John Cox and Byron Velvick on MERCER-212

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
He is a seven time Bass master Classic qualifier, A2 time bass
Master winner, a nine time FLW tour winner, the always popular
John Cox. But that's not all.
We also kick off a brand new residency with Byron's Bunker.
Three time bass master winner, two time classic qualifier,
former Bachelor Byron Velvik. Both of them join me this week.

(00:21):
Oh. I'm Bob Cobb for the Bassmaster.
Welcome to Mercer. Welcome one.
Welcome all friends, family, freeloaders, fishing freaks, and

(00:42):
of course you, my humpers. Happy hump day to each and
everyone of you and welcome intothe awkwardly Honest fishing
podcast that goes by my last name, which is Mercer.
This is the 212th edition of theMercer Podcast and I hope
wherever you're watching or listening from, life is treating
you well. Thank you all for tuning in week

(01:04):
after week. As you can see, I am clearly not
in the Studio Slash office here this week.
I am on the road back-to-back Bassmaster events here in the
Lone Star State and behind me islegendary Lake Fork.
As you watch this, we are just afew hours away from kicking off
the sixth stop of 2025 in Orange, TX and the Sabine River.

(01:28):
I hope to see a bunch of you there.
But let's talk about this fabledfreaking fishery, Lake Fork.
Unbelievable. What a tournament.
I probably covered more tournaments on Lake Fork than
any other body of water if you take into account all the TTBCS
over the years. And this body of water is

(01:48):
literally responsible for my MC career, especially in the US.
This is where I got kind of my big break.
And I am thankful for everythingthat happened to the Toyota
Texas Pass Classic. I never come here and don't
think of Lenny, Andy, Katie, Eric Perry, everybody that that

(02:13):
Freddie, everybody that was a part of the original TTBC.
Then those are the Toyota Texas Pass Classic.
It's wild to think what that event has been over the years.
It really was my big break in the US.
It's one of the major reasons that Bass hired me, I would
imagine. And without that event, Lord

(02:39):
knows where I end up. But it was just an event ahead
of its time. It was when we would take 15
anglers from the Elite series, 15 anglers from FLW at the time,
15 anglers from the PAA at the time, and we would let them go
head to head. So you hear people every once in
a while we need an event where MLF goes against bass and blah,

(03:02):
blah, blah. We had it for a decade and
weirdly enough, I don't think itgot the credit it deserved at
the time, but it was so ahead ofits time.
I mean, when I drive past that field, every time I'm here, I
literally make sure to drive past that field and just
sometimes stop and just look because it's wild.
Like to think that, I mean, it'sjust a field right now.

(03:24):
Sabine River Authority. But at one time there was 3540
thousand people in that field for a tournament way and for a
Trace Adkins concert. It just was a cutting edge, way
ahead of its time event and something I was proud to be part
of. And that's literally where it
all started. That's where Catch Way and

(03:45):
release started just so they canhave a tournament on Lake Fork.
You have a slot limit here between 18 and 24 inches, so you
cannot bring the fish in. So to have a pro level event is
impossible unless you've judges in the boat and you do catch way
and release and that's where it all started.
Obviously MLF has adapted that and use it to great success and

(04:10):
once a year bass does it when wecome to Lake Fork.
So it's really, it's really coolto just come back to this area.
But every single time I'm at Fork, all the events I've
covered, it's just, I leave herescratching my head, being like,
wow, how does that fishery just continue to do what it does?

(04:36):
For the second year in a row, wehad 10 anglers.
The entire top ten had 100 lbs, which is unthinkable.
The fact that we were even talking about Paul Elias's
record from Falcon Lake in 2832,a 132 lbs eight oz.
The fact that that was even in conversation that it could get

(04:56):
beaten on Lake Fork is puzzling.Falcon at the time was
undiscovered. It's in Zapata in the middle of
nowhere Fork is an hour and a half from Dallas.
It is one of the busiest bass fishing lakes in the world.
I had a hard time finding a spotto actually sit down and record
this without people here. So the fact that we were even

(05:16):
comparing those two is wild And and I get it.
I know exactly when I say this, you some of you were like, but
forward facing sonar, yes, forward facing sonar, huge piece
of technology. It is a huge reason that the
weights are what they were. But I will say that record has

(05:40):
evolved over the years. I mean there's people that broke
that record before Paul, as Paulthat had different technology
than the people before them. It also makes me think that if
there was forward facing Sonar in 2008, Paul Elias would have
needed £50 a day to win on Falcon Lake.

(06:03):
It's wild when you think about it.
I mean if you don't believe that, just think Terry Scroggins
weighed in 44 Ford, the second biggest bag ever weighed in in
Bassmaster history. And he did that without forward
facing Sonar back then. So I mean it would have taken
£50 a day to win that tournamentif it was forward facing sonar.
And the other thing that nobody thinks about is back then they

(06:23):
were fishing with Co anglers, sothey were splitting fish.
I mean, you have to believe thatthroughout the week some of
their Co anglers caught some of the fish that they would have
ended up catching on the Elite series.
Now they're fishing with Marshalls, so nobody's taking
the fish. But what happened this past
weekend is truly incredible. It was just a fun, fun event.

(06:47):
Great crowds, great people. I loved meeting all the fine
humpers that were in the area. They don't like dealing with
critters crawling on me. It was it was just a fun, fun
week and I thank everybody that came out.

(07:08):
Had a lot of fun, had a lot of fun.
Seth Fighter, he needs a certainshout out.
I mean all 10 and also Tucker Smith.
Congrats on winning the lead series event in only your 5th
Elite series event. Really cool to see him and Paul
Marks flip flop. Hartwell.
Him and Paul Mark for first and second.
They were first and second once again, but this time, you know

(07:30):
the opposite order and I believe, I haven't checked it,
but Paul Mark said on the stage he believes that they were
separated by 14 ounces in both occasions, which is wild.
Another wild thing is the fact that Tucker Smith won that event
on Mother's Day. The most famous mother son
combination in bass fishing history is Aaron Martin's and

(07:51):
his mother Carol. Aaron won on Mother's Day with
his mother in attendance at LakeHavasu.
Tucker Smith is Aaron's protege and he won on Mother's Day.
I might be overthinking it, but I just think somewhere upstairs

(08:12):
Aaron is looking down and smiling because it was a very,
very cool event. Special shout out to Seth
Fighter who cracked the Century Club but he did it in the dirt.
He won the dirt Derby most of the field.
I mean Wesley Gore caught a bunch of shallow fish but he was
also scanning quite a bit. But Seth did an old school he

(08:33):
won the dirt Derby. Me and him made a agreement that
during Mercer in the morning that if he cracked £100 I would
buy him a trophy. So he gets a dirt Derby trophy.
So I need to make said trophy and present it to him.
I'll probably present it to him as part of Mercer in the Morning
because that's where it started.For those of you who watch
Mercer in the Morning, it's an hour before each Elite series

(08:56):
take off or classic take off. I run around with this skinny
Bob Barker microphone that I'm using right now and I just ask
weird questions and talk to anglers when they're half
asleep. You should try TuneIn because
we'll have it again this week onthe Sabine River where I as
you're watching this. We're just a few hours away from
kicking off the sixth stop of 2025 in Orange, TX, the Sabine

(09:20):
River. It is the home of the record
crowds. We had 40 something 1000 people
there the last time we were there.
We'll have giant crowds again. We will not have century belts.
It is a much more stingy fishery, good for numbers but
not for size. I mean, that part of the world
deals with hurricanes and floodsand things like that.
The fish just don't get big. But it's always a fun,

(09:42):
compelling tournament to follow.I mean, we had Lee Livesey last
time jumping dead cows. I mean, nothing's as fast
fishing like jumping dead cows. It's always a compelling, fun
tournament. Brock Mosley the defending
champion there, Jason Christie'sone there, Hackney's one.

(10:04):
I mean it's just a fun event. And here's if you're not as
forward facing sonar guy, prettygood chance that this will be
the least amount of forward facing sonar we'll see
throughout the year. So make sure you're tuning in
this week. Doesn't matter what's going on
in my life, I make sure you guysget a show each and every
Wednesday and I pre recorded 2 segments for this show to make

(10:26):
sure that we had a show. I mean, I mean I sure I could
pull the hey, I'm on the road. We got back to backs.
We can't do a show, but I promised you guys you'd have a
show each and every Wednesday and this one is a good one.
We kick things off with John Cox, who is incredible, one of
my favorite people to literally talk to.
We have weird little conversations throughout the

(10:47):
year where we just call each other and have rando
conversations because he's just a fun dude to talk to.
And then we kick off a brand newresidency.
Residency started here in this podcast.
Of course, we had the Rick Klungresidency.
Seems some other podcasts are adding residencies now.

(11:08):
But hey, that's how the podcast world works.
But we're adding one Byron's Bunker, the always popular Byron
Velvik, former Bachelor Classic qualifier, Bassmaster winner.
He joins the show once a month, tells us a quick, funny story,

(11:28):
Interesting story. Sad.
Well, I mean, doesn't he tells us a story?
The stories are all good. You guys know you've watched the
shows, and we'll still do shows with him throughout the year.
But Byron's going to come on once a month, going to tell us a
story, and then he's going to talk to us about some of the
stuff on eBay. It should be a fun segment that
you can tune into each and everymonth.
Speaking of which, we have, that's our big announcement for

(11:50):
this week, a very big announcement coming next week.
Something I'm really excited about that we're going to start
doing on the show. This show continues to evolve.
Don't worry, Jake's take will beback in your life.
Obviously, in back-to-back events, it's hard to fit it in,
but Jake was in the boat with Kyoya Fujita.
I pushed him and bullied him into getting some of the secrets

(12:13):
from Curious, so he will be sharing those with us when we do
a double dose of Jake's take. Basically, he'll break down
everything that he saw at Fork. Then he'll also break down
whoever he is with this coming week in Orange, TX on the Sabine
River. So that is something to look
forward to. But without further ado, let's
just jump right into this show and we'll kick things off with

(12:38):
the water and only. John Cox.
John Cox, We now interrupt this laughter.
Soon start recording this podcast.
How are you? Man, I'm awesome, doing good.
I just got back from Oregon lastnight.
I went and shot with the loophole guys.

(12:58):
They kind of taught me how to dosome long range rifle shooting
and man it it was epic. I shot Bigfoot at 12160 yards.
I can't, I couldn't even see them.
You know, I had to, I had to hithow to find them with my
binoculars, you know, hit them with the range Finder, do a
little guessing and they have this custom dial now that they

(13:20):
make for their scopes that I just dialed it in.
I don't even know what I'm doingand I'm able to, you know, hit
them at 1200. It was 12162 yards.
It was insane. Like 1212 1/2 football fields.
Yeah, crazy. Do you realize the goal to you
just, I mean, I can literally call this podcast John Cox.
I shot Bigfoot. I'm just setting it up for you,

(13:45):
Dave. I appreciate it.
Wow. Yeah, wow, we don't even want.
To do anything else, we're done.Thanks for tuning in.
So you have no experience that? Dude that is a ridiculous.
I mean, the furthest I shot before was like 100 feet, you

(14:08):
know, I mean, I'm in Florida, you know, there's houses that I,
I, the only time I, I shoot, like I'll shoot.
Yeah. It's just not, there's nowhere
to do it that I know of. And so I, you know, they, they
were like, hey, they had a few of us out there and they wanted
to show us some new products andstuff.
I mean, it, it was, it was an awesome trip, a super awesome
trip. A lot of new stuff coming.
It's really cool. The wife and Lil came and for

(14:32):
day one I don't hear from them all day.
I'm like they must be having a blast.
Check the location, you know, because we got the life 360 or
whatever. They haven't moved in like 7
hours and they're like out in the Wilder, like out in the
woods and nothing. So I'm like, you know, we'll
give them till, you know, 6:00 tonight.
So everybody back here in Florida, it's dark, all the
kids, other kids. So they start panicking.

