Is it too soon to call it a season of comebacks?
Almost certainly. I mean we’re only one tournament plus one day of competition into the Elite Series marathon, but still, look at how much things have changed from day to day.
If it seems like it was just four days ago that I was singing the praises of John Garrett as perhaps the best long-term hope of the rookie class of 2024, that’s because it was. Garrett had over 30 pounds on Saturday. Today he barely had over 10 and finds himself in 62nd place. Meanwhile, last year’s ultimate wunderkind, Trey McKinney, was 89th last week. We were neither predicting nor celebrating his potential demise, but it seemed that just two dozen tournaments into his BASS career perhaps the shine was dimming slightly.
Today McKinney was the last boat out but he caught up quickly, putting on a masterful performance on Live, stacking up 21 pounds of river bass early to land in 4th. You could say he’s back, but he never really went away. Tomorrow he’ll be the first boat to leave the dock, with a distinct chance to close the gap on the three anglers ahead of him.
Likewise, your tournament leader, Greg DiPalma, finished 79th last week. Apparently, as the brokerage houses are required to tell you, past performance is no guarantee of future success – and vice versa – because he crushed ‘em.
Indeed, the top of today’s leaderboard is littered with others who struggled in Palatka:
- Paul Mueller was 97th last week. Today he had 19-10 and is tied with Cooper Gallant for 7th.
- Stetson Blaylock was 100th last week. Today he had 20-12 and is in 5th.
- Matty Wong was a bottom-scraping 103rd last week. Today he caught 19-7 worth of Lake O bass and is now in 9th.
- The 10th, 11th and 12th place anglers all finished in the bottom quartile of the standings last week, too.
None of them are guaranteed to hold those spots, but things are looking up for sure. It ain’t over until it’s over, and the season has barely started. Expect more changes than stability before we close it out.
Here’s what I saw, heard, thought and hallucinated on the first day of competition from Lake Okeechobee, one of bass fishing’s most vaunted coliseums:
Rolling on Twenties – There were six bags over 20 pounds today, topped of course by Greg DiPalma’s 29-12. That’s down from the tournament two years ago when there were eleven Day 1 bags over 20 pounds, topped by 28-11 from Bernie Schultz.
2023 Revisited – Of the Day 1 Top 10 from two years ago, Will Davis Jr. and Cooper Gallant are the only two who find themselves there again.
Scoping and Hoping – I’ve long considered the dominant performance from Patrick Walters (15th, 16-13) at Fork to be the seminal tournament of the new scoping era, but maybe it should share that billing with Tyler Rivet’s victory at Okeechobee in 2023. When Walters won, it clearly showed what forward-facing could do, but it was almost too soon. Many other top pros still hadn’t adopted it, so the gulf between what guys like Walters were doing and others’ abilities was still huge. By the time Rivet won, however, it was less of an “us versus them” mentality. He did demonstrate that FFS could win on venues where it wasn’t expected to be a player, but it was also before the entrance of the Rookie Class of ’24, all of whom seem to excel with the new technology, came into the field. It was pre-Trey McKinney and his ilk, who – for better or for worse – ratcheted up the pressure on everyone to be on their “A Game” when it comes to electronics. This week may not be won with the winner looking at a screen, but it’s no longer unbelievable to think that’s possible.
Speaking of Rivet – This seems like an important inflection point in Rivet’s career. After the win at Okeechobee, he went on a mini-tear, following up with a 3rd place finish and a total of five consecutive Elite checks. That led to a 9th place finish in the AOY race, which itself was part of an upward trend – from 61st in 2020 to 44th in 2021 to 25th in 2022 and then finally single digits. Last year he backtracked a bit, ending up 42nd in AOY, still good enough to make this year’s Classic but a move in the wrong direction. That campaign included four consecutive finishes of 57th or worse to end the season, followed by a 71st place finish at St. Johns to start 2025. While no single tournament is determinative of an entire season or career, a top ten this week could get him back on track on his path to entering that next echelon of pros that he’s already shown himself to be capable of inhabiting. He’s in 40th after Day 1, 1-4 inside the cut. It could go either way.
Cut Weight Math – Today’s 50th place cut weight of 12-1 portends a Saturday cut weight of somewhere between 24 and 25 pounds.
Rookie Report – Six of the nine true rookies are inside the cut after Day 1. Paul Marks is the leader amongst them in 21st.
Home Cooking – John Cox is the only angler with a Florida mailing address inside the top 50, and he’s barely there in 48th.
Sophomore Surge – Seven of the 10 rookies from last year are inside the top fifty cut, with two – McKinney and Dube – inside the Top 10.
Florida Food – Matty Wong’s big bag included two fish over 7 pounds. He previously coined the phrase “spicy brown meatballs” for big St. Lawrence smallmouths. What would you call a pair of jumbo largemouths pulled from the Sunshine State grass?
Greg DiPalma – “To be leading one, to be honest with you, it’s about damn time.”
Trey McKinney – “I love you but you’re ugly.” Plenty of other anglers would’ve loved to have had that allegedly ugly fish.
Carl Jocumsen (56th 11-7) — “I had 9-pounders jumping around my boat and none of them were on my line.”
Greg DiPalma – “Me and Will Davis are sitting side by side.”
Brandon Palaniuk — “I only had six bites all day.” Apparently they were the right bites, because the two-time AOY, who has claimed to struggle in Florida, is in 3rd with 23-7.
Drew Cook – “Right flavor, wrong size….Working on a micro-limit.” He eventually culled up to 13-11 and finds himself in 34th. “I ain’t got a clue how we’re going to catch any tomorrow,” he added on stage.
Seth Feider (94th, 6-13) — “Probably the only person I’m beating now is Scott Martin.”
Trey McKinney – “All I know is that I love it when my ribs hurt.”
Jacob Powroznik – “I think I’ve been in Florida now for three weeks and haven’t caught one over 3 ½ pounds.” He’s in 66th with 10 pounds even, exactly a 2-pound per fish average.
Brandon Cobb — “That one fish was half my bag.” His 8-10 tied leader Greg DiPalma’s. It actually was more than half of Cobb’s daily weight of 16-11, which has him in 17th.
Some Things Never Change – No knuckles for Mercer from Shiloh Lester.
Other Things That Never Change – “Grind” was the most popular word on the weigh-in stage.
