MLF 1st event

[Alex Heitman]

Watching some of the event this morning and it’s almost unwatchable. They are in Toledo Bend and all screen watchers staring at love scope. I’d rather watch paint dry. 

[Seth]

Tournament fishing in a nutshell these days. Fishing with FFS is a hoot, but watching somebody do it sucks. If they showed the screen so you could see what they are looking at then I'd be more apt to watch it. Mark Davis is probably the only guy not glued to his screen.

[fishinwrench]

Pro fishing has gone totally stupid.  I hobknob with a group of full-time pro anglers, but I dare not mention any of them or openly repeat anything I hear.....Yet they all (well, most of them) are active social media butterflies who occasionally talk in code on their respective channels......and get lambasted for it. 

I'll tell ya what they remind me of, is a bunch of law enforcement officials whispering in private about all the underhanded crap going on that can't be "leaked".   

The pretentious BS that I 💯% won't stand for, is the facade that college and highschool anglers want to be brought into this fold......NO THEY DON'T!   And if you have a kid in your family that is in any way being coaxed (or funded) in that direction, do them a huge favor and do whatever you can to stand in their way.    Teaching kids to fish is very cool, but encouraging kids to enter the world of competitive angling is probably worse than anything right now.   It didn't used to be like this, and it sucks to see.   I keep thinking that it can't continue on this path for very much longer before it implodes...... but I've been thinking that for way too long.   😔

[snagged in outlet 3]

5 hours ago, fishinwrench said:

 I keep thinking that it can't continue on this path for very much longer before it implodes...... but I've been thinking that for way too long.   😔

As long as “pros” 😆 keep paying to fish it will continue.   Never heard of a pro ball player “paying” to play in Busch Stadium  😂.   My neighbor says he’s a pro while going to his real job every week.  He won a few hundred bucks in a charity tournament so, Bam!    He’s a pro.  

[DADAKOTA]

So few on the smaller circuits make any real money.  Most in fact donate substantial (to me anyway) amounts of money to say they are a tourney angler.  Must be an ego thing unless one has throw away cash.

[fishinwrench]

2 hours ago, DADAKOTA said:

Must be an ego thing unless one has throw away cash.

Not as much as you might think.   

Advertising is a write-off and to my knowledge there's no limit to the amount of advertising a business can do.   Basically (under current tax laws) any amount of money a company pays to Uncle Sam each year can be given to pro anglers......and at least the company gets SOMETHING out of it in return.       

They don't have to win tournaments, or even place high, they just have to show up and walk across the stage.   Being an entertaining person that the the public can relate to is a plus.    If you follow the B.A.S.S. OPENS you'll notice that an opportunity to end your day early to help a fellow angler is never avoided because you'll be openly recognized and praised for it.   Sponsors eat that stuff up !  👍😇   That's actually better than a landslide win, because you'll carry that for YEARS.  

[tjm]

33 minutes ago, fishinwrench said:

Basically (under current tax laws) any amount of money a company pays to Uncle Sam each year can be given to pro anglers..

Tax write-offs don't come out of 'what is paid' for tax, but  simply reduce the taxable income, so the tax savings is only a percentage of the write off. If one is in a 25% tax bracket any write off of $1000 would be a tax savings of only $250. And there are rules that only a tax expert would know differentiating advertising and sponsorship.  I'm not that expert, but, I suspect that if you pay my tournament entry fee of $5000, that I might have to pay $3-400 taxes on that as personal income while you could only reduce your  tax by $1500, or some such figures- it's not a dollar spent is a dollar saved situation. Lots of the tax write offs, like business lunches/dinners,  are limited to 50% of actual expense too. I'm sure it works out as favorable to the sponsors based on their perceived advertising results or they wouldn't do it, but it's not a straight conversion to tax savings.   

[snagged in outlet 3]

2 hours ago, fishinwrench said:

Not as much as you might think.   

Advertising is a write-off and to my knowledge there's no limit to the amount of advertising a business can do.   Basically (under current tax laws) any amount of money a company pays to Uncle Sam each year can be given to pro anglers......and at least the company gets SOMETHING out of it in return.       

They don't have to win tournaments, or even place high, they just have to show up and walk across the stage.   Being an entertaining person that the the public can relate to is a plus.    If you follow the B.A.S.S. OPENS you'll notice that an opportunity to end your day early to help a fellow angler is never avoided because you'll be openly recognized and praised for it.   Sponsors eat that stuff up !  👍😇   That's actually better than a landslide win, because you'll carry that for YEARS.  

Several guys on You tube lay  out their whole expense for tournaments.  

[fishinwrench]

25 minutes ago, snagged in outlet 3 said:

Several guys on You tube lay  out their whole expense for tournaments.  

Well sure😅 

Everyone is glad to share their EXPENSES with you.   Wanna hear mine?   

What's really amazing is that if you sit with your calculator and add them up, and then add up my "profits"...... you'll be left astounded as to how the heck I'm not living alone, just me and my dirty barefoot & cross-eyed hungry children, in a van down by the river. 😉

[Quillback]

Mark Zuckerberg made $28 billion today (on paper) with META stock surging in value.  There's some crazy money out there.