(14:54):
They call the cops. We got the cops looking for
Melissa and Lil. This is the first day we're out
there. And so I'm like kind of
panicking and I don't know what to do.
I don't have a car and they. Called the cops from Florida.
Yeah, and had them like and thenand so and then they crawl on me
and then they're looking for us.They're like we're pinging her
phone. We got a 25 mile radius.
We don't see their car. And then like, you know, 7:00

(15:18):
comes and Melissa and Lil come out of the woods had the best
day of their life, you know, hiking.
So I I had to call the police officer back.
I was like, man, I owe you a fishing trip.
I'm so sorry. Like, they're fine, you know,
and the pictures they got were epic.
Like they were in the snow one minute, then they were like on
this mountain, like climbing these rocks the next minute, and

(15:41):
then they're in a waterfall. I mean, it was they had a really
good time. So why did they not move like it
was just their phone wasn't? No signal out there, I guess.
Yeah. So once it lost it, it kept them
in that one and they were they were like they were way far past
that even but. Wow, what a day.
I mean, you're shooting Bigfoot.Yeah, they're getting searched

(16:01):
for. I mean, you need a freaking
reality show, my friend. I mean, that is the sweeps week
episode right there. Not.
John shoots Bigfoot and his loved ones are missing forever.
Yeah, that's, I did feel a little guilty because I'm like,
maybe I should have went with them, you know, But I was like,

(16:22):
I'm having the best day of my life, you know?
It was, it was, it was somethingelse.
Yeah, yeah, sounds like it sounds like So that's what you
do to relax in between lead series events.
Yeah, go on other trips. I don't know what's happening to
your signal. We're fighting it here,

(16:42):
hopefully from the other end. Oh, you're back.
You're back. You're good.
Oh man, I lost you for a second.I should have just no.
I had your voice. But you.
Just you were like. I might have been just staying
like that, I don't know. It'd be great.
You're welcome to do that whenever you wish.
What? What is like a real, I mean, so

(17:03):
this is so now I feel guilty. When are you leaving for Texas?
Tomorrow morning. OK, so moment of total honesty,
we shot this before Lake Fork. So this is going to air between
fork and orange. I'm getting ahead because.
Yeah, we're going to be busy. Yeah, we're going to be busy,
but this is like your one day athome and I'm invaded it.

(17:28):
I feel like a total asshole. No, Dave, this is what this is
what we do. I mean that that was, you know,
that wasn't really, I don't feellike that was work for me last
week, you know, and, and even the week before that when I was
fishing at Hartwell, that was a lot of fun too.
So, yeah, so I mean, this is, you know, it's all part of it.
It's a lot of fun. And man, I'm looking forward to

(17:49):
the next two. They're going to be a lot of
fun. Fork and Sabine.
I know a lot of people don't like Sabine, but I mean, it's
the challenge part of it that I,that's what I, you know, I do
enjoy that part so. It's a fun event I love.
I mean, it is always, it's always fun to follow, you know
what I mean? But it's here's the only problem

(18:09):
I'm calling it right now, horrible order.
I mean, if we were going to Sabine next, we went from
Hartwell to Sabine, we're going to go from freaking Lake Fork.
Catching 10 pounders. To 10 lbs is good.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. They're, they're mixing it up
for us. You know what's not what's nice

(18:31):
about Sabine is when you show, Imean, the people, the people
there love us for the most part.I mean besides the people that
stole my my kind of weight converter that time.
But that was they weren't from. They weren't from Warren.
Yeah, they were from war over byHouston or something, But for
the most part, everybody there, they, they, I mean, they're
there. They're there during practice at

(18:51):
the Rams. It's waiting to, you know, to
hang out and talk to us when we come in.
Go out. Yeah, which is cool.
Giant crowds, incredible crowds for the weigh in.
Yeah, they're good. They're good people.
Just lock down your catalytic converter.
Yeah. Yeah, yeah.
How many did they get? They got like 8 or.
Nine, yeah, 8 or 9. I was the only one that still

(19:12):
drove it. I didn't think there was any,
you know, I was like, ah, you can drive it.
Lester probably would have drovehis.
But the when the guy came up, they watched the video.
When he got out from underneath,he hit his head on the mirror
and was like, oh, and he like cut or he cut the guy's mirror
off and then cut Lester's tire. So he was he was having a bad

(19:33):
day, but. Damn it, that never got in the
way of my thievery. Yeah, you are.
Driving it, dude, I mean, when you rolled up, I saw you that
morning, you rolled up and you were like, it's like a NASCAR.
All they got to do is Weld the doors shut.
Oh God, You didn't put your phone and do not disturb, did

(19:54):
you? That you're going to destroy.
This entire podcast. I am so sorry I didn't I didn't
know I my bad the. Yeah, You know, I drove it in
there and yeah, I mean, I was trying to make the best of the
day. So I was I was revving it up and
stuff. It was, it was crazy.

(20:15):
That's how you are, though. That's how you are.
You don't. You're never.
You're never grumpy. Sometimes, yeah, ask my wife.
Sometimes I get. Sometimes I get frustrated.
What? What is what?
What happens to make John Cochran?
So I think it's more, I don't know, I think, I think it's, I

(20:37):
think it's usually the kids, youknow, them kids, God, them kids.
I love them to death, but man. Don't whisper.
They're not going to watch this podcast.
They. I don't.
You never know. They might be.
They probably. Think your kids are a bigger fan
of you than they really are? Yeah, they might be.
You're probably right. Oh my.

(21:00):
Do you think they still like going on the stage?
So that I don't think they like anymore.
I mean, it's, it's been obvious.I mean, you've seen it.
It's like, you know, I've had totwist their arms.
But I, I wanted to say the last one, they went to the last
classic when we came home that was like, hey, dad, I'm going to

(21:21):
get a rod out of the garage. Like all of them, all of them
have rods and reels back in their truck set up ready to go.
And, you know, and they were, they were haven't been like that
in a really long time. So.
It's kind of. Neat, they love.
Fishing. They just don't like when their
dad ridicules them on stage and makes them home.
Fishing. Yeah, yeah.
Yeah, I made it to go. I wasn't frozen.

(21:44):
I that look I was giving you. That's the look that your girls
give you on stage. Yeah, yeah, they are.
They're like, why am I up here? Yeah.
So what is a? You don't get a lot of them, but
what is a day off like? John Cox So a day off for me.
I'm, you know, I'll, I'll sleep in, you know, try to anyways, or

(22:09):
I'll sleep a little. Bit I'll.
Like I'll have to get up at like, well, I'll get up with,
I'll get up with Nan at six and then she'll go to school and
then I'll go back to sleep for about 30.
Then I'll wake Lil up and then Lil will go to school and then
I'll go back to sleep for maybe a couple more hours.
And then I'll get rolling like, you know, around 9:00 or 10:00.
And yeah. And then, you know, if I have

(22:30):
absolutely nothing, I'm, I'll probably go fishing somewhere
around here. I mean, that's pretty much, I
don't really know what else to do with my life that's honest
with you. That's it really.
I mean, last last time I had offI had to, I was fixing, fixing
sprinklers. And that was my goal today was
to change some more sprinklers, work on the pool, pack my stuff.

(22:54):
But when you were like, hey, come on and do you know, come
on, do the show with me. I was like, sure, you know, I
didn't. Screw the sprinklers.
Yeah, I don't want to do anymoresprinklers.
No, not at all. Sorry, but you're welcome.
It saves you from sprinkler, dude.
Yeah. Whenever you come home after

(23:15):
this road trip and you've brown grass.
That's why. Because of me.
My gift. Yeah.
So you're looking forward to Texas?
Oh yeah, yeah. I mean, I love going out there.
You know, it was kind of funny last time, you know, you guys
were all asking me, well, ask mycamera guy on live, how do you

(23:36):
think you're doing right now? You know, and I thought I was,
you know, I had 1819 lbs. I was feeling like, OK, you
know, I was like, I'm not reallyhaving a great day.
And then when I came in, I was in like dead last.
So it was, it was pretty impressive last last time.
This time it will be more, you know, probably a little more top

(23:58):
water action stuff like that. So it'll be a lot of fun.
Yeah, you like top water? Yeah, I do.
I I like, you know, I like. Florida thing though too.
Yeah, I guess so. I mean, I do like I like seeing
the fish react on a bait, you know, and eat it.
Like I just I don't know that does it for I mean, I have, you

(24:18):
know, burned in my memory so many times where a big fish
would come up and either eat a frog or eat a swim bait or eat a
swim jig and I would either missit or it would miss the bait,
you know. And like those, those you don't
forget those fights, you know, and and then ones you've caught
too. So I don't know, just some of
them, you know most memorable fish catches or you know when

(24:41):
you see them eat it. Do you have like a most
memorable like if somebody said,hey, what was the greatest fish
you've ever caught in your And Idon't mean like, hey, I caught
this one and I won this tournament.
Do you have like a moment that in your mind?
God, I mean, the one that really, that I really remember

(25:02):
was that one we went to Harris Chain a while back and day 2,
you know, I got enough to make the cut.
I'm I'm looking for a couple extra.
I see this fish that's like as long as my leg, you know, and
I'm like, Oh my gosh, I fished for it for a minute, can't catch
it. And I come in, I make the cut
and I'm like, I'm going straightback to that fish and I'm not,
I'm going to stay on it all day.I'm like thinking it's £15 or

(25:24):
so. I get there.
I fish for it for like, I think I'm 4 hours.
I was in on it day three, can't catch it.
I'm like doing all kinds. I'm changing directions, I'm
throwing all different baits andfinally I'm getting frustrated.
I ease up on that fish and I like put the cattail under my
foot and I'm holding the boat there and I just drop my, my
little crawl right over its headand I gave it 1 pop and she just

(25:46):
opened up and sucked it in. And I'm like, Oh my gosh, I got
this 15. I get them all the way in.
I grab it and it's not quite 15.You know, it's skinny and, you
know, and I'm thinking it's onlylike A10 pounder.
I'm like, it's only a 10. And I was frustrated, but it
was, it was, you know, but it was like one of the most epic
catch ever ended up being like an 11 pounder.
But yeah, it was, that was that one I remember.

(26:08):
I mean, I remember like it was yesterday too.
That was a incredible bite and fish catch.
I mean, I set the hook on them. I had maybe, maybe the maybe 10
feet of line out with 20 LB big game.
You know, the the new Crick crawl we were we were working
on, you know, and it was just got sat in the hook.

(26:30):
I mean it didn't even move when I set it on him.
You know, that line stretched real nice.
And I mean it was just awesome. It was awesome fish sketch.
Do do you comprehend at any level how few, how, how small
the percentage of humans that exist on this earth that have
ever said it was only a 10,000? Yeah, yeah.

