In a flick of Flick’s eye, she was gone.
Brennan Flick, in perhaps the freakiest fashion, lost his best fish on Championship Friday of the Nitro Boats Bassmaster Elite Qualifier on Norfork Lake presented by Bass Pro Shops.
The 37-year-old from West Monroe, La., briefly lamented the oddity of a 4-pounder leaping from his livewell, but he didn’t lose his cool. Flick got right back to work, a mindset he hopes will help punch his ticket to the 2027 Elites.
“For every fish you do catch that you shouldn’t catch, you’re going to lose one down the line that you shouldn’t lose,” he said. “You’re going to be able to get your hands on one that you hang on a dock cable. Meanwhile, a week later, you’re going to lose one on a jig that you never in a million years figured you would have lost.
“I think it all evens itself out in the end.”
Flick finished fourth at Norfork, a great start for the former minor league ballplayer’s Elite quest, especially after finishing 197th in last year’s Open there. He worried about this no-scope event against 133 “absolute hammers.”
“I stressed about that,” he said. “Before I even made the EQs, I was not looking forward to that. That place is so tough.”
Pressure affected the shallow bite, so Flick relied on deeper bites that were few and far between. Catching a 4-pounder was gold, and losing about a 2 1/2-pound cull cost Flick $5,000 in earnings – “Shoot, I work for a living, I need every dollar I get” – but only two points.
Even though Flick finished 4 pounds, 6 ounces behind winner Kaden Buchmann’s 42-7 total, he might have been closer if it wasn’t for other misses.
“I actually lost two bigger,” he said. “The biggest bite I had the whole dang tournament happened on Day 1, and I had one that was about 5 come off right at the dang boat. That hurt more than the one jumping out of the box.
“But that was such a weird thing, though. It was just like, really? Like, I couldn’t even really be mad about it.”
Around midday, Flick’s 4-pounder was set to cut into Buchman’s 3-7 lead. Flick was estatic and optimistic about winning.
“We get five of them we got a shot,” he said on Bassmaster LIVE. “We’re going to make those boys have to catch them. We can do it.”
With both livewell lids open, Flick was adding ice and about to cull when the bass he just caught went Houdini. Presto, escapo. It leapt from the livewell toward his motor and back into Norfork. Flick lunged and reached into the lake with his left hand to no avail. Gone. Then he lay face down on his back deck for a moment before reacting in a calm, matter-of-factly fashion.
“I’ve never had that happen. That hurts. Golly, them bites don’t come often. That super sucks. It’s my fault for leaving the fricking lid open,” he said as he sat to retie. “It’s alright, we got plenty of time.”
He took a deep, resetting breath and assessed the absurdity and timing of the crazy happenstance.
“All the years of doing this, not once,” he said. “We got a shot at winning, the sucker jumps out the livewell … with a camera in the boat?
“You can’t make that up. What are the fricking odds of that? … It’s alright. We got time.”
Starting third with 15-14 on Day 1, Flick stayed there with 13-9 that all came after noon. The freak loss came on his worst day of 8-10, and it cost him a runner-up finish. On his drive home with wife and three daughters, he received condolences and heard all types of crazy fish loss stories.
“Everybody’s been pretty cool about it. It’s one of them things. You can leave your livewell lid open for a half hour 1,000 times and that not happen,” said Flick, who went through his GoPro footage to make sure it never happens again. “The lid stayed open a little bit longer than I would have liked, but it didn’t stay open as long as I originally thought.
“As soon as I got done dumping the ice, I got eyes on (the fish to cull) and I was like, sweet, I’ll just grab her and throw her back. Man, the second I reach for her, the other one dipped out and she’s gone. It’s just kind of a quick brain fart.”
Flick, a hard-hat worker in the oil industry, didn’t have many of those in finishing ninth in Division 2 of the 2026 Turtlebox Bassmaster Opens presented by Battery Tender. He started with a 20th at Sam Rayburn then went 24th and 25th, respectively, at Grand Lake and Kentucky Lake. His glitch was an 86th at La Crosse.
He’s hoping he won’t have another as the EQs head to Toledo Bend Reservoir, Oct. 21-23, before the decisive event at Lake Guntersville, Nov. 11-13.
While he lives about 2 1/2 hours from Toledo Bend, Flick’s experience there has mostly been in spring events. He does expect anglers to fish however they want, whether it be grass, timber, brushpiles or scoping, but fall there can be tough.
“To be honest with you, in our part of the world, I really don’t like October. It gets weird,” he said. “Sometimes they scatter out. October has always turned into junk fishing, you just throw stuff at the wall until something sticks.”
The goal would be another Top 10 so he could have some breathing room at Guntersville, where he expects a smashfest that can create point volatility. An angler might think he’s done well with 20 pounds then winds up 80th. To improve his chances, Flick took a scouting trip to better familiarize himself with Guntersville.
“I had two days in between having to watch kids and work,” he said, “So I ran over there and slept in the truck and pretty much idled.”
Loving to punch and knowing the Guntersville mats would call, Flick set a timer and allowed himself only 20 minutes at a time to flip before going back to mapping potential spots.
“I was trying to guess where I think they’re going to be,” he said. “I think I marked some things that are going to be useful.”
Last year, Fisher Anaya averaged ninth-place finishes to win EQ Angler of the Year, and Brock Reinkemeyer averaged 23rd to take the final Elite berth. This year those numbers could be slightly lower with 25 more anglers in the field.
Originally from Morgan City in southern Louisiana, Flick was a relief pitcher in the minors for several years, which he said helps in his approach to competitive fishing. He knows you have to just get back up on the mound, even after allowing a homer on a 90-plus mph slider.
“I’m so big on fishing being more of a mental game than anything,” he said. “The past couple years, I’ve done pretty well but I don’t think I’m more talented than anybody. I think the one edge I have is that I’m super, super efficient and my mentality is rock solid.
“I’m not gonna flash out. Because every time you flash out, it costs you time. That’s time I’m not willing to give my competitors.”
Despite his weird loss, Flick kept chugging. He said he believes that’s exactly how he’s going to make the Elites.
“I just gotta keep showing up,” he said. “I got all the tools to do well in the next two. I just got to show up and do my job.”
And you can bet he’ll pitch a shutout of bass flinging themselves out of his livewells.
