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Improve That Limit – Jig ‘Em
By Jerry Puckett

July/August 1998

Springtime and early summer bass fishing strategies on the Colorado River chain of lakes seem to follow a tightly scripted scenario. Chunk a spinnerbait and if that fails, chunk a spinnerbait. And it works, almost always, but it rarely accounts for a tournament winning stringer.

The tournament winners probably threw a spinnerbait or some other reaction-type bait; they just didn’t leave it at that. In all likelihood, when their strategy called for culling, they chose a jig to improve their weight. It’s not that easy to make that change, to leave behind fish that are biting to seek out a few big bites on the jig. Tournaments are won on reaction bites but success can work against you at times. The fact remains; more tournaments are won after having culled a limit on the jig. At least out west.

A case in point occurred this year in a Wild West team tournament in Arizona. Wild West is an upscale circuit offering a fully rigged Champion as top prize in the one-day outing, a much larger than normal purse for a teams event. As a result, the top four finishing teams (it was tight) read like a who’s who of western bassing. An analysis of their strategies tells the story – in the words of Yogi Berra, "You can observe a lot just by watchin’."

Pro Staffers Derek Yamamoto and Ben Matsubu have each won a boat on Yamamoto’s light wire spinnerbait. It’s a great bait, no two ways about it, and they caught lots of fish, and good ones. Chartreuse and white and chartreuse and blue were the skirt colors of choice, teamed with silver #4 willowleaf blades. Outside points and flats adjacent to deep water produced the fish good for fourth place and a nice check. You win a couple of boats on a particular bait and it’s hard to set it down in favor of a jig. But it’s that one kicker on a jig that so often separates fourth from first.

The father-son team of Jerry and Tom Loughran also put together a solid outside point pattern. They chose a small crank plug and it worked very well. Maybe too well. They couldn’t make themselves lay it down to jig up a kicker – third place, nicer check.

Jim Furr and Mike Baldwin, each sponsored by Yamamoto, also found the outside point pattern. A small crankbait accounted for a solid limit of fish, but not winners. The key change in the team’s strategy came when they put aside the productive reaction bait and picked up a black rubber Yamamoto Widowmaker jig dressed with a black/red flake twin tail trailer (16-10-051). They moved inside to a brushy cut and proceeded to cull their limit with much better jig fish. Unfortunately for Furr and Baldwin, they lost the "my kicker is bigger than your kicker" battle by a couple of ounces – second place, much nicer check.

John Murray and Larry Mantle, two of the toughest sticks anywhere, put together a solid outside spinnerbait pattern. Just like the other top guns, it was outside points and flats bordered by a drop-off to deeper water. The action was quick and the fish were solid. Winners? Not yet. Out came the 5/8 ounce football head jigs dressed with a pumpkin pepper skirt and a pumpkin pepper twin tail Yamamoto. Moving inside, Murray and Mantle managed to cull a big limit on the pumpkin jig. Those fish, and one that fell victim to a zipper worm, anchored the team’s successful bid for first place and the keys to the new Champion. Their kicker was bigger.

Have we made old Yogi proud? Let’s analyze what we managed to observe just by watching four top teams. They all found the prime pattern, took full advantage of it, producing solid limits good for a top four finish. But the winners left that productive pattern, took a risk in order to give themselves a shot at the win.

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