80K-100K To Be In The Pro's? 2024
Khong reply :
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hPBeTjyaUOE
After watching most of the Pro Talk episode. I have to give a lot of my props to them for doing what they love. Seriously spending at least $80k -100k a year out of your pocket.
SirSnookalot reply :
Being a professional fisherman or golfer isn't much different than being a businessman or professional, a capital expense is needed to get started plus the ongoing expenses. A doctor for example has large expense just to get thru school, then setting up a practice with the cost of hi tech equipment. Many businesses require land, buildings, machinery like cranes, large trucks and material handlers plus a payroll that's expects to be paid whether the business is profitable or not. Luckily the fisherman can get sponsorship, endorsements and may get a big score in the winners circle. It's a great way to make a buck, but as in most endeavors 90% of the money is made by 10% of the people. I would think one tournament fishes or plays golf for the love of the sport, there are easier ways to make money.
Brian Needham reply :
that whole series of videos are good. It's a good look at who/what/how it all goes down.
slonezp reply :
On 8/14/2013 at 7:48 PM, Brian Needham said:that whole series of videos are good. It's a good look at who/what/how it all goes down.
Yep
tbone1993 reply :
On 8/14/2013 at 4:55 PM, SirSnookalot said:Being a professional fisherman or golfer isn't much different than being a businessman or professional, a capital expense is needed to get started plus the ongoing expenses. A doctor for example has large expense just to get thru school, then setting up a practice with the cost of hi tech equipment. Many businesses require land, buildings, machinery like cranes, large trucks and material handlers plus a payroll that's expects to be paid whether the business is profitable or not. Luckily the fisherman can get sponsorship, endorsements and may get a big score in the winners circle. It's a great way to make a buck, but as in most endeavors 90% of the money is made by 10% of the people. I would think one tournament fishes or plays golf for the love of the sport, there are easier ways to make money.
Being a professional fisherman IMO is a lot harder than a businessman or doctor. Yes they are completely different and both require different skills and levels of intelligence but a pro has to be a businessman as well as compete. For a doctor or businessman to get started they most go to school, attend college etc. In todays college market you can get a loan/ scholarship almost anywhere. I dont think it will be easy to convince a bank to give you a loan so you can compete in fishing tournaments. Just like any profession you are not going to start at the top. Before a doctor starts a practice he is going to spend years working in other hospitals just like a fishermen works his way up the ladder. I am almost positive that every pro has some sort of business on the side that funds their tournaments. But yeah I am not a doctor , businessman or pro so I cant really say much.
DancesWithJigs reply :
I think this is why high school and college fishing programs are going to be so pivotal in the future to identifying and developing professional talent. Younger people are getting both the opportunity and the exposure that was not as prevalent until a few years ago.
SirSnookalot reply :
On 8/14/2013 at 11:45 PM, tbone1993 said:Being a professional fisherman IMO is a lot harder than a businessman or doctor. Yes they are completely different and both require different skills and levels of intelligence but a pro has to be a businessman as well as compete. For a doctor or businessman to get started they most go to school, attend college etc. In todays college market you can get a loan/ scholarship almost anywhere. I dont think it will be easy to convince a bank to give you a loan so you can compete in fishing tournaments. Just like any profession you are not going to start at the top. Before a doctor starts a practice he is going to spend years working in other hospitals just like a fishermen works his way up the ladder. I am almost positive that every pro has some sort of business on the side that funds their tournaments. But yeah I am not a doctor , businessman or pro so I cant really say much.
You may good point, as a rule bank likes to make loans on based on collateral, past record and potential, in an attempt to limit their risk. A doctor for instance isn't a bad risk for them, a starting out professional fisherman probably isn't as good a risk, either would be a business person with little money or collateral and experience, both may need private backing. Spending 80-100k a year to tour may sound like a lot of money and true if they don't produce they don't make. The upside potential is huge, with success comes endorsements, commercials, maybe even a tv show. IMO the love of the game supercedes monetary rewards.
The small business man (woman) is no more assured of success, competition is every bit as fierce, they have the same at home expenses away from business, employees that rely on them to produce income so they can be paid, just a few salaries add up to a lot of money. A business person may not be doing what they love, but doing it out of necessity maybe with less upside earning power, being a businessman myself I can attest to that. Student loans need to be repaid like any other loan, the assurance of a job isn't a guarantee. Making a living doing something one loves to do sounds pretty appealing, the 100k a year now seems like a small price to pay on a gamble that could turn out big.
jhoffman reply :
A four year engineering degree is around $100,000 now a days. That breaks down to about a $1000 a month loan payment... chew on that a couple mins. Now imagine you go for broke here and somehow could get a loan that size. Youve quit your job for a year at least and now have $1000 a month payment for 20 years.
