The False Promise of BASS Nostalgia

I need to preface this article by saying that I loved the old Bob Cobb/Ray Scott Bassmaster TNN shows. To this day, the music continues to get me fired up and I occasionally go down a deep rabbit hole of reminiscing, coming up for air hours later with old memories from Toho and the James River and Kentucky Lake, among others.

Accordingly, I definitely get it when some of you long for those earlier days of bassing television. But I have to tell you – the good old days of coverage are now. Yes, I understand some of your complaints about watching forward-facing sonar, but longing to go backward in time – with the limitation that would entail – is ridiculous.

For example, I recently watched the YouTube video of the 1989 Maryland Top 100 on the Potomac River, the first time B.A.S.S. visited my home waters. The show is 20 minutes and 11 seconds long. 

Here are some fun facts about that show.

• Approximately 6:47 of the show consists of footage of the weigh-in. Obviously, in those more tech-limited time, those were the easiest scenes to gather.
• Only about 6 ½ minutes of the show, roughly 30 percent, shows actual fishing, and much of that is B Roll of anglers who didn’t contend.
• A whopping 2-plus minutes are dedicated to the art of eating crabs.
• Over 3 minutes consists of Tournament Director Dewey Kendrick working with the anglers to determine whether to postpone/cancel a day due to a hurricane.
• Less than 3 minutes of the video shows eventual winner Guido Hibdon fishing, and it only shows one or two fish catches).
• Depending on how you look at it, either one or two specific lures are mentioned – a Stanley Jig and a Guido Bug Trailer.
• The show only had footage of three of the top 11 anglers (there was a tie for tenth) on the water fishing.

That’s 20 minutes, with 6 minutes of fishing. Today we exceed that on the first morning of our 30-plus hours of coverage. We see specific lures, precise modifications, and get to shadow multiple contenders from start to finish. Is it perfect? No. Is it always super-compelling? Well, it’s fishing, so that’s in the eye of the beholder, but there are some flat spots.

Again, I understand the power of nostalgia, and those shows were a building block of the love of the sport for so many of us. But we can’t go back. We can’t even suggest it with a straight face.