There are some moments in tournament fishing a man never forgets. For me, one of them began the instant Dewey Kendrick slammed the door at Jasper High School.

It was 7:00 p.m., the night before the first day of competition at the B.A.S.S. Texas Invitational on Sam Rayburn, February 12-17, 1996. Dewey, the B.A.S.S. Tournament Director, walked into the high school gym, shut the door hard behind him, and barked to one of his staff members to fine anyone else who came in late. In B.A.S.S., being late to a meeting cost you money, and Dewey was not known for treating it as a minor offense.

More than 300 of us were sitting there, eyes fixed on him, waiting for the rules to be repeated one more time and, more importantly, for the partner pairings to be announced for the next morning. For the rookies in the room, and I was one of them then, that meeting carried a special kind of pressure. You were sitting shoulder to shoulder with the biggest names in bass fishing. Men like Rick Clunn, Gary Klein, Denny Brauer, Tommy Martin, Zell Rowland, Dion Hibdon, and Larry Nixon. Just being in the same room with that kind of company could put a little extra electricity in your pulse.

Part of the anxiety came from knowing you might be paired with one of them. In those events, you could not draw someone from your home state, but beyond that, anything was possible.

Dewey started reading off the pairings. In the third flight, I heard my name. I jumped to my feet and shouted “Yo!” loud enough to shake the rafters. I had learned the hard way at the Arkansas Invitational that if Dewey did not hear you respond, he was liable to make a public example out of you.

He looked up, found me, glanced back down at his list, and called out my partner for the next day:

“Larry Nixon.”

That was no small draw. Larry was already one of the biggest names in bass fishing, one of the best to ever put his hand on a rod. We left the gym and stepped outside, where dozens of newly paired anglers were already huddled together in quiet little groups, trading secret areas, bait choices, and carefully guarded information. Nobody wanted another pair overhearing anything.

Larry told me he had fish in about the same area where I did, and we agreed to head that way and split time between the fish both of us had found. We talked through tactics and bait choices so I would know exactly what to bring. It did not take long for me to realize that Larry was a genuinely nice man, straightforward and sincere in the way he talked about the fish and the water. There was no gamesmanship in it. Just calm confidence.

The next morning we launched with the rest of the field and our flight headed up the lake. We pulled into Larry’s area, a broad flat with a creek running along one side and timber scattered all through it. Larry had three keepers in the boat before I had even had a bite. Fifteen minutes later he had a limit.

“These fish are easy,” Larry said.

And for him, they were.

They were all two-pounders, just as he had told me the night before. By around 9:00 a.m. I had finally scratched together three of them myself. We had worked that same area all morning, and Larry kept saying, “We’re not leaving until you limit.”

Not many men would have shown that kind of patience. Most would have boxed their own limit and gone looking for something bigger. Larry knew, though, that if he stayed, I had a very real chance to fill out a limit, and on the first day of a three-day tournament that could make all the difference in the world.

Meanwhile, he kept catching two-pound fish left and right while I struggled to get bit. We were standing shoulder to shoulder on the front deck. I was not at any real disadvantage, unless you count about twenty-five years of B.A.S.S. experience, and that is no small thing to count. Larry was on another level altogether, catching fish one after another and explaining everything he was doing as he did it.

Oddly enough, my confidence never dropped. I was too busy being amazed. Watching somebody absolutely smoke fish the way Larry was that morning was like watching a craftsman at work. At times I honestly think he wanted me to catch the rest of my limit worse than I did. He was doing everything in his power to help me do it. At one point, he even stopped fishing altogether.

Finally, I told him we ought to just move on to the bigger fish and I would pretend I already had a limit. He agreed, though reluctantly, and we eased farther through the timber flat to an area where both of us had caught bigger fish in practice.

When we pulled into the spot, Larry said, “This is it. This is the place. Flip over by that big stump.”

I flipped to it three straight times and never got a bite. I picked out the next stump and pitched to that one. Larry quietly flipped into the stump I had just fished and set the hook.

A bass of about five pounds came thrashing to the boat.

He culled, stepped back up beside me, and we kept moving. A little later he caught two more solid fish that improved his weight, then said, “We need to go back and fish that big stump.”

We eased back over, and he told me again to flip to it. I pitched to that stump eight times, hitting the sides, the back, and the front. Nothing. Larry flipped in right behind me and instantly set the hook on what he called a horse.

He fought the fish for a bit, then finally lipped a giant.

On his computerized culling system, it weighed 9.15 pounds.

By then, words really did fail. The performance Larry was putting on was part lesson, part masterpiece. It was not just fishing. It was judgment, timing, instinct, patience, and experience all rolled into one.

Before long, it was nearly time to leave the creek and head back down the lake for weigh-in. I still had only three fish. I started fishing my way out through the timber while Larry sat behind the wheel eating a Mars bar and drinking a Diet Coke. As we neared the edge of the timber, he looked up and said, “Make sure you flip into that stump right up there.”

I saw the one he meant, pitched to it, and got an immediate bite. The fish was small, but it was a keeper, and Larry had called it from the driver’s seat while barely even looking.

We ran back toward the weigh-in site and arrived with about five minutes to spare. Larry suggested I make a few more casts while he stayed seated behind the wheel. Without even dropping the trolling motor, I jumped to the front deck and launched a Rat-L-Trap with the wind, probably fifty yards. I burned it back hard, trying to catch that fifth keeper before time ran out.

Nothing.

I cast again. Still nothing.

There was a small mudline within casting distance near the bank. I had noticed it, but had not thrown at it on purpose. Just as I was about to make what I figured would be my last cast, Larry told me to bring the bait through the mudline.

In one motion I adjusted and fired the lure into the stained water. As soon as I tightened up, I felt a fish.

I was so stunned I could hardly turn the reel handle.

I got the fish to the boat, and with that I had my limit at the very last minute. We rushed in, bagged our fish, and walked through the crowd to the scales.

I weighed first.

My five little fish went 9.15 pounds, exactly the same weight as Larry’s giant bass.

Then Larry stepped up and weighed his fish. The scales pushed past 24 pounds, and the crowd erupted.

Afterward, I walked over to the section of tournament headquarters where the next day’s partner pairings were posted. I found my name and looked across to see who I had drawn.

Ken Cook.

But that is another story.

I still think back on that day, and every time I do, I seem to learn something new from it. More than anything else, what I took away from fishing with Larry Nixon was this: there is absolutely no substitute for experience. Tackle matters. Timing matters. Instinct matters. But experience ties it all together, and there is no shortcut to it.

That day on Sam Rayburn, I showed up with rookie nerves and left with a firsthand look at greatness. And for a young tournament fisherman, that was worth almost as much as the limit I carried to the scales.