Khong reply :
On 8/15/2013 at 10:21 PM, jhoffman said:A four year engineering degree is around $100,000 now a days. That breaks down to about a $1000 a month loan payment... chew on that a couple mins. Now imagine you go for broke here and somehow could get a loan that size. Youve quit your job for a year at least and now have $1000 a month payment for 20 years.
Yea, but these guys have to spend $80k - $100k per year to be in the pro's. With that saying, you have to make at least $160k each year just to live normally. Can you be that competitive to win $160k per year. That's why I'm saying they have my hard earn respect for sticking to what they love to do.
SirSnookalot reply :
Most likely a engineering grad is going to be an engineer, hopefully getting employment after graduation. Not that a student loan is to be taken lightly. Pre grad loans are 3.8%, post grad are 5.4%, 100k undergraduate loan amortized for 20 years is about $575 per month and post grad about $680, many institutions require only a $50 monthly minimum, but you're still on the hook for the entire amount. A student loan may or not apply to a pro fisherman, a college degree isn't a requirement to go fishing for a living. However a capital investment is needed for just about anything.
I do not feel 100k a year to operate a 1 man business, and being a professional fisherman is business that has a high upside potential is that much money. The average small business person can have expenses not much different than that 100k, with a couple of employees it's probably more. For the most part the small business person doesn't have near the upside potential, no endorsements, no sponsors, no books, and no commercials. It's all about risk and reward whichever path is taken, no business is easy.
Khong reply :
See the thing about me is that I don't believe in luck. I believe in hard work will get you what you want.
I feel that all the Bass Pro fisherman know it's about luck at that end game competition. Why do I say it's luck, because when everyone is trained to compete at that level and they know where the fish is at. It's a matter of luck on who's catching the big one that makes you win.
This is why I wouldn't want to be a Pro and putting $80k-$100k per year to win. Literately, it's like a huge gamble. If you win, you win big and you get sponsor knocking on your door. This doesn't mean it's a close deal until you start showing them that you can sell their product.
Again, I would give them props just putting in that much and holding out on luck to win at end game.
flyfisher reply :
At the 2 minute mark i think was the best statement. It is about bumping into the right people and being at the right place at the right time...
JayKumar reply :
It's not about luck or anyone with the $ could do it, and that's not the case. It's a tough life, not for everyone, the great ones are masters at a lot of skills, ones that have nothing to do with fishing.
Zach Dunham reply :
On 8/16/2013 at 6:03 PM, Khong said:See the thing about me is that I don't believe in luck. I believe in hard work will get you what you want.
I feel that all the Bass Pro fisherman know it's about luck at that end game competition. Why do I say it's luck, because when everyone is trained to compete at that level and they know where the fish is at. It's a matter of luck on who's catching the big one that makes you win.
This is why I wouldn't want to be a Pro and putting $80k-$100k per year to win. Literately, it's like a huge gamble. If you win, you win big and you get sponsor knocking on your door. This doesn't mean it's a close deal until you start showing them that you can sell their product.
Again, I would give them props just putting in that much and holding out on luck to win at end game.
This is definitely 100% incorrect (about pros thinking it is all luck in the end). Yes, there is luck (or variance, the more proper statistical term) involved, just like in playing poker, yet the best still win the most consistently. There are infinite ways to make your odds the best. The pros that are consistently on top are great at creating good situations for themselves. There is a reason why a guy like Kevin VanDam has qualified for 20-something straight Bassmaster Classics and has cashed a check in 30-something straight Elite Series tournaments. It isn't luck when it happens over a long period of time and you have a large data set. Aaron Martens placing 2nd, 8th, 2nd, 5th and 12th (would have been first or second with no break down), in the last 5 Elite tournaments is not luck.
As for finding the big ones, occasionally someone may get lucky and run into a lunker, but to catch entire limits of big ones (or larger average size) is not luck. If it was luck you would see guys going up and down a lot in a 4 day tournament. It does happen to some of the time, but a lot of the time the ones on top in any given tournament had 4 very consistent days of good weight.
J Francho reply :
Tournament fishing is more about guessing right, than luck. Those guesses might be more educated than most, though. 
flyfisher reply :
To me luck is where preparation meets opportunity hence the reason i don't believe in it at all. The "luckiest" people i know are the ones who work hard and make educated guesses based on that preparation and experieces they learned from in the past.
And sorry but variance is not the same as luck from any statistical analysis perspective. Luck is not a statistical term and cannot be measured.
Zach Dunham reply :
On 8/27/2013 at 12:15 AM, flyfisher said:To me luck is where preparation meets opportunity hence the reason i don't believe in it at all. The "luckiest" people i know are the ones who work hard and make educated guesses based on that preparation and experieces they learned from in the past.
And sorry but variance is not the same as luck from any statistical analysis perspective. Luck is not a statistical term and cannot be measured.
