Welcome to the BassBlaster, your daily email about all things bassin’. Hey — have you forwarded the BassBlaster to a bassin’ bud yet?!

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Today’s Top 3

1. Zona gonna throw first pitch at White Sox game.

Is that cool or what? And pretty dang unusual for a bass-head: “When they asked if I was interested, I thought they were messing with me,” he said.

We were messing with you, man!

Just kidding. Anyhow, congrats in advance to Z…and this might be indicative of a new period in bassin’. What do you think?

2. FLW Okie wins St. Clair Open.

FLW pro Jason Christie of Park Hill, OK won the Bassmaster Northern Open on St. Clair this weekend with three 20+ pound days. Nice!

He fished the mouth of the Detroit River with a YUM 2ube and a Carolina-rigged YUM Salleemander, both green pumpkin, both baits below. Biggest fish came on the ‘mander.

He also said his HydroWave fired up the smallies (do smallies really need to be fired up?!) and Power-Poles slowed down his drift.

In case anyone’s paying attention, that’s at least two major events won this year on YUM baits: largies on T-Bend and smallies on St. Clair.

3. JT Kenney goes from 9th to 1st on Champlain!

Ninth to 1st? Can’t recall that ever happening in a major derby.

> On day one, he weighed the event’s second-heaviest catch (21-08), but stumbled a little on day two with a 14-14 bag that dropped him to ninth. In the final round, he stormed back up the leaderboard and took back the lead with a bag that weighed 20-06 and finished with a tournament total of 56-12 and a 3-ounce margin of victory.

> “Ninth to first – I would have never thought,” Kenny said. “I thought maybe ninth to third or fourth, but not this.”

> Kenney earned his victory by running 70-plus miles each day to Ticonderoga in the lake’s narrow southern end and working the fertile grass beds for largemouth bass.

> Kenney employed a blend of reaction and flipping tactics [using] a Gambler Big Easy swimbait (ghost shad), a black/blue Gambler Ugly Otter Texas-rigged with a 1.5-ounce Reins tungