ORANGE, Texas — If you didn’t pick Shaw Grigsby for your Bassmaster Fantasy Fishing team, you just plain messed up. He was the best overall pick for the Bassmaster Elite at the Sabine River presented by Stark Cultural Venues.
Here’s the perfect team:
Bucket A: Chris Lane, 360 points
B: Mike McClelland, 295
C: Shaw Grigsby, 272
D: Keith Poche, 257
E: Micah Frazier, 254
Total: 1,438
No Fantasy Fishing player achieved a score that high.
Bucket A: Lane
Of course you should have picked Chris Lane. He not only won the tournament, earning 300 points, but he led all four days — so that’s a 5-point leader bonus times 4 — and he caught the biggest bag of the tournament, which is worth another 40 points.
But of course, you probably didn’t pick him. Only 2.7 percent of players did. Those players earned beaucoup points and earned the right to shame all the other players who didn’t have faith in the 2012 Bassmaster Classic champ and the guy who pulled off a 355-point win for his Fantasy Fishing owners this time last year at the St. Johns. In fact, Lane now owns the Top 2 spots in Fantasy Fishing points wins of all the Elite Series anglers in the past two years.
Next time you wonder if you should pick Chris Lane for a tournament, the answer is probably yes.
One other group of fans got to rejoice in the hefty 40-point bonus for big bag, and those are the 0.3 percent of fans who chose John Crews. He ended with 316 points in Bucket A and was the second-best pick behind Lane.
The popular picks in Bucket A did well, but compared to Lane, they were terrible, at least as it relates to Fantasy Fishing points. Greg Hackney scored 280 points for his 13.3 percent of fans; Todd Faircloth, 264 for 34.8 percent; and Dean Rojas, 237 for 16.5 percent. If you were among the one-third of the bucket who chose Faircloth, you lost his bucket by nearly 100 points.
The worst picks in Bucket A were David Walker, 61 points; Brandon Palaniuk, 73; and Jared Lintner, 79, but combined, those anglers had only 2 percent of owners.
Bucket B: McClelland
Mike McClelland threatened to win the tournament. He came in second instead. But he did win Bucket B, producing 295 points for his 2.2 percent of players.
Practically no one picked Brandon Lester — 0.3 percent — but those who did were rewarded with the second-best points in the bucket, 285.
Terry Scroggins owners, at 4.5 percent, were surely disappointed to not see him fish on the final day, but they were hopeful that his big bass on Day 1 would hold up. It did, and they got a 40-point bump. He delivered 263 points for his fans.
Bobby Lane was definitely the wrong brother to have on your Fantasy Fishing team. He earned only 71 points for his 12.9 percent of fans. Alton Jones, owned by 10.9 percent, gave up only 91 points. Bill Lowen was a favorite with 14.4 percent of owners, but he earned only 161 points.
The most popular pick of B was Mike Iaconelli at 22.1 percent. He delivered 215 points for his fans — good, but still an 80-point loss from the McClelland pickers.
Bucket C: Grigsby
Shaw Grigsby — just like Chris Lane and Mike McClelland — was owned by less than 3 percent of players but was the best pick in his bucket.
Grigsby’s seventh-place finish was good for 272 points. He’s the best overall pick because the angler closest to him, Hank Cherry, was 55 points back.
The favorite in this bucket was Kevin VanDam with 40.6 percent of owners, but he earned only 183 points, nearly a 90-point deficit off Grigsby.
Other popular picks were Stephen Browning, 10.1 percent, 199 points, and Ish Monroe, 17.6 percent, 189.
The worst pick of the bucket was Chad Pipkens. He was only owned by 1.6 percent of players, but those who stood by him earned exactly zero points, putting them 272 points behind those who picked Grigsby.
Bucket D: Poche
Louisiana native Keith Poche’s Alabama address must have thrown people off because only 3.2 percent of people picked him. But he earned 257 points for his comparatively small group of fans.
You did well, though, if you were among the 4 percent who chose Boyd Duckett — fewer than 10 points back of Poche.
Some pundits predicted Fantasy Fishing would be won or lost in Bucket D, and that ended up not being true. The big points differentials were in A and C. The anglers who were the most favored in D — Cliff Pace, Tommy Biffle and Dennis Tietje — all did well enough to be less than 50 points behind Poche, and those owners made up 57 percent of the group.
Two anglers in D, Scott Ashmore and Byron Velvick, went fishless on the Sabine, and their combined 1.6 percent of owners paid the price with zero points.
Bucket E: Frazier
Bucket E was very small this time, meant to include only rookies. But due to an error, we included Kevin Ledoux in here, too. So it was mostly rookies, plus one who’s just been out for a while.
Micah Frazier was the right rookie. He earned 254 points for his 0.6 percent of fans. David Williams came in second with 243 points for his 0.5 percent of fans.
What do Frazier and Williams not have that Brent Ehrler does? Name recognition. Ehrler was owned by more than half of the bucket — precisely 51.3 percent — and wow, all of those are wishing they had heard of Frazier or Williams.
Ehrler earned only 101 points in his first Elite Series event. Because of his very high ownership, if you chose any angler higher than him, you practically won the bucket.
Jordan Lee put up good points for his strong following of 9.7 percent of fans with 231 points. Paul Mueller, who was owned by a strong 15.7 percent, came in even lower than Ehrler with 95 points.
Ledoux was fishless, so his fans went pointsless.
The good thing about Bucket E for Guntersville is that it will be bigger and will not be just rookies. It will be the bottom 20 or so guys from Sabine, which means you will have some very big names to pick from on one of the best fisheries in the country.
Good luck on the next tournament!