(26:54):
I just, I just thought, yeah, I don't know if I would have spent
that much time on it, but I'm glad I did.
It was, you know, became one of my most memorable fish catches
so. Yeah, your bet it was only an 11
LB. Yeah, it was skinny.
What is the biggest bass you've ever caught?

(27:14):
I mean, that was the biggest oneI've ever weighed in in a
tournament. But I, I've caught, you know,
because you know, I was doing a lot of Shiner trips a lot a long
time ago and I, I watched some people catch some really big,
you know, 1213 LB fish. So.
Yeah, yeah, you still love the Shiner fish a little bit.

(27:34):
Yeah, I do. That's what I mean, you know,
that's it's a lot of fun. You don't have to go for long.
A lot of action, you know? Yeah, it's a yeah.
We just love fishing. Yeah, I really do.
Yeah, I do. And when you take, when you take
someone Shiner fishing, you can take anybody Shiner fishing.
They don't have to know how to fish anything, you know And you

(27:56):
have a great. Oh boy, here we go.
And we, we're just going to dealwith this the whole time.
Am I able to turn it off? I mean, yeah, you can do it.
Go ahead, let. Me.
See. I mean, give her a little slide.
Let. Me see.
Regular viewers of this show areused to this because two
reasons. The main reason is I'm not good

(28:20):
at my job and when I spend 10 minutes laughing with the guests
before we even start recording, See, do you see focus?
Did you hit focus slide? Oh no, I was on focus.
I was on focus. You've got to hit it, don't you?
I mean, you clearly were not on.You were getting interrupted.
But, well, no. So that's what I thought.
I don't know why they're coming through.

(28:40):
I I leave it on focus always. OK, all right.
But we'll find out. Yeah, I don't know.
Well, so if it's on focus and they call 3 times then it comes
through right? Or?
Two times. Do you have emergencies you need
to deal with? Oh no.
But that's what people do when they want to get a hold of me.
They call over and over. Why?
You have a lot of friends that do that.

(29:00):
No, I don't have any friends Dave.
I just. Have the bull.
It's a nobody that doesn't like you.
No, it was like all kinds of it's probably, I don't know, I
probably didn't pay on the truckpayment and they're going to tow
it or something. Probably.
Today's high tech fishing world can be a real pain in the neck,
especially if you're running thewrong mount beat down outdoors.

(29:20):
They bring the graph to you and they support this podcast and
care enough. About You To make this a short
ad read, check out Beat Down Outdoors.
Now back to the show. I'm I'm drinking a water with a
a Celsius powder in it. You like a little taste?

(29:41):
Is that what it's all about? Yeah, a little taste, little,
you know, peps me up. It's way better than a a
slushie. I mean not better, but better
for you. Yeah, that as soon as I got off
the plane, that was my first stop.
I haven't eaten all day, get offthe plane and went into 711 and
kind of got a Slurpee. What does a Slurpee make you

(30:04):
feel? You know, I, I don't know, I
think it just, it brings me backto like hanging out with my mom
and dad when I was a kid. And like, you know, my mom would
sit on the porch, smoke a pack of cigs and and I would drink my
Slurpee, you know. So it's kind of good time.
Just yeah, good time. We fish from the bank somewhere,
you know, like it was just, I don't know, it comforts me, I

(30:26):
guess. Yeah, I don't know.
Is he ever asked fighter just tosit around and smoke near you?
So you. Yeah.
Yeah, that's probably why I get,I mean, fighter reminds me a
lot. You know, he's, he's a lot like
my mom. What kind of darts does she
smoke? Well, she likes to mix it up,
you know, She's, you know, one day she'll be Marble Reds, you

(30:48):
know, and then she'll she'll geton a menthol kick and then, you
know, and then every once in a while some Virginia Slims.
I refuse to buy buy some of those, though, when she's like,
Hey, can you pick me up a pack? I just, I feel weird buying, you
know, Virginia Slims. It just, I don't know.
I don't know, you know, Marvel ones I can buy.
I'm like, I'll take those, but I'll always send my brother in

(31:09):
for the Virginia Slims. That's where you draw the line.
Yeah, I mean, I got this somewhere.
I'll buy yours cancer sticks. Yeah, I ain't kidding you,
Virginia. Yeah.
So yeah, get get some real ones,Mom.
Get the cowboy killers. If you're going to smoke, smoke

(31:31):
damn. It Yeah.
Not loyal to any brand though. Wow.
No, she's most. Smokers, she's very like they
smoke that and bright it. Well, so she is very particular
on where you get them, you know.You know, the Virginia Slims

(31:51):
have to come from the store up by winn-dixie.
The Marble Reds have to come from the Circle K down at the
end of the street. Like they there's certain places
that they have to come from. Why?
She says, she says they're fresher.
Yeah, says they're fresher. I don't know.
I don't smoke them so I have no idea.

(32:15):
Have you ever tried to just go to the one store and be like,
yeah, I went to that one you? Were Oh, yeah.
No, she knows. She's like, oh, she's like,
these are we? Where'd you get these at?
I'm like, are you kidding me? Like, are you serious right now?
Crazy. Strangely, the more you tell me
about your mother, the more I'm getting to know you.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. You see where all of it comes

(32:38):
from. Yeah, do you?
Do you dream about fishing? I dream of, I guess.
I mean, I set the hook a lot in my sleep, you know?
But I, I I never connect with them though.
It's very weird. It's always, Oh yeah, it's
always like A and it wakes you up and you're like, oh, I missed

(32:59):
them, you know, like, so I mean that, yeah.
But I don't think I ever, I never, yeah.
I'm always just missing them in my sleep, you know?
Those are nightmares. Yeah, pretty much, yeah.
I mean it wakes me up. Yeah.
I have that one. Then I do have this other dream

(33:21):
too, that, you know, I'm like leading the tournament.
I think it's a classic. And I don't get up, you know, in
like I'm trying to get up, but Ican't get up.
Tournaments going on and then I get up, you know, and you guys
are all there and you're like, you know, oh, you can go out and
fit. You can maybe fish for an hour,
but then it's time to come in and I'm like, Oh my gosh, I

(33:42):
can't fish everything in an hour, you know?
And I'm that and I'm panicking. I'm like, you know, the heart's
racing. I'm probably having a mild
stroke at the time, you know? But yeah, crazy.
Have you ever slept in for a tournament?
Me like, well, yeah, I used to be a little bit of a slacker and

(34:09):
I'd never like super late like alot of like in the FLW days, I
would get there, you know, as like the last boat was taken off
or something or, you know, but. And when me and Keith fish some
team stuff, fishers of men, likesometimes we would jump in some
of the divisions far away and, you know, we would drive, you
know, 5-6 hours to a tournament and we'd get there at like 9:00

(34:31):
and, you know, meet the people, you know, meet the directors and
stuff, eating breakfast somewhere.
They would check everything and we'd dump in and and fish the
tournament. But but yeah, I got my, I got my
life together. Now I get there on time.
I get there early. I think it's a getting old
thing. Why do you get there early?
I, I don't know, I just, I think, 'cause I'm like ready to

(34:52):
go, like I'm ready to, you know,you still get.
You still get like butterflies in the morning A.
Little bit or just aunt like antsy to go.
Like when you get on the mic andstart talking, then I know it's
like, you know, like, oh, we're getting ready to go.
Like, you know, I'm getting, youknow, I'm getting jacked up, you
know, I don't know. I love it though.

(35:15):
You do you. I mean, it's it's wild to watch
you compete. And I've said this to you
before. I mean, we get to all see each
other kind of under all circumstances.
You can see people when they're happy, when they're sad, when
they're, you know, when it's good things are going there.
We're bad. Like, you know what I mean?

(35:36):
You get to see if you spend thatmuch time on the road.
But dude, you just always bound of happiness.
Like you're like the the American Takumi.
You know. How you look at Takumi and he's
just yeah, I. Mean well, I mean, he probably
feels the same way I do. It's just, you know, amazed to

(35:57):
be there. You know, it's incredible.
I mean, that's the part like when, you know, at that take off
in the morning, you see all the guys here's guys you watched on
TV, you know, in your life and like, you know, it's like, you
know, you're up to everybody. Like it's just it's unreal.
You're like, man, I'm here, I'm fishing, I'm fishing the
Bassmaster elites right now. You know, I still feel like I'm

(36:18):
that 20 year old kid. That's why I don't it's just
incredible to you know, it's it's hard to believe sometimes,
you know, so there's no bad daysbeing there.
I mean, you're, you're there andyou know, I even like I came in
Smith Lake last year, I think, Ithink I caught like 5 fish over
2 days, you know, and I had a lot of really good bites.
But I don't know. I thought I was going to be

(36:39):
really, you know, really mad andupset and, you know, I don't
know. You can't get there.
You can't. I mean, dude, I talked to you
right after the classic this year.
Like while you were like right at the loading docks, I was
leaving. You were heading back to your
boat and you were bummed about the classic.

(37:01):
You know what I mean? You were just like, but you're
still smiling like it. But that moment and I feel like
I've seen it different people gothrough it.
But like that moment where you're like, damn, I was, I was
close in this classic. Like a couple of things go right
and this is mine. How tough is that to deal with

(37:22):
for you? I, I, I do hate that part, but
you know, my first two days wentreally well in this last 1.
And in the final day, they just quit coming to me, you know,
because the wind kind of laid down and stuff and they didn't
have to swim all the way back there.
But it made me realize how it could have been earlier in the

(37:43):
week and I could have not even been there that last day, you
know. So I mean it, you know, it's
tough and I do want, I want to win one, you know, But I mean,
when it, you know, one of these days it'll line up, you know?
It will. It will.
And if not, yeah, whatever. Stuff's still pretty good.
Yeah, stuff's still good. Still fishing there.

(38:04):
You know, as long as I get to keep going.
I mean that just making that tournaments, like, I mean, it's
great. I mean, you know, just, you
know, it's one we all look forward to every year and.
Yeah, I don't know. How does it feel different like
in the mornings are the we just talked about kind of sometimes
jitters and the regular elite classic morning?
What is it like for you? You know, it is a little intense

(38:27):
with everybody's out there and stuff.
You know, a lot of fans out there.
I just, I think I enjoy it because it's, you know, the
field's smaller already, so it'slike we already made a cut.
You know, usually fish is a little more open, you know,
compared to this last time we were all kind of fishing really
close to each other. But I don't know, it was just

(38:47):
and I love, I love that March time of year.
I mean, that's my favorite time to fish anywhere, you know, So
it's just, you know, I'm just always like, man, I'm really
glad it's right now in March andit's not in the middle of summer
or fall. You.
Know Yeah, well, it's fun to watch you compete.

(39:08):
Do you realize that the reverence that people speak of
you like, I mean the the fellow anglers, like we're doing this
frog thing together for officialand official and another guy in
that is Ish Monroe. And it's just like, well, who
else is going to be on this? And it went through the people

(39:30):
that are on it. And when he got to you, he's
like, man, that guy, in my opinion, is the greatest natural
shallow water angler. In the.
Sport like. I don't even know.
I mean, that's I mean, I I've watched, I don't even know, like
I, I've watched ish my whole life, you know, and that was,

(39:51):
you know, Ish was always, you know, big line frog flipping and
you know, I actually fished an FLW tournament maybe like a a
month before you guys went down there and I got second and then
I watched ish go in and just destroy him And when like, and I
was like thinking the whole I'm like, man, those fish were there
the whole time. And like he just like he did it

(40:14):
so well and won that one. And yeah, it just is, you know,
gosh, that's crazy. Yeah, Yeah.
You think you'll, you told me once, like you don't want to
ever stop doing this, but do do you think?
Like, how late do you? I mean, are you going to be the
next Rick Klun? Oh gosh, I don't know if I'll
live that long, but but I'll layon some.

