was just a
random uh I used to the hell lot. I was
in college.
Speaker 1 (45:30):
Spro does these uh frog tournaments on different lakes and
they have one Huntersville line. A couple of years ago
they had to go back and rework their rules because
dudes were Carolina rigging fraud.
Speaker 2 (45:39):
Yep, I remember that, yeah, and they were smashing them.
Guys were punching frogs too, with big ways because you
have to use a frog but spro frog only. But
the frog bite wasn't all.
Speaker 1 (45:52):
It had to be worked like a traditional frog on top.
Speaker 2 (45:55):
They just said they've changed it now though, right, I mean,
they've got to be a top lot or you can change.
Speaker 1 (46:01):
You can't change the legs. All you can do is trim.
Speaker 2 (46:03):
You can't change the color. It's got to be completely
out of the package. Guys buzzbaits in front of them, like,
but you know, putting buzz bait blade guys will get creative.
But Carolina one of them got one, if I remember,
right on a Carolina rig on one of the famous
ledge spots on Gunnersville, like twenty two pounds like Carolina.
He's like, I'm out here this can you imagine a bass? Yeah,
(46:27):
a frog comes floating by on a Carolina.
Speaker 1 (46:30):
They say they don't have hands. They're gonna be like,
I'm gonna eat that.
Speaker 2 (46:33):
I'm gonna I'm probably I've never seen that down here. Yeah,
it's exactly right. I love that though.
Speaker 1 (46:38):
I think that there should be more tournaments where you
can get creative. You know, a lot of guys talk
about the tournament schedule and they're like, well they got
this and they got that. Well you bash master used
to do this kind of thing, and man, I'd love
to see some tournaments again where you had ten pounds
of tackle that you had to bring, it'll only bring
three rods, Like maybe doing those is kind of offshoots
(46:58):
would be kind of cool for sure.
Speaker 3 (47:00):
And you can bet talking about the rules, you can
hand any tournament fishermen set of rules and they're going
to push it. Absolutely.
Speaker 2 (47:07):
That's a fact every time. Little gray area? Is that
what you're talking about here? There's some gray areas every
fisher atney. Yeah, yeah, pretty much a lot of them.
A lot of the ones that win the most money.
I feel like are really could really they could get
you out.
Speaker 1 (47:22):
Of something, and you gotta be detail oriented. There's a
lot of guys where they'll go out and they'll throw
the same exact thing as somebody else. But the difference
in twelve pound tests a ten pound tests, it's a fact.
Speaker 2 (47:33):
It's a fact. What's the old saying it's hard to
catch somebody else's fish? As well, like the confidence, Like
you mentioned, it's the biggest thing in fishing. I see
that from either my own experience or covering tournament's. Confidence
is the number one best lure in your tackle bars.
Speaker 3 (47:48):
It is.
Speaker 2 (47:48):
I don't care. I mean you put a certain thing
Like Jason Christie. You're talking about him winning at Grand Lake.
I was in that tournament and on the co anger side,
but I got to witness I fished with Ishmunro one
day two and I witness Jason Christie in his element.
We were withinside of him and dude, everybody knew where
he was catching fish and he's flipping bushes. Nobody was
going to catch those fish like like Jason CHRISTI. It
(48:11):
was just me up the other day that video where
he was talking about how oh Shannon, Yeah yeah, so yeah.
I was talking to his wife about that because I'm like,
I would have been mortified because he was have you seen.
Speaker 1 (48:24):
The video hunter?
Speaker 2 (48:25):
Yeah, So he gets.
Speaker 1 (48:29):
He's like, I'm the most athletic guy in this count.
Speaker 2 (48:32):
I'll hit my arm on Jason. You know, he's basketball like, dude,
He's you don't get him going about basketball like he
he coached forever, he played forever, and then he coached,
and yeah, he was so insulted by that.
Speaker 3 (48:42):
It was amazing.
Speaker 1 (48:44):
It was such a good video because then everybody starts
talking about like, well, how athletic are bass fishing? Oh yeah,
and it's like, well, ask Jason Christie. I'll tell you
that they're all athletes.
Speaker 2 (48:53):
He was shook by that. It was amazing. And I'm
not in a lot of TikTok trends, you know. I'm
an old dude. I don't know. And my wife was like, oh,
you haven't seen those. Those those are everywhere and she's like,
we started to do one with you the other day
by the pool, and I'm like you better, Like, no,
I would take a lot of.
Speaker 1 (49:08):
The The big one right now is people try to
rage bait you so.
Speaker 3 (49:13):
Off.
Speaker 2 (49:14):
Oh yeah, and they get you go. People do a
good job of that with me a lot of time.
Hard whether it's the I was gonna say, ye know,
whether it's the internet or my kids at my house.
I'm my my freshman in high school. He says, I'm
rage bating you dad all the time. Like that's that's
in his vocabulary. I had to look at it. No,
(49:34):
he has not, he has not.
Speaker 1 (49:36):
I'm is he saying six seven?
Speaker 2 (49:39):
They say six seven a lot, and they say chopped
like they were talking about a uh some girl at
their high school was chopped and I had to ask
what that was and says, she's not that good looking.
And I'm like, well, that's very mean for you guys
to say, but chopped, chopped that is oh yeah, we
say cooked a lot at my house. That's mass cooked
bro bro. And I'm like flocking and all, oh yeah,
(50:02):
oh yeah, I mean we all I can't keep up.
Speaker 1 (50:05):
You're thirty eight, I'm forty three.
Speaker 2 (50:08):
Okay.
Speaker 1 (50:08):
So like when we were in high school, we all
had turns. Yeah girl with chopped, we.
Speaker 2 (50:13):
Just go the girls whatever. Yeah, butterfight Yeah that was one. Yeah.
Yeah we uh you know. I was in the nineties
attitude era of the WWF man. We said all kinds
of student stuff we heard on Monday Night roll. We
were doing some of those in school exactly.
Speaker 1 (50:31):
My mom actually was the teacher and she had to
ban wrestling T shirt I guarantee you because kids would
come in and they'd act like the Undertaker, try to
I'll drive somebody. My mom said these are all technical moves,
like you can't do that. The litt Johnny Camp come
in and get the diamond cutters from Dallas to Diamond.
Speaker 2 (50:48):
Page or whatever. The fact that my little brother is
still with us today after the trampoline beatings he took
from me and my friends, just like, all right, we're
gonna try this figure four leg lock. All right, sere
right here, dude, or the sharpshooter Brett Hart. He does this.
It's cool. We just stamp out and we're just you know,
giving him the business on the trampoline. He was four
years folders. It was a lot of fun. It's been
(51:10):
awesome to have you guys on the podcast.
Speaker 1 (51:12):
Make sure you download Lose podcasts and make sure you
check out Hunter as he continues to go for glory
and hopefully get a win here the West.
Speaker 3 (51:21):
That's the go
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