Who’s the Best, RIGHT NOW?

For a remarkably lengthy period of time, no one held a candle to Kevin VanDam on the water. You could have him fishing a puddle of parking lot antifreeze, and put someone else on the best lake in the world, and he’d still manage to double their catch. He was the unanimous number-one pick in any Fantasy Fishing draft. Occasionally someone like Skeet would have a run like he did in 2010, and you could occasionally make a case for an Andy Morgan or a David Dudley, but over time, KVD was the consensus champ.

Now, there is no such person. Times change and talent levels equal out in some ways and spread out in others. Part of the problem in picking the “best angler” now is that there are two very different tours. Yes, there were both BASS and FLW back in the day – but it’s often forgotten that KVD won even the latter tour’s AOY title (in 2001). Today, thanks to factors including (but not limited to) sonar advances, the internet, and college fishing, there are a lot more really good pros, even spread across two (or three?) tours.

So who ya got?

I still think that thanks to different formats (up until now) comparing Elite Series and BPT results remain apples and oranges. But what if you had to choose five pros from each tour, to win either: (a) a single event at some random site TBD; or (b) an AOY title over the course of a complete season? Based on the last two or three years worth of performances, here are my thoughts:

BASS

• Brandon Palaniuk
• Brandon Lester
• Chris Johnston
• Jason Christie
• Patrick Walters

BPT

• Jacob Wheeler
• Ott DeFoe
• Jordan Lee
• Bryan Thrift
• Dustin Connell

Even though I follow BPT less closely than I follow BASS, my first four picks came easier with the former. I had trouble with that last pick, though. I was tempted to slot Michael Neal in there, but ended up with Connell based primarily on his 2022 headlines.

This is not a perfect science, but what it comes down to for me is the sniff test. If you heard that any of those guys won at Okeechobee or the Cal Delta or Table Rock, would you be surprised? If they slapped 35 pounds on the scales, or caught 12 when 8 was a really good day, would it make sense to you? There are lots of anglers out there who’ve historically fit the bill, but right now those 10 (or 11) wear it the best.