(40:36):
Slurpees. Yeah, I know.
I don't think, I don't think I have, you know, the health like
Rick does. But but the yeah, I don't know,
you know, I mean, The thing is, if I'm not fishing these, I'm
going to be fishing at home, youknow.
So I'm like, I'm thinking like as time goes on, if it starts
getting too much, maybe I'll just cut practice out, you know,

(41:00):
and, and just wing it. What would the perfect practice
be for you? Like if you could make the
rules. Yeah.
What would it be? One day, yeah, one day would be
cool. I mean, I I do like riding
around kind of seeing everything, but I also some of
the most memorable tournaments. I it's a different feeling when
you show up and, you know, everybody else practice and you

(41:23):
go from one tournament to the next and you show up the day of
the tournament and you go out there and you figure it out that
first day. I mean, it, it's like a whole
nother level of excitement. Like it's like, Oh my gosh, I
got them figured out, you know, and it's just, but it can also
go really bad too, you know? But the times it has worked out,
it's been it's been awesome. So you mean like it's a whole

(41:45):
different level of excitement for you personally, Yeah.
So it's a whole different feeling like, you know, when you
go out, you practice, you kind of have an idea what you're
going to do. You go out and fish the
tournament. But man, when you show up, no
practice. Yeah, it's sometimes I've showed
up not even know not even been to the lake before show up and
then put it together and be one time I was leading at Sturgeon

(42:06):
Bay the first day I showed up. That was insane.
Like I. Remember that.
Yeah, and they like threw cameras in my boat and I'm like,
guys, I've never even seen this place.
Like I was like, so I was more nervous in that moment than than
any tournament ever. And, and I remember just
catching them like, like first stop catching them every throw,

(42:27):
you know, And it was just like, boy, it was, it was incredible
feeling. Take me through what you do in
that like, so you go to, I mean,doesn't have to be Sturgeon Bay
it it can be wherever you want, but you go to a body of water
you've never fished before. Like how do you like, how did
you start that day? Like what?
I mean, honestly, that morning I, I knew I, you know, we just

(42:51):
came from Saint Clair, you know,I was catching them in the
river, throwing up the walls andstuff.
And so when I came out of the boat ramp, you know, I looked on
my map, you know, you got it wasa Green Bay to the left or
whatever, or Lake MI to the leftand something over to the right.
I don't know. But when I went out there, I was
like, man, it was just so overwhelming.

(43:12):
And I, I hung a right and I wentunder a bridge and I was
thinking about, oh man, I shouldhit that bridge.
But then I looked up over to theright and there was a, a metal
wall, you know, just like we were at Saint Clair.
And I was like, well, we might as well try it.
And. Oh my gosh, where they loaded on
it? Oh my gosh, I think it got like
£100 that day. It was insane.

(43:34):
So it's really that it's like. You just go, you know it's.
Free. Yeah, you just, you know, and
that and sometimes I'll ride. That's what I like visually
throwing at stuff. So like everything I know is
I've seen it with my eyeballs, you know.
So like a lot of times I'll justride and then when I see
something that looks set up similar to somewhere I've been

(43:55):
or done, well, you know, try it out, you know, So it's just
trial and error and. How much of it is gut feeling
and how much of it is like mathematical, like I fished this
at this time of year, this, Thisis why they're there?
And I, I try, I fight with myself that I do fight with
myself a lot, but usually whatever's inside telling me to

(44:21):
do something is usually like 90%, right.
But you know, 50% of the time I don't want to do it.
You don't want to do it way I want to do it, you know, maybe
even 90% of the time it's right.And I just don't want to like, I
don't want to do it sometimes, you know, like, I mean, that was
like the whole spinning rod thing.
Like, I mean, when I was fishingall these years, like I did not

(44:43):
want to throw that spinning rod.You know, I just I wanted to
use, you know, braided line baitcasters.
And I remember the first tournament I I pulled it out and
I was like, OK, I practiced witha bunch in the offseason,
whatever pulled out and and I went in the tournament on
Hartwell with it, you know, and I was like, Oh my gosh, you
know, like I got to, I got to use this more, you know, and

(45:05):
it's AI don't know. It's that that spinning rod has
definitely kept me going over the years, you know, because,
you know, I don't. Know is that exactly what's
going on in your life with Forward face and sonar?
Oh yeah, I'm fighting it. Oh yeah, I'm fighting it.
I'm fighting it, I'm fighting it.
Really, you know, I'm really fighting it.

(45:28):
I just don't, I, I enjoy what I do and I don't want to lose
that. I don't want to lose that
visually seeing areas and knowing that they're good, you
know, yeah, I don't want to haveto put the troll motor in and
then, you know, search and be like, OK, this, you know, I
just, I don't know. I just don't want to.
I don't want to try to relearn something that that I really

(45:49):
love, you know, kind of. I feel like, and I mean this as
a compliment, but you've explained this to me before and
I feel like John Cox is scared of forward facing sonar.
And what I mean by that is you're not scared to use it,
you're just scared of what you have to give up to use it.

(46:11):
Does that make sense? Oh, 100%, yeah.
Yeah. And I mean, because, I mean, if
I put it on, I mean, I so I lovelooking at fish and throwing to
him. That's my favorite thing to do.
And to be able to do that all the time, you know, it's scary.
Well, I mean, you're kind of committed now though.
Like, I mean, yeah, I mean, if I.

(46:31):
If I put it on now, you know, you feel like I'm burn my house
down. I don't know.
Dude, I don't know if you noticed it and I pay attention
to this stuff. Maybe it's just a little
wrestling geek in myself, but you got a pop.
I mean, you always get a great pop from the crowd wherever we
are, but you got a distinct pop every time I mentioned that you

(46:53):
don't have forward faces. Sonar at the Classic, every time
I mentioned that, you'd get the cheer and then I'd say that and
then you'd get. Like.
There, it's become A and that's actually why I did it, because I
was like, am I just assuming that I heard that and then I did
it again? Honestly, up to this point,
there hasn't been that happen ina noticeable way where the crowd

(47:17):
reacted to it. But it's, it's kind of you now,
I mean. I, I don't know, I, I just, I
don't know, I, I just think of me, you know, getting into this
when I was a kid, I wouldn't be here now.
No way, you know? So that's why I just, you know,
trying to, you know, make it where, you know, if that kids

(47:42):
out there watching a show and right now and they're out there
pond fishing, you know, they can, you know, they can be like,
well, that guy's doing it, you know, Yeah.
So I think that says a lot aboutyou that you even think that.
Like, do you think the majority of the people you compete
against think about the impact of what they're doing on the net

(48:03):
like? And I I I don't know but wants.
To have it good for kids. Right.
Right. And I shouldn't say the people
you compete everybody on Earth. I mean, dude, if somebody's, if
there's one parking spot and you're going to the mall at
Christmas, yeah, very few peoplewill stop for that little old
lady. They'll be like.
Yeah, yeah, the world. Needs more people like you.

(48:26):
You just, you just think of all the people you looked up to, you
know, as a kid and stuff. I mean, God, they influence you
so much as good or bad, you know.
So now I, now that I'm getting older, I'm, I'm seeing that
realizing that, you know, that there are a lot of people
looking up to us and watching usand, you know.

(48:47):
Yeah. Yeah, definitely.
You know, like my kids, I mean, they're, you know, that's where
I saw it the most, you know, youknow what they're, you know,
they, they'll tell you if you'redoing something wrong.
No, I mean, I, I think it's the world needs more people to think
like that. But you say you're fighting it

(49:10):
like when you say you're fighting it like, is this like a
demon that goes on your shoulderjust says just do a job?
Yeah, Oh yeah, just. Embrace the machine.
Oh, yeah. Just take it.
Just just put it on. You'll love it.
You'll win. You know, I you know, and I, I
don't, you know, I don't, I don't know.
I mean, I might win with it. I don't know, you know, why not?

(49:32):
But I just think too like, you know, if I'm able to win
somehow, you know, kind of like low and one in Florida this year
and stuff like, you know, it's very, I mean, God to win, win
without it now in this day and age, I mean, that's I mean,
that's a huge win. You know, I don't know.
I just want to I want to experience it before I put it on
and and don't get a chance to. Yeah.

(49:55):
Yeah, because by the sounds of it, you feel like if you did put
it on, you'd be very I. Mean, I don't think they want me
to put it on. I'm telling when I watch them
kids and I watch what they do, I'm like, Oh my gosh, they they
fish like I do like they fish a lot.

(50:18):
Like, they do a lot of the same little sneaky stuff that I do
when I'm, you know, seeing them with my eyeballs, you know, So I
don't know. It it is the same you're you're
100% correct. It's very the same, but I it is.
Turned the entire season into perpetual side fishing.
I mean, you're still shaking a bait in front of a fish, whether
it's in 12 inches of water or 12feet of water.

(50:43):
It's Yeah, it's definitely, it'swild.
I. Don't know.
It it the only time will tell. I feel like we're closer.
I, I feel like, and this is justmy feeling, but I feel like that
there'll be limitations at some point.

(51:03):
I feel like we're closer to thattoday than than we were maybe a
year ago. Yeah, yeah.
I mean, I, I think we'll probably end up, you know, I
mean, I don't know for sure, butI'm thinking we'll either split
it up or do something, you know,I don't.
Yeah, yeah, it's, it's such a polarizing, weird topic, like it

(51:23):
drives people absolutely crazy. I meant not even to talk about
it yet again on this podcast, but here we are.
More importantly, what do you think of my hat?
The the Berkeley guys gave it tome and I put.
It on I think it. Maybe make me look a little
younger and cooler? Am I pulling it off or do?
I just yeah, that looks. Good trying to be.

(51:44):
No, no, I like that. Yeah, Yeah, I haven't got that
one yet. That's the old, the old triling.
Yeah, one. I like that one.
I don't think they're sending itto regular folk like you.
It's just like I give person theold box of shitty hat.
No, actually they gave them out to everybody at A at one of the
media events earlier. This year.

(52:05):
So yeah. Oh nice.
It's cool. Cool.
Now it's cool. It's like bell bottoms.
They're back. Yeah.
Yeah, it looks good. Avco not only makes incredible
outdoor clothing, but they care about anglers.
With their 10% pledge, Avco and The Shed family donate at least
10% of the company's profits to conservation and making fishing
better. Now back to the show.

(52:27):
What's the weirdest fashion thing you ever wore?
Oh, man, so funny thing was, I, I was at one of the kids
tournaments and I was, it was real cold and I had my, my, my
SIM suit on and stuff and I was walking around and this is when
my kids were real little. I was just doing it because they
were short a couple captains or whatever.

