The Champ’s Key Gear: What Edwin Evers Caught ‘Em on at REDCREST

Edwin Evers' front deck was loaded with fish-catching gear at REDCREST. Photo by Joel Shangle

August 29, 2019 • Joel Shangle • Bass Pro Tour

If ever a bass angler wanted a testimonial about the fish-catching proclivity of a flat-sided crankbait, a vibrating jig with a white plastic trailer, a walking topwater plug, a shaky head and a 3/0 flipping hook armed with a creature bait, all they had to do was watch Edwin Evers’ performance in winning REDCREST Presented by Venmo on the Upper Mississippi River.

Evers worked his way through three competition rounds on Pool 8 of the Mississippi to qualify for the Championship Round on Pool 7, and then maneuvered his Nitro/Mercury into a secret honey hole to land on the mother lode of largemouth. The result: a 45-pound victory in the final round and a REDCREST trophy to top off his already-extraordinary season.

Here’s the gear Evers used to take home the first-ever REDCREST title and it’s $300,000 payday.

Berkley Frittside Crankbait

Evers cranked a No. 5 Honey Craw Berkley Fritts Side crankbait over subtle points. Photo by Joel Shangle

Evers relied heavily during his first three rounds on a new flat-sided crankbait designed by Berkley pro/crankbait master David Fritts: a No. 5 Honey Craw Fritts Side, a 2 1/4-inch crank engineered to run 2 to 5 feet deep. Evers fished the Fritts Side on subtle points that had shell beds on the tips, throwing the bait on a 7-foot medium heavy Bass Pro Shops Crankin’ Stick and a Johnny Morris Platinum Signature casting reel in 8.3:1 gear ratio spooled with 12-pound Bass Pro Shops XPS Fluorocarbon.

Berkley J-Walker Topwater

Evers threw a Berkley J-Walker over the same shallow points that he cranked. Photo by Joel Shangle

The Upper Mississippi was set up perfectly for a walking topwater bait, and Evers capitalized on that throughout REDCREST by throwing a bone-colored Berkley J-Walker 100, a 4 3/4-inch plug that hit the market in 2018. Evers threw the J-Walker over the same subtle points as the Frittside, and used the same rod and reel he used for the crankbait, but with 50-pound XPS Braid.

Evergreen Jack Hammer Chatterbait & Berkley The Deal

An Evergreen Jack Hammer Chatterbait coupled with a Berkley The Deal was Evers’ main go-to during his Championship Sunday flurry. Photo by Joel Shangle

Evers’ most notable flurry of bites – an astounding 21 scoreable fish to the boat in 23 minutes in Period 3 of the final round – came on a vibrating jig/worm combo: a chartreuse-and-white 3/8-ounce Z-man Evergreen Jack Hammer Chatterbait with a 3 1/2-inch white Berkley PowerBait The Deal trailer. Evers simply cast the Chatterbait, cranked a handful of times, and connected time after time after time.

“The water was maybe 1 1/2 to 2 feet in there, so I could reel that Jack Hammer just a few inches below the surface, and those fish would come up and bite it every time I threw into that particular spot,” Evers said. “(The Deal) has two alternating tails that give it a really cool action, fish really seem to bite that bait well.”

He fished the vibrating jig on a 7-1 Bass Pro Shops rod and the same 8.3:1 Johnny Morris Platinum reel as his crankbait and topwater baits (but spooled with 20-pound XPS Fluorocarbon).

Berkley Pit Boss

Even though Evers’ horizontal moving baits got the majority of the play at REDCREST, he also added to his SCORETRACKER® totals by flipping laydowns with a 3/8-ounce tungsten weight and a 3/0 Berkley Fusion19 Heavy Cover Hook armed with a Berkley PowerBait Pit Boss in California 420. His flipping setup included a 7-6 heavy Bass Pro Shops rod and the same reel as his cranking and topwater setup, spooled with 20-pound XPS Fluorocarbon.

“In years past, that spot I fished (on Championship Sunday) was matted, so I mostly flipped it,” Evers admitted.

ALSO: Evers also caught scoreable bass on a 6-inch green pumpkin Berkley PowerBait Bottom Hopper on a shaky head.