Saturday, December 11, 2010

To Boyd Duckett (and Kevin Short): I Disagree

On his two blogs (Boyd's Blog, Boyd's Biz Boyd Ducket writes a blog post entitled: "To Kevin Short: I agree" or at Boyd's Biz: "Dear Kevin Short — I agree with you"

Boyd is responding to Kevin Short's essay found on the blog Bass Parade entitled Short Challenges Duckett, All Elites

Boyd writes:
...But let me address another thing that Kevin said, because he made a great point. He said he would be happy if we, the pro anglers, could receive no information at any time about the bodies of water we’re going to fish. No help from locals, in other words.

I agree with that 100 percent.

I think a “no help rule” would be outstanding — a great thing for our sport.



I think Boyd and Kevin Short are 100% wrong about this. One of the greatest things about the sport of fishing, any kind of fishing, is that the sport is heavily built upon personal relationships. Ray Scott had it right in the beginning when he recognized that bass fishing could and should be a fraternity. Getting help from others when it comes to fishing is a feature, not a bug. It's a feature precisely because it builds relationships and community and isn't that what we claim is important? I believe a "no help rule ever" sends the wrong message to bass anglers everywhere. The flip side of you can't get help, is that it is wrong to give help. There is already too much of that kind of attitude when it comes to bass tournament anglers as it is now.

I've seen it on Facebook where Professional anglers due to "no info rules" have basically had to tell someone to shut up and keep it to themselves when offered a simple helpful suggestion. Shutting out others especially with the technology we have at our fingertips now is the wrong way to go, period.

I add more thoughts at Futurebass.com Forums...

5 comments:

Bo said...

How about let them get all the info they want, but limiting practice?

Basspastor said...

Come on Bo, you know practice is already limited with off limits periods and designated practice days. I don't have a problem with that at all.

I think the only time tournament anglers should be banned from receiving outside info is during tournament hours by phone call or radio. I think some level of info should be allowed by computer/smartphone in an open sourced network platform that is available to all competitors and fans alike. Kind of like a combo Facebook BASSTrak kind of thing. Imagine the openess and mind games something like that would put on the table.

Basspastor said...

That computer info should be allowed during tournament hours, if you didn't pick that up.

Anonymous said...

I like the no practice idea. That would seperate the men from the boys. Plus 99% of these waters have been pounded by these guys for years. In practice, they just go through 30 to 50 known spots and keep track of the hot ones for the day. The good guys know where to fish and they are not out exploring new areas unless the 50 saved spots are dead.As for sharing info, that is impossible to monitor and like they say..."it's not what you know, but who you know"

Basspastor said...

@ Anon

It is not necessarily true that most of the anglers have been on a Tour body of water a bunch of times.