(52:49):
And, you know, I'm walking around and then one of the kids,
you know, everybody's kind of looking at me funny.
I'm like, hey, you know, and oneof the kids dad comes up to me
and he's like, hey, what's that thing, you know, stuck here on
your, you know, what's is that to cover your mouth or whatever.
And I, I reach over and peel it off the Velcro.
And it was one of my kids socks,you know, one of their baby

(53:10):
socks. And I looked at it and I was
like, Nope, that's just a kids sock.
Yeah. And it's like the so the whole
time everybody thought it was some kind of new thing that
covered your face that was attached to the front of the
suit. But no, it was just the sock.
Just the sock. You could have made it cool if

(53:31):
you committed to, yeah. I mean, they they were all like,
what is that? What do you use that for?
And I was like, Nope, yeah, it'sjust the SOG.
Growing up, do you remember likedid were you ever at that age
where you're like, hey, I need that cool shirt or I need that
cool bike or I need that little rod?
Yeah, yeah, I remember, I, I remember there was these pants

(53:53):
that because I used to jump my bike and stuff when I was in
middle school and there was these pants that I, I always
wanted. They were like cargo pants.
They made them right down the street.
And I remember like, dragging mymom into this, like, warehouse
and picking out a couple pairs, you know, and I wore them every
day. But yeah.

(54:14):
Did they make you cooler? God, I felt.
Cool with them, I'm not going tolie, because only like me and
like one or two of my other buddies had them, you know, like
they weren't. No one really knew about them.
I don't know if they were makingthem there or what, but.
Yeah, yeah, most of my clothes growing up came from a store
that was like an Ontario store called Bargain Heralds.

(54:36):
But Bargain Heralds was like, I can't even compare it to Dollar
General cause Dollar General is pretty, pretty cool now.
Like it's not as like, you know what I mean?
But like the Bargain Heralds would have like particularly, I
forget the brand, but like, it wouldn't be like the Polo.
It would be like a just a guy ona horse.

(54:57):
And I felt like as a kid, you'relike, that's just like the polo
shirts everybody else wearing. But my parents couldn't afford a
polo. So I've got this.
Guy on a horse. And I just felt like it glowed
like as a kid you were just like, like now I'd be like,
screw you. It was a lot cheaper.
Just the same shirt. But then you were just like, oh
God, everyone knows. I got the guy on a horse shirt.

(55:18):
Yeah, it might be cool to have that now, I don't know.
Probably. I mean.
Yeah. I mean bargain Harold's.
Who doesn't want to shop there? Exactly.
It's out of business now. Oh yeah, yeah, it's gone.
It was a beautiful store bargain.
Harold and Byway were the two stores and everybody like if you
had the knock off Nikes, they were Jikes or whatever.

(55:41):
Everybody knew. So you like you looked at each
other with shame. Yeah, you're broken too.
What what is is your dream in this sport just to like what is
it Like what if if I could be a genie and say dude you get 3

(56:01):
wishes to accomplish in this sport, What are they?
The one, the number one is is tojust be able to get my kids
through all their school. That's like my that's been my
number that that and feed them, you know, and then second would
be to pay my house off and then third would be would probably be

(56:25):
to win a classic. Winning classic would be cool.
Yeah, that'd be a fun party. Yeah, that would, that'd be man,
that would, that'd be nice. I mean, you were close this year
can happen. Yeah, yeah, one day.
Put it out in the universe. Yeah, maybe we'll get him.

(56:45):
Maybe we'll get him to come to Florida again one day.
God. I would love that.
Had to maybe, you know, twist. I mean, it'd be nice to March in
Florida, you know, either do Harris chain Toho weighing at
the Convention Center or something.
Which would you if you could setup the Classic in Florida?
Where are we fishing? Where's the weigh in?
So yeah, you know, I would like Harris Chain or Toho, but one I

(57:08):
really was thinking hard would be Winter Haven Chain and we
weigh in at Legoland. Oh damn.
Right I. Like the sounds?
Of that, I mean be incredible. It's right there on the wall.
I mean, we could do a, we could,they could fill the stands there
at Legoland where the old ski stuff used to be, where Venetian

(57:29):
guard like they used to have like so.
There's the wind could be on thewall.
Oh. There's a huge like area looking
out over. We could drive the boats through
and do the weigh in. I believe you do it right there.
I like the sounds. It'd be epic.
So we're not in an arena, we're outdoors.
We're on the lake, they have theout outdoor seating, arena

(57:50):
style, where they you would do all the the ski stuff that they
do. We could pull in, pull our boat
in, tie it off real quick, bringour fish up, Wham.
Boom. Yeah, I like it.
Yeah, it'd be pretty epic. I feel like it's going to happen
now. Yeah.
I mean, you put it out in the, Imean.

(58:12):
I mean, it's a it's a great place.
They got all the all the roomingdown there Legoland for the
families. I've never been there, but it
sounds cool. Yeah, I mean, it's I live from
Legoland. Oh.
I'm sending the. I'm sending the e-mail to them.
It's trying to put the pieces together.
As soon as I go, I'm sending an e-mail to them.

(58:32):
Yeah, we're going to make this happen.
Yeah, it should. It should.
I mean, I pretty certain it will.
Hey, you lied to me last time wedid a podcast.
Yeah, you did. You did.
It's been a while. I mean, we did one with you and
Keith, but it's been like 2 years since we've done 1 like
this, So what the hell? I mean, we enjoy the I I enjoy

(58:53):
it anyway, so I don't know why it's been so long.
But you did lie. So maybe that's so long because
you told me about your Gator hunt and the noises the skull
made and such and like it was a dinosaur and you're into the he
said you'd never do that again. And lo and behold, you're a
freaking Gator hunter again. What happened?

(59:14):
I, I like it too much. It's I don't know what it is.
I don't know if it's the hangingout with the guys and going to
Waffle House at 2:00 in the morning.
You could do that without Gators.
I know, but there's something about it when especially like
where we go, where we go is it'snot easy.
Like when it might be easy. We just don't know what we're
doing. But it's, it's, it's like it's

(59:35):
very hard. Like, you know, you're chasing
these things all night. They're smart.
I like the hunt part of it, you know?
Yeah. Just try, you know, and I don't
know, but yeah, I can't stop. I actually 30 minutes ago,
before we started this, I put infor my 1 tag.
I could and then they have this super hunt where you can apply

(59:57):
as many times as you want and I put in maybe about 20 times for
that one. Now hopefully those don't get
drawn because they're 500 to pop, which I mean I don't think
I would get 20 of them, but I mean you never know.
So if we do, we'll have a bunch of tags if you want to go get
your hunting. OK, I mean, sure, I'm up for

(01:00:19):
anything. Why swam with sharks this year?
So I mean. Oh, you're good then.
I would never swim with the Gator though.
Yeah, I wouldn't. I wouldn't either.
No, they're short legged aquaticT Rex.
Is that all that? Is.
Yeah, they are. Is it true that you use forward
facing sonar for Gator hunting? Oh.
God. I'm sorry to expose your.

(01:00:41):
Oh, so I we got down to the lastday, not last year, but the year
before the last day. We could kill one.
We had, we had one tag left and we put it on.
We put it on. We went out and we got one.
I mean, I imagine they're easy to see.
Maybe you can see a bass. You damn you can see a Gator.

(01:01:03):
Yeah, well, that was the thing. Like it would go down, you troll
up to it, it would be sitting there and, you know, flip the
hooks to it. Got them.
You know, I mean that's the whole thing.
Like there's so much to like, you know, you see like the
bubbles coming up or you see them like go over this way.
They're really good at hiding when they get down there.
So but not with that forward facing.

(01:01:27):
But we haven't used it since. We haven't used it since.
Did that Gator feel less like? I don't know.
We were, we were pretty pumped up on that one because I mean,
you're, you're talking last. Day.
Yeah, it's the last day. We were like, we're maybe 10
days in of not getting them, youknow, And it was one we were
chasing like it was 1, you know,I mean, we, we were chasing like

(01:01:48):
10 different ones, but that was one of them, you know?
So it was like, oh, we got you, you know?
Wow. But I don't know.
How do you actually so, so you said you put the hooks to it,
Like do you snag them or what? Yeah.
So we have we have like 2 big pen spinning reels, you know, 10
rods. We got it on like I don't know,

(01:02:10):
like maybe 65 Durbraid or X5 andand and then we got this big
truck. I actually got one right here.
Oh wow, John Cox's making a moveright now to get he's that's
called the Silver Spider. Yeah, that's right there.
What you tie on and so you take you.

(01:02:30):
Guys to use one of those for suckers in the Creek.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
So you two guys get up front, you see the alligator?
We run at him full speed and he'll dive down and we'll both
cast at the same time. And then you let it get down
there and you reel up and you try to snag them.
Sometimes they'll stay up and you can snag them.

(01:02:51):
But but then the fights on, you know, and usually one person
will hook up and then the other person will try to get another
hook in them because you'll fight them for a while and, and
you know the line will break andyou want to have two lines on
them. And then once you get them up to
the boat, you know, then you, you know, either hit them, hit
them with the bang stick if you can, or, or hook them on a a big

(01:03:15):
trouble on like a rope, which I don't really like doing that
because someone always seems to put it like behind my leg or,
you know, somewhere where it shouldn't be, you know, but but
yeah, it's a lot of fun. It's it's it's a blast.
And then another way is you can bait them.
You can put a big beef lung on afishing pole.
You know, you see the alligator,you drop it out, give it like

(01:03:37):
500 yards, sit in the bushes there and wait for him to
swallow it. And then that's like your guide
to when you get up to them and you flip near that line and hook
them on the trebles. They like beef lung, do they?
No, not as much as I I hear other guys, other guys are using
like tilapia like blowing them up and then I think different

(01:04:00):
kinds of like chicken maybe. What do you mean blowing them
up? Like they'll I don't.
This is a wormhole we've got. Well, I think it's like, I think
they put foam in it. Actually, I don't even know if
I'm supposed to be. This might be top secret stuff.
Oh wow, I'm sorry. You know, from the great Shaw
Grigsby, but. He is a great, I mean.
Let me let me tell you. So we were struggling and he

(01:04:22):
said this is on the beef lung and he and he was like, man,
he's like, you got to leave it out there and pop it like a top
water. And I'm like, are you serious?
Yeah, I'm like, work it like, yeah, I'm like, work it like a
top water. And he's like, yeah.
And sure enough, that night we got one popping it like that,

(01:04:42):
just like he said. And and we were popping it and
it just because we were just leaving it out there.
We didn't know, you know, you bait and wait.
That's what we thought. And we we got one that first
night. He told us to do that.
God, he's the master. At him, he is.
He is him and Scroggins. Every time I see Shaw, I've

(01:05:04):
talked to him about that, he starts talking about other stuff
and I'm like, just tell me aboutyour Gator.
Hunt Yeah, yeah, he's and that now he's doing like trapping,
like when you have a nuisance one, yeah, he comes out and gets
them. So like he's not even killing
those. Like he'll he'll catch them and
then and then throw them in the truck and relocate them.
That's so weird. That must be for some people.
They just call about their nuisance Gator and Sean Briggsby

(01:05:26):
shows up. Yeah.
Oh yeah, Can you? Back in the Ned Flanders.
Oh yeah, yeah. I might prank call him one day
and tell him I got one just to get him to come out here.
Him and his grandson, Bryce. Yeah.
Yeah. That's who does it.
Yeah. I I'm, I'm going to have to do
that one day. Yeah.

(01:05:48):
I just think it's funny that youused forward face and sonar for
it, but that's fine. And you just want to show the
world that you can, but you choose not to, I guess.
Yeah, Yeah, yeah. I think we've, I think we've
talked about a lot of things here today, John.
Oh man. Yeah.