I didn't mean that luck and variance are the same thing, I meant that luck doesn't actually exist but variance is the reason why it sometimes seems that it does. I'm not going to explain why variance is the correct term when I can just link it: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Variance
J Francho reply :
Real bass fishing statisticians use standard deviation, not variance. 
SPEEDBEAD. reply :
On 8/27/2013 at 2:48 AM, J Francho said:Real bass fishing statisticians use standard deviation, not variance.
I just fish.
flyfisher reply :
Are we going to get into a statistics conversation here 
My knowledge of variance and what is determined is luck they are not even close to the same. Also given the variables involved in fishing the variance piece is kind of out the window. Now if yo uwere tlaking about electro shocking and sample sizes then i could buy the variance argument but we all have fished next to people who are catching and you aren't when throwing the same baits.
This is where the preparation comes into play.
Really any sports event variance is a difficult one to use as there are so many variables involved.
And yes, standard deviations are the way to go
Zach Dunham reply :
On 8/27/2013 at 3:13 AM, flyfisher said:Are we going to get into a statistics conversation here
Nerdy conversations are fun!
OK OK, I won't keep going with it much further, just this last part. As far as fishing next to people and throwing the same baits but not catching, we can just break out more variables: retrieve, minor differences in the exact location being fished, etc. Take all of the variables into account (we may not know them all yet, but it is possible to eventually know them all), and then you have a list of possible outcomes that can happen with all of said variables taken into account. Of the set of outcomes created, each has a chance of happening and their chances add up to 100%. The only way to change your "luck" is to change the variables so that the more likely outcomes in the set are outcomes that benefit you. That's why I say it is similar to poker: you can never control them all, but you make the odds in your favor and you'll do better in the long run thanks to variance (or worse thanks to variance if one isn't very good).
This conversation is satisfying my day whether I am right or wrong. I probably could have taken more time to write this but I had to do it in 2 minutes because I am about to leave work!
SirSnookalot reply :
On 8/27/2013 at 3:11 AM, SPEEDBEAD. said:I just fish.
Sounds good to me.
ChrisAW reply :
On 8/26/2013 at 11:14 PM, imanidiot777 said:This is definitely 100% incorrect (about pros thinking it is all luck in the end). Yes, there is luck (or variance, the more proper statistical term) involved, just like in playing poker, yet the best still win the most consistently. There are infinite ways to make your odds the best. The pros that are consistently on top are great at creating good situations for themselves. There is a reason why a guy like Kevin VanDam has qualified for 20-something straight Bassmaster Classics and has cashed a check in 30-something straight Elite Series tournaments. It isn't luck when it happens over a long period of time and you have a large data set. Aaron Martens placing 2nd, 8th, 2nd, 5th and 12th (would have been first or second with no break down), in the last 5 Elite tournaments is not luck.
As for finding the big ones, occasionally someone may get lucky and run into a lunker, but to catch entire limits of big ones (or larger average size) is not luck. If it was luck you would see guys going up and down a lot in a 4 day tournament. It does happen to some of the time, but a lot of the time the ones on top in any given tournament had 4 very consistent days of good weight.
You can't say his statement is 100% incorrect, and then say the same thing in the next sentence. He never said "It's ALL about luck." You said that.
Yes, a majority of the top players are there because of SKILL. But random happenings play a roll in this game too. I would say it was LUCKY for Chris Lane that Aaron Martins had a breakdown, or he wouldn't have got he win on St. Clair.
No, luck might not exist as a true phenomenon in life. We use that word to describe something out of the ordinary happening, that we may not find a cause or reason that it did happen. Good or bad, luck DOES play a roll in fishing.
SirSnookalot reply :
Quote
Good or bad, luck DOES play a roll in fishing.
IMO there is no question about it. Not to say that the more experience one has can create good fortune. Bad luck may be getting your line wrapped the motor of trim tabs with a big fish, happened to me many times, result is a lost fish. In an area where fish are stacked, having a larger one hit your lure first I think is good luck
Zach Dunham reply :
On 8/28/2013 at 9:48 AM, ChrisAW said:You can't say his statement is 100% incorrect, and then say the same thing in the next sentence. He never said "It's ALL about luck." You said that.
Yes, a majority of the top players are there because of SKILL. But random happenings play a roll in this game too. I would say it was LUCKY for Chris Lane that Aaron Martins had a breakdown, or he wouldn't have got he win on St. Clair.
No, luck might not exist as a true phenomenon in life. We use that word to describe something out of the ordinary happening, that we may not find a cause or reason that it did happen. Good or bad, luck DOES play a roll in fishing.
I wouldn't say that is luck at all. Aaron Martens changed the probability distribution of the outcomes by making a long run in dangerously rough water. He made a breakdown more likely than it should have been and it happened. It is all just a risk/reward system. He may have had better fish there but he also may not make it back in time or at all. He knew this and made the choice to do that anyways.
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