Quick Bites: Forrest Wood Open, Day 2

Wal-Mart FLW Tour
Forrest Wood Open
Wheeler Lake, Florence, Ala.
Opening round, Thursday

Congrats, Dan. You’re the man.

It’s official. Dan Morehead of Paducah, Ky., is the 2003 Wal-Mart FLW Tour Land O’Lakes Angler of the Year. He made it interesting right to the end when he only boated a mediocre weight of 8 pounds, 14 ounces Wednesday and left the door wide open for David Dudley and Clark Wendlandt. But Morehead effectively slammed the door on all comers Thursday when he caught five bass weighing 11-10, finished this tournament in 68th place and won the yearly standings title with 1,048 points. Dudley finished second in the standings with 1,001 points and Wendlandt third with 999.

Morehead needed those 11 1/2 pounds today to do it, too. Rough calculations say that if he had weighed in around 8 pounds or fewer, Dudley would have walked away with AOY.

Of course, no one was more relieved about the final outcome than Morehead: “To be honest with you, it’s been a long week, a hard week. I’ve been out in the hot sun for 15 hours a day. Today was a trying day. I just did my best to stay focused. … I look at it this way: I had the chance to catch 90 bass in the rounds I’ve fished this year and I caught 85 of them, so it hasn’t been a bad year by any means.”

Certainly not bad at all for any of the top three pros. Wendlandt, who is the only pro angler to win FLW AOY twice (1997 and 2000), said he just couldn’t muster the weight when he needed it.

“I had a shot at it yesterday, and I had another shot at it today. I just didn’t get that big stringer I needed,” he said. “I lost two big ones yesterday, and I think that made the difference.”

Biffle’s AOY hopes baffled at Kentucky … Dudley and Morehead weren’t the only ones pushing Morehead this week. Tommy Biffle quietly caught the two biggest stringers of the week so far – 18-13 Wednesday and 19-4 Thursday – and leads the Pro Division by over 6 pounds after the opening round. Not only that, he catapulted himself up the standings and has assured himself a fourth-place finish in the yearly points regardless of how he finishes the next two days. “I don’t wish them any bad luck. Dan, David and Clark – they’re all great guys. But I was hoping they wouldn’t catch anything,” he said. He wasn’t being unreasonable. Given what has happened at Wheeler Lake, Biffle, a flipping specialist, would have walked away with the AOY title if not for his unusual 121st-place finish at Kentucky Lake in May, which was a big flipping tournament. “Of all the places to do bad at a tournament, it was Kentucky Lake,” he lamented.

Martens makes it … On Wednesday, pro semifinalist Aaron Martens said he wasn’t even thinking about qualifying for the FLW Championship since he came into this tournament ranked 60th. But with a top-10 finish assured here at Wheeler, Martens has guaranteed himself a spot in the championship. The top 48 pros in the standings will fish the year-end tournament, and he’ll end up ranked somewhere between 26th and 30th place after this week.

What about the ones who just miss the cut? … We’re always talking about the anglers who make the cut. What about those who miss it, especially in a close, agonizing fashion? Take the case of pro Jeremiah Kindy. In 11th place, he missed his first FLW cut by a mere 1 ounce. “I’m aggravated,” said Kindy, who was penalized 8 ounces for a dead fish Wednesday. But it wasn’t just the penalty that had him kicking himself. “You know, in my livewell (my fish Thursday) had spit up two shad, and I guarantee you they were at least 1 ounce apiece. They were huge gizzard shad. That’s just sad.”

Sound bites

“Well, it only cost you $200,000. So don’t worry about it.”
– FLW host Charlie Evans, who takes no prisoners, to pro Bob Plemmons, who miscounted his bass and unnecessarily culled out a 2 ¾-pound bass Wednesday. Plemmons ultimately finished in 49th place, but might – just might – have made the cut if he had kept that fish.

“If I win $40,000 tomorrow, I would hate to be in your shoes because I’m going to hug and kiss whoever’s standing next to me.”
– Co-angler finalist Alex Ormond, to Charlie Evans.

Quick links, Day 2:

Photos
Results
Tomorrow’s pairings
Press release
‘Biffle blows away competition to maintain overall lead on Wheeler Lake’