(01:06:11):
How did that? Yeah, it's been a been a good
conversation. Yeah.
All right. Yeah, always enjoy it.
Do I really have Keith on? He's he's fishing another
tournament somewhere. I.
Think that's what he does. That's what he does.
Last time you guys got in trouble with that bear?
Oh, yeah, It's tongue ripped out.
Remember that? We were, we were at Alex Davis's

(01:06:33):
uncle's. Yeah.
And it was like, it's just the tongue came right out of the
bear's head. Yeah, yeah, forgot all about
that. Yeah, I do have trouble with it.
Yeah, is what it was. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
The tongue just came out of it. I was like, Oh my gosh, we broke
it. What did you do?
Did you just put it back in or did you glue it or?

(01:06:55):
Yeah, no, we put it back in it. I want.
Oh, yeah. It was a rug with the bare head.
Yeah. And Keith had it over his
shoulders or something. Yeah, something and then
something. Yeah.
I don't know. We were playing.
As you do. Well, that's the one and only

(01:07:15):
John Cox. And here's the only thing I'm
leaving this podcast from. We need to do this more dude.
Yeah, yeah, man, whatever. You tell me when and we should
go Gator hunting this this end of this year.
Yeah, we will. Just so you know, I'm popping
that beef lung like Shaw Grigsby.
Yeah. We liberalize, dissipate.

(01:07:37):
Yeah, yeah. You want to let the rings, it's
just like working that top water.
You pop it, let the rings kind of go away, and then give it
another pop. How are the blow UPS?
It's it's probably not as aggressive a blow up as you
think because they just probablyjust go out.
Yeah, but you can hear them. You can hear them.
They'll, you know, they'll hold their head up and yeah, you'll

(01:07:57):
see your line kind of moving. You're like, Oh yeah, he's
eating it. Yeah.
Yeah, it's fun. All right, see ya.
See you, Dave. See you.
See him two days or a day or something.
Yeah, we're. Some whenever we get there.
I'll see you in Orange, TX, yeah?
Congrats all. Right, Congrats.
Hey, let's just imagine you wantLake Fork.

(01:08:20):
All right, yeah, Lake Fork was awesome, man.
Got the Berkeley. Nessie caught all them giant
ones. Man, what epic week that was.
Good times. See you Dave.
Love you buddy. From the always jovial John Cox
to Byron's Bunker Byron. 'S bunker, he tells a story and

(01:08:45):
then tells you some self firsts are very special and very
important and this is the very first Byron's bunker.
We're going to make this into a thing, Byron, unless it crashes
and burns this first one. But every month you're going to
join the show, you're going to regale us with one of your
amazing stories, and then we're going to sell some stuff.

(01:09:06):
I love that it's easy. All I got to do is Google
Byron's bunker or maybe go to eBay and look at Byron's bunker.
But I I want to sell a bunch of stuff because I'll never use all
this tackle again. Mercer and I'm not fishing
tournaments anymore. So like, you know, wiggle warts.
I'm never going to throw a wiggle wart again.
So I got boxes of wiggle warts. I might as well just I'm not
going back to Table Rock. I'm not fishing in Missouri
anymore. I'm not fishing in the Midwest.
Like, you know, the DLV to get all this tackle here.

(01:09:28):
Like, if you're not on tour, what the heck you going to do
with all of it? People like wiggle warts.
I, I was surprised when I lookedup how much they're going for,
but you know, that's, that's forthe end of the show.
Let's talk about the beginning of the show, like you said.
All right. Well, let's jump right story
time with Byron Falk. Where we go in this this month?
You know, I, I, I, I, I, I'm glad the other day you asked

(01:09:48):
about this and I know you told me not to tell you this story.
And it's a story that's really special to me.
And it, you know, it, it, I was inducted into the West Coast
Hall of Fame. I never got invited anywhere
near the Fishing Hall of Fame like the big kids.
But for the West Coast, I got the invitation to be inducted.
And it was a really special induction because Rick Klein and

(01:10:10):
Melissa were there. We were sharing a houseboat on
Lake Mojave. And Rick, as you know, I've
talked about all the time, he's like a mentor.
He's like, he's helped me through my whole career.
You know, he, he took me under his wing, flew me out to Texas
back when he lived in Texas, hadme come visit him there several
times. You know, convinced me to go
from the regional fisherman out West to a national fisherman.

(01:10:31):
That's really who did it was Klun.
He saw me on the lake a lot of times.
He saw me at US Opens. That's where I first thing that
happened in college was I drew Rick Klun.
So I drew him when I was a college kid and a pro, pro draw,
of course. And, and we had a really, really
hard day. He caught 2, I caught none.
Just typical Lake Mead sometimesback in the day where if you

(01:10:51):
caught 5, you were a hero. And I fished with Rick, but side
by side, mano a mano, fishing with Rick Klun.
You know, I was just in awe the fact that I was fishing with a
legend as a college kid, you know, and one of the cool side
stories, we're in the car driving to the lake and on the
dash of his car is Henry David Thoreau, Walden Pond.
Like how crazy is that? He's got Walden Pond, American

(01:11:13):
philosopher Thoreau, and I'm a philosophy major in college.
I'm like, dude, why is there a book of Thoreau on the thing?
He goes, Oh, it's one of my favorite books to read.
I'm like, you know, Klon, right,That's that's Klon.
He's. Of course, American.
Philosophers in a fishing tournament.
He used to. He told me he used to read while
he drove. He did long.
Before testing, he would be likereading while driving.

(01:11:36):
This is, and I'm in the school of Rick, man.
I'm in the school of Rick. So I, you, you go on, you're out
New Mexico, Arizona, you just, you put you, you put it on
cruise control and you read a book and you look up every now
and then I would read books again.
Klun was like, he, he had such ahuge influence over me.
And that's where this story comes in because this is,
there's there was a moment. The most important thing that
could have happened at the Hall of Fame induction was I could

(01:11:58):
have told this story and I was abasket case and I was nervous.
You know, Mercer, unlike you, I'm not a pro at this stuff.
You get up and you're like the man of the hour.
You just own the room public speaking.
And I am the opposite of that. Like put me in front of a camera
like this, you know, just me andthe little butt thing there, I'm
good. But put me in front of a room of
10 kids for a club tournament thing.
I'm, I'm, I'm a jello. I'm a mess and I suck at public

(01:12:21):
speaking. So what happened was the Hall of
Fame event. I have this story I want to
tell. And I got up on stage and I had
severe fright and I never got totell the story that I'm going to
tell now. And it would have been very
important to me to tell at that time because Rick Klun was
sitting in the audience with Melissa.
And this was it was a thank you to them.
And it was also an amazing story.

(01:12:43):
And, and and, and, and and you want me to just go into her?
Do you have? Any questions?
No, no, no. Let's just jump right into it
and I'll make sure Rick hears this.
So. Well, yeah, that would be great
if you make sure he hears this and that would be cool.
I'll ask him to. I mean, you can't make sure Rick
does anything just so. Rick, Rick was a huge, like I
said, influence on me. And you know, he, he convinced
me to move to Lake Mead for the US Open because I had won my

(01:13:04):
first US Open at 26. And he, he said you need to live
on a tournament lake and have that in your back pocket and
everything. But but it was that first win in
in, in in two. I can't remember what year it
was now 1990 or 91 guy, I have to look at the trophy.
But a long, long, long time ago when I was 26 decades, lots and
lots of decades ago, I win the US Open at Lake Mead.

(01:13:28):
And at that time, Zelle Roland, Danny Brauer, Rick Klun, you
name it, Jimmy Houston, everybody came because it was
right after Abas event, one of the top national BAS events were
at Lake Mead. And directly after that event
was the the US Open. So it kept a lot of pros out
there, you know, and back then that was a huge showcase
tournament, $50,000 plus a boat,you know, and all this other

(01:13:51):
stuff. Check for 50 grand in a boat and
everything else. And I'm a kid, 26 years old.
My boat broke down, the Skeeter that I bought from Jay Ellis
broke down. So I'm fishing out of a borrowed
boat with no electronics, a little 17 foot boat with A-150
on it. And I'm around all my peers,
like at night I'm asking for their autographs and stuff.
I'm so excited to be fishing against everybody I've ever read

(01:14:13):
about in a magazine, anybody, anybody I've ever seen anywhere
on television. And they're all at the US Open
at Lake Mead. You could pinch me.
I'm so excited. And I'd go out and the one thing
I noticed was that nobody was bed fishing.
And this was in April and nobodywas bed fishing like they do
now. It was something that didn't
happen back then, 40 years ago, 40-5 years ago, not a lot of

(01:14:33):
guys were bed fishing. And I'd go around looking and I
was like an 8 up little kid, 20 year old California kid and I
loved bed fishing. I found out about it when I was
a teenager and it was a niche thing like Shaw Grigsby, you
remember Shaw was like one of the few.
Shaw had bed fishing to himself on the national tour.
We'll come out to Lake Mead and there's a few of us kids that

(01:14:54):
are bed fishing. And I drive around while there
tournaments going on for Bassmaster and I see guys
Carolina rigging, spinnerbaiting, cranking Mercer.
I go into every pocket and I seeall these beds and I'm like, how
are these Bassmaster guys not railing on these fish?
Like the bed fishes bed fishing is insane.
The bed the fish are on beds everywhere and I'm not competing

(01:15:14):
with anybody in practice that's running the banks looking at bed
fish. So as much as I'm a fan of
everybody at the at, at the registration and the partner
pairing, I'm like, man, I am so excited about this tournament
because my fish are not being tapped at all.
And John Murray is a good friendof mine at the time and he's not
even bed fishing back then at all.
And, and and I'm keeping it quiet, but I'm like, yeah, I've

(01:15:35):
seen some fish. I'm just doing some stuff and
just bed fishing wasn't a thing.U.S.
Open, 26 years old. I go out and I just start
racking them. Tournament, first day, I'm
probably in the top five. Second day, I'm leading the
tournament and I remember clearly, Murray comes up to me
and he says, hey, he goes, if you catch 5 tomorrow, you win
the US Open And I'm Mercer. I mean, I get goosebumps telling

(01:15:58):
you this because because I stillhad a whole island in the middle
of the lower basin that was fullof beds.
And every day of the tournament I would drive by this island.
I never saw a boat fishing the island.
The whole island, never had a boat on it.
Big Giant Island and I'd go around the island looking, I
never saw anybody fishing it andthere's beds all over it.
So I'm like Oh my gosh, I can catch 5.
You know, I mean this is I can catch 5 the last day.

(01:16:19):
And Murray goes, you got a 3 LB lead going in the last day.
You will win the US Open, Lake Mead.
That's huge. If you have a 3 LB lead going in
the last day, you're going to win the tournament.
So last day of the tournament, Igo out, I catch my 5th fish at
11 in the morning and, and, and,and, and I literally felt this
euphoria like I knew I had one, you know, and I had jumped

(01:16:40):
through my skin. It was like Maslow calls it like
a peak experience where you justhave this moment where you feel
like you touched perfection. You know, the whole, everything
I'm telling you guys is, is whatI experienced.
And then something really weird happened.
I had the most amazing last day.I come in and I literally, I
literally feel myself deflating,like I feel myself getting

(01:17:03):
everybody's, hey, hey, you won. And they give you the check and
there's this depression setting in and this is really weird.
Like everybody's congratulating you.
They give you the money, they give you the boat.
And you're feeling like this letdown, like this thing's coming
down on me. And I'm like, Oh my gosh, like
what am I doing? It's and through the course of
the next day or that evening andthe next day, we go to the bar
and you got the drinks and everything and you're like, man,

(01:17:24):
I don't think I'm doing the right sport.
And I remember telling Rick Klunthat I think I picked the wrong
thing to do for a living. Like I told Rick that I go, I
just won the US Open and I was insanely unhappy afterwards.
And this is Rick has me fly out to his house.
We're in Texas. I'll never forget this.
And Rick, I got to thank him forthe rest of my life for this.

(01:17:44):
Rick has me in his den at his house in Texas and he goes, tell
me what's going on with you because he could sense something
was off. And I go, you know, I won the US
Open. I'm out here to go with you to
ICAST. And I feel depressed.
I feel bummed. I feel like, you know, I'm, I'm,
I'm in the wrong sport. I go, you know, I, I was the
youngest guy to win the US Open and and and and and and I'll
never forget this Mercer, you know, Rick, Rick goes, tell me

(01:18:07):
the whole process. Tell me everything happened.
And I told the story to him justlike I told it to you just now.
And I talk about it and he has this huge smile on his face and
I'm talking about he goes, wait,wait, tell me more about that
last day. And I go into these details,
Dave, about every fish and catching them.
And he wants to know every detail.
And I tell him that when I caught that fish, Rick, I go, I

(01:18:30):
literally felt the most amazing sensation, like my soul jumped
out. I jumped in my boat.
I felt like my soul jumped out of my skin.
I touched heaven. I go, it's, it's all I can say.
I, I touched perfection. I don't know what it was.
And then, you know, everything else kind of it was awesome
driving in the, you know, the sun's kind of going down.
I'm driving across the lake and I know I just won.
And then I get in and all of a sudden it all starts to go down

(01:18:51):
and, and, and, and Rick tells meto and I'm going to get
emotional. Rick tells me to go stand up.
I go, what do you go stand up? And he gives me a huge hug in
his den in Texas. And he says, don't you ever quit
doing this because you love it for all the right reasons.
He goes, you love the process. You touched perfection and you
don't want the money. You don't care about beating

(01:19:12):
your friends. You don't care about, you know,
as sponsors and accolades. You love the process of the
tournament. You fished a perfect tournament,
your first perfect tournament. And Rick went on to explain, you
know, fishing the perfect tournament, whether you win or
lose, leaving that water knowingthat you were the best you could
be that day, even if it doesn't get you the victory, leaving the

(01:19:33):
lake knowing that you had the best tournament you could
possibly have. And, and, and, and Rick saved my
career in that, in that, in thatU.S.
Open, because I honestly thoughtthat after winning in the money
in the boats and everything, I thought, man, I, I need to go
find something else to do because this isn't my gig.
You know, I, I shouldn't be bummed out after winning the US
Open at 26. And, and Rick steered me the

(01:19:55):
other direction And I, I owe himfor that.
And, and it, it's, it's, it's truly an amazing lesson that I
learned from Rick Klein And I, I'm, I'm, I'm glad to hear he
might be watching this. And I wish I would have said it,
Rick and Melissa. I wish I would have told the
story at the Hall of Fame event.But I, I was too nervous and I
was all screwed up and I, I kicked myself every minute of

(01:20:15):
the day for two months for not telling Rick in his face with
Melissa the story of how he inspired me to stay in fishing
at 26 years old because of all, for all the right reasons, Dave.
I've run a Yamaha outboard for over 30 years.
It has got me home safe each andevery time.
If you enjoy this podcast, remember Yamaha supports it and

(01:20:36):
they care enough about you to make this ad read very short.
Be all back to the show. Wow.
Wow, that's incredible. So did you ever feel that
feeling again throughout your career or did did him kind of
accepting it make it different? This is a feeling like when my
daughter was born, like my daughter being born was a peak

(01:20:57):
experience. And I, you know, I was in
college and Maslow was a philosopher and they talked
about peak experiences and a child being born.
You know, Clear Lake was definitely one of them.
The first time I won Clear Lake,I was, you know, 83 lbs.
And I set the record that that was close, but it was but the US
Open at 26, it was the strongestat first.

(01:21:19):
It was my first major victory. You know, I'd won some small
rules and stuff, but but that was beating, you know, I'm
asking for these guys autographsevery day at the tournament.
And then I beat everybody, but Ididn't when I got on the water,
I was just trying to be the bestI could be.
I didn't. I didn't care that I beat Zoe
Rowland and Danny Brauer and Rick Klun and everybody else
there. You know, for me, I just wanted
to fish a perfect tournament. I just want to catch the biggest
bass I could. And it wasn't about bragging

(01:21:40):
rights. I didn't want to brag.
I, I, these guys were my idols, but I knew that I was doing
something that nobody else was doing, especially I had been
doing it for probably 10 years by then, you know, and, and Shaw
Grigsby was the only real sight fisherman I knew of.
You know, that was a famous sight fisherman.
But a lot of guys worked and a lot of guys, I went back East
Dave and guys would tell me, well, if you can get that close
to a bass, he's probably sick. I mean, I'm telling you that I

(01:22:03):
grew guys in Florida that told me if I'm getting this close to
a bass, that bass is sick because I was dead fishing in
Florida and I have a pro, pro pro draw.
And the guy in the back of thosegoes, well, that bass is sick.
I go, no, it's not, not at spawning.
He goes, what are you talking about?
And this is a pro, pro draw. And these guys back then were
like that bass is sick. I'm like, it's not sick.
It's spawning. Well, I don't understand.
I'm like, well, you're going to see the male and the female and

(01:22:25):
I'm going to catch the male, then I'm going to catch the
female. And I'm educating these pro pro
draws. I'm having back East.
But there was Once Upon a time when site fishing was basically
unknown and, and it was a, it was a, it was really special
that they had AUS open in April that year and it afforded me to,
to win my first major title. And, and yeah, Dave, I clear
like was a good one with my child being born was a huge

(01:22:45):
moment. And, and, and that Rick Glenn,
you know, that Rick Glenn momentwhere he inspired me to stay in
it. Wow.
I, I, I mean, wow. I almost, I almost teared up and
I told that story before crying.So I'm glad I didn't cry today
on your show. Yeah, no, that's incredible.
That really is truly incredible.The site fishing thing, when it
first became, what did it get a lot of pushback?

(01:23:08):
I mean, because it still gets pushed back today.
There's a percentage of population of things that we
shouldn't do it at all. Yeah, you know, back then most
people weren't doing it. I I remember Kent Brown famously
said he goes, he goes, what's Byron doing on his trolling
motor driving around? He goes and people say, what did
you lose? They thought you lost a rod or
something because your hands arein your pocket.
You're driving around with your trolling motor down.
You're looking and they're like,did he lose his car keys or his

(01:23:29):
cell phone or his fishing rod because he's in the water
looking around. I, I clearly remember the days
when people looked at you weird.So sight fishing, you know, back
back then, you didn't get a lot of pushback because nobody was
doing it. There came a point in my career,
you know, before I retired, where I started feeling bad
about it. Especially when you're catching
fry garters, you know, you're just watching that that pot of

(01:23:50):
fry get decimated by the bluegill and man catching a fry
Garter or, or the the bed getting robbed.
I mean, there, there is a pain to that.
You know, it's like you're doingit because you because it's the
necessary evil. But at the same time, you know,
in the early days, not a lot of guys were doing it.
Now everybody's doing it, you know, and, and when a tournament
happens, you know, there's a lotof beds that are damaged and a

(01:24:10):
lot of, you know, females are snatched off the beds and the
males guarding the, the eggs or the fry get pulverized.
And, and, and, and so late lateron as it became very popular.
And it's, it's, it's difficult, you know, I mean, I could see
where there's pushback for it because it's a it's, it's one of
those times you have to do it, But at the same time, you don't

(01:24:30):
want to, I don't want to do it for fun.
You know, I don't go out there. I don't fish small little
tournaments, bed fishing and just destroy a bunch of beds
for, you know, $800, you know, aregional tournament, you know,
on the national tour. You were forced to do it because
for me, that's the only way I could be competitive.
And again, Rick Klun, you know, he was interested in site
fishing. I taught him a lot.
It was cool that Rick would callme.
Those are those messages you wish you had on your phone.

(01:24:52):
Hey, bar, it's Rick. I just want to pick your brain a
little bit about this bed fishing, you know, site fishing
or swim baits. Hey, Byron, it's Rick.
And I'm like, Oh my God, I'm going to play this for all my
friends. Hey, guys, check it out.
Rick Glenn called me to talk about swim baits.
Hey, guys, check it out. Rick Glenn called me to talk
about site fishing. Like who does that?
Like when does that happen? In what universe?
Like I might one of your idols, your absolute idols.

(01:25:14):
And, and yeah, it was it, it, itwas an amazing time and I can
see where there's a lot of pushback for it.
I I understand that. Yeah, Klon is truly an amazing
gift. I mean, I I get your feeling.
I mean the every anytime he's ever called me, I'm like the
first time he ever called me, I literally answered the phone
because I didn't have his numberin my phone at that time.

(01:25:35):
And it showed up Ava, Missouri, and I'm and I literally answered
the phone. Who's calling from the town that
Rick Klon lives in. That's.
What you said and. He goes.
It is he. And he said it in such a soft
voice, you had to listen. It's a very faint voice.
It is he Because I swear to God,when I talk to Rick on the

(01:25:59):
phone, it's like, OK, I got to shut the radio off.
I got to stop driving, roll up the windows.
I'm like, because Rick, he's like EF Hutton, you know, when
he, when he speaks, people listen.
But boy, he speaks very soft. Yeah, it's very.
Poignant and like me, I'm just aI'm just a jabber mouth.
I'm just a chatterbox and a halfand I can talk all day long like
this and maybe something I said has some resonance with him.

(01:26:19):
It's like 6 words come out and four of them are like.
Oh yeah, Everything that comes out of his mouth matters.
It's he's an amazing man, Great story.
That's, that's a story if I everget, if I ever get asked to go
to the real Hall of Fame, you know, not the West Coast fishing
Hall of Fame, but the real Hall of Fame, I will make sure I have
that story ready to go because that's one that's an important

(01:26:41):
lesson for, you know, young anglers and all that.
I mean, love the process, love the sport, love, love being
imperfect on the water. And Rick explained that he goes
by and there's tournaments I didn't win or I was still
perfect. I fished the best, cleanest,
didn't lose any fish was on the best quality fish.
I still finished third, 5th or 7th, but I fished the perfect
tournament and that's all Rick would chase is the perfect
tournament. That flawless time on the water,

(01:27:04):
even if you're not on the biggest fish.
I was by far on the biggest fishbecause I was able to cull with
my eyes. And that's before forward facing
sonar and Alabama rigs, those lopsided big weights back in the
day and spring or either swim baits before swim baits.
It was all site fishing, like site fishing was light years
ahead of everything else. Everybody else had 12 lbs and
you could have 18 or 20 because you were culling with your eyes.

(01:27:26):
You could go pick and choose which fish you want down the
bank, you know. And so that's where you could
dominate a tournament because you could, you could pick 18 lbs
off with your eyes where everybody else is dragging a
Carolina rig or throwing a crankbait and maybe they catch
12. And it used to be the dominant
way to fish before swim baits, Alabama rigs and then forward
facing sonar. Yeah, very cool, Very cool.

(01:27:47):
All right. Now time for the second part of
the segment, Byron. Autograph Crank Bates.
Look at how that segue you know you're dealing with the pro you.
Signed them. I got some Rick clan autographs,
so he's like, I go. I got my eBay store back up and
I go, Rick, would you give me a favorite, the Classic and sign a
few more of these? And and he's he's gracious
enough to know that I got he gave me all these pose a long,

(01:28:08):
long time ago. Some of them were signed, some
of them weren't. So obviously the signed ones.
I'm like, gosh, I'll ask Rick ifhe'll sign a few more.
And you know, I'm I'm glad him and Melissa are so supportive
and so kind. And, you know, they know that
I'm basically retired now and raising my daughter and just
fishing around here in Texas and, and trying to eliminate
everything I got that I'll neveruse again on eBay, buddy.
Yeah, no, they're amazing people.

(01:28:29):
So they are. So I'll make sure they watch
this too. I'll mention I'll mention this
as well when I talk to them nexttime.
Yeah, I'll give you another Segway, too.
The the fact that we're kind of doing like whatever you want to
refer to it as, like kind of residency where you come home
once a month. You're also the only other
person we ever did that with is Rick Klun.
No way. So it all ties in together.

(01:28:50):
Oh my gosh, I'm in the best company ever.
Don't screw it up. His segments were really good.
Byron A. Friend, you know, he's he's a
brother, he's a mentor and he's a friend.
I, you know, I, I call him like a dad, but I know he hates that
when I say father figure becauseI didn't have a dad, you know,
from when I was 10 years old. So to him taking me under my
wing and taking him taking me under his wing and, and showing

(01:29:10):
me around and, and really encouraging me to go national.
He saw me fishing regionally andhe saw me have some pretty bad
experiences with draws, you know, certain pro, pro draws
where guys would take you off your fish even though you were
in the top five and the guy wanted to be 50th, you know, was
trying to make a check and he, you know, Rick would be like,
you need to come fish the national tour.
And he was very, very persuasivein me giving up just being a

(01:29:33):
West Coast fisherman. And so I owe a lot for that.
An amazing man and and you know,you think about it in
competition, how many people would do the opposite when they
see somebody with a little skill?
A young person coming up would be like, yeah, I mean, there's
the people that ruin. That like that, there's so many
that ruin that. Dave, there is a there is a
mafia of guys that and I won't name those names, but there.

(01:29:55):
Are maybe next segment? I got a Horror Story on top of a
Horror Story about that. But there was an old guard that
hated all of us young guys coming up and including me,
Murray Skeet, Aaron, Brett Hyde.I mean, I can tell you we all
had big giant targets on our back and they were, you know,
taking shots at us big time because because, because we were
stealing their money and they're, they, they were all

(01:30:16):
about just, you know, crushing it didn't like the young guys
come up taking their taking their, their, their Thunder.
Wow, Wow. So, Byron Bunker, we've learned.
You've learned more about eBay. You were telling me, how do we
find you? You know, you can Google Byron
Bunker. So like the classic and a guy
comes up and he saw your podcastand he says, dude, he goes, I
hear you on Mercer talking aboutByron Bunker.

(01:30:37):
But when I go on my thing and I Google, I type in Byron Bunker.
Nothing comes up. So this is crazy.
I, I, I go, really, I go give meyour phone.
Let me try that. I put in.
I never tried this. I tried putting Byron's bunker
in his phone and I'm like, Oh mygosh, you can't find me.
And then I found out from somebody else, you have to
Google Byron's bunker. Then it comes up.
So I call eBay. This is funny.
Here's here's, here's the phone numbers for eBay right here.

(01:31:00):
I call the eBay 100 hotline. No joke.
Right here 800. EBay and I talk to somebody in
India or Pakistan or wherever they're from, you know those
those international telebank people.
OK, explain. The problem and she goes, oh,
very good point. I will share with our tech
department. But I'm like I I have a store
called Byron Bunker on eBay. If you go to Byron, if you go to

(01:31:22):
eBay, you put in Byron Bunker, nothing comes up.
So why is that like why can't you find the store?
Well, apparently eBay after thatphone call changed.
So now when you type it in on eBay, it actually shows up like
user, you know eBay user and youcan click on Byron's bunker.
So after that, that 30 minute phone call to eBay.
I think they changed the algorithm within their thing so

(01:31:44):
you can either Google it or go on the thing.
But but yeah, I'm on Byron's Bunker and I'm just, I got like
70 things listed. Funny story.
So I didn't know this would work.
So last night I put a whole bunch of auctions on it says
Byron's Bunker Mercer. There's a whole bunch of
auctions that say Byron's bunkerMercer in the title.
So if somebody types in Mercer or Byron's Velvik, these
auctions come up with your name and my name on it.

(01:32:05):
And I, and that was the only thing where you can actually put
it in the product title. Like, you know, $0.99 for six
bags of Berkeley worms, $0.99 auctions like galore.
So all these $0.99 auctions bidding more.
But I I figured I'd just do a podcast by a Mercer podcast.
Byron Velvik Auctions. So you're boxing you off.
Basically, oh, that'd be fine. That'd be fine.

(01:32:26):
I mean, worse has happened to me.
Yeah, well, I got like wiggle works.
I got a whole like I'll never use this again.
I was talking about that. I got a boxes full of Wiggle
Works that I'll never use again here in Texas.
So and I don't know, I saw on eBay, some are going for like 80
bucks. There's one for $400.00.
I don't know if you know about that.
There's a, there's. A It's crazy, Crazy, right?
Now for 400, I don't know if this is one of the $400.00 ones.

(01:32:48):
I know some are pre Pradco or pre Rapala or something like
that. I'm just going to put them all
on there. But I got boxes of these wiggle
warts and I got something for your viewers.
I'm going to ask about this because I'd love somebody to
tell me who makes this. I got all these swim baits.
You see all these swim baits here?
See all these Gizzard Shad swim baits, OK, I'm a swimbait guy,

(01:33:09):
so everybody and their mother, Igot millions and millions of
these swimbaits. I got to sell different brands,
like, you know, the old true Tungsten, that was a big popular
one, the true tungsten. But this one right here has a
signature on it. And I don't know, see if I can
get this up there. I don't know.
Mercer, do you recognize that? Can you tell me who makes that?
Swim bait, I don't know the signature on that.

(01:33:30):
I don't know, but I bet you in the comments people will tell
us. If somebody can tell me who made
these, I got a whole bunch of these and I don't I honestly, I
like I'm looking at them going. I don't know who the heck who
the heck made that swim bait? And they signed it too, and it's
all signed the same. I got to just find the without
the glare. Wow.
Somebody, if somebody in the comments can tell me it's signed

(01:33:51):
and numbered. These are signed and numbered
glide baits and they're really cool.
They're foil finish and I don't know even what they are, so I
can't list them without like I need to know the name of it and
who makes it. It's all these little glide
baits. So maybe somebody can help me.
I got all these other stuff. I got river to sea baits and
swim baits. I'm going to start doing swim
bait Sundays on Sundays. I'm going to do like all swim

(01:34:11):
baits on Sunday. So I'm just going to list like
20 more swim baits this coming Sunday.
Gosh, I like it. How it is you got it too.
Oh my God, the live target. I need all your live target
stuff. You need to.
The traps are selling for 25 to 30 bucks a piece and I had
someone just buy a whole bunch of them.
Like all these live Target baitsare going crazy right now,

(01:34:33):
Mercer. And I know you got a bunch.
I do. I do have a bunch.
Well, we can. We can fail Byron's bunker.
I could I, I, I I'll pay a Commission to all your cool
stuff, like all the stuff in thebackpack there that you.
Want to eliminate? Well, we will.
We'll continue to Phil Byron's bunker, and you're going to be
back here once a month, every month, the Byron Velvik

(01:34:54):
residency. Dude, I'm so honored to be on
there. Thank you so much.
And and by the way, anybody mentions they saw us on this
podcast, I throw in a little something extra like I have
every time I get a whole, hey, I'm I'm buying this wiggle word
on there. And I saw you on Mercer's
podcast. So something else is coming in
the mail with it. Check it out.
Byron's bunker. Don't miss out.

(01:35:15):
Bass center hats. You got your bass center hat.
Fine, I do, I do. Where is it?
It's in here. It's I'll.
I'll have it in a good location so that I can.
Show it up. It should be in a frame Plex.
It's at the framers. Right now it's at the framers.
Yeah, yeah, the Byron, the Bass Center, Byron Velvet Bass Center
hat from a million years ago when you and I were starting off
in television. It was a while ago.

(01:35:37):
It was a while ago. Thank you SO.
Much for having me on and I can't wait for Rick to finally
hear my story of gratitude. My Rick Collins story of
gratitude in fishing. And the good news is we don't
have to wait long to see him again.
Once a month you can TuneIn and check out Byron's bunker.
And I'll have updates for you onstuff that's selling and I'll
encourage Mercer to start shipping stuff from Canada to me
so I can sell it for him. Deal.

(01:35:59):
Or bring it to Lake Fork. Or bring it to Orange, TX.
Pack your. Suitcase full of stuff.
Deal, deal. Bye guys.
Thank you and thanks for supporting my my fledgling eBay
store. Well, that's it, that's all.
I guess we can officially stick a fork in this show.
You get it. I know it's cheesy, but if you

(01:36:21):
don't like cheese, you wouldn't be tuned into this show.
Thank you all for watching. Thank you to everybody who came
up and said hello. At Lake Fork.
You don't have to deal with those critters when I'm in the
studio, but I am now. Thank you to everybody that said
hello at. Fork it was.
Awesome meeting all of The Humpers, so many old friends.

(01:36:43):
Great to see Tim Cook and the entire crew there.
Randy Buddy Randy, one of The Humpers, local guys who drove
the vehicles around the stage. It was cool to have a humper
driving vehicles around the stage.
It's always cool to meet The Humpers.
And if you are a fine Humper andyou are going to be in Orange,
TX, make sure you holler at me and say hello.

(01:37:03):
I would love to meet you there. It is always fun to meet you
fine folks. This tournament is going to be a
lot of fun. It's always giant crowds.
Orange always shows out in an amazing community.
Davy Height and Tommy Sanders are going to be on site.
We're going to have a tailgate this week, so they're going to
be doing live on site. So lots going on myself and

(01:37:26):
Kyle, Jesse will be doing live cast and the always popular
halftime show, which we are doing a lot more on the water
stuff. I'm pushing for it.
Trust me. All on the on the water all the
time and pay attention. Lots of cool stuff happening.
More cool stuff to come. But I hope you've enjoyed this

(01:37:46):
remote version of Mercer. Have a great week.
Enjoy being and as always, Bob Cobb.
Oh, by the way, hey, like comment, subscribe, do all those
things, give us a bunch of ratings on the streaming
services we are blowing up on Spotify.
And I thank you for it because, well, it just makes it feel like
me sitting on a bench in the middle of a park sounding like a

(01:38:09):
weirdo in front of people. Well, it makes it all seem
worthwhile. So continue to like, comment,
subscribe, do all those things, give us ratings on Spotify, do
all those things on YouTube, stroke the algorithm and help
the grow going and keep this show going.
Have a great week, enjoy being and as always, Bob Cobb, take it

(01:38:30):
away. Thanks for watching.
Please like, comment and subscribe because Bob Cobb of
the Bass Masters told you to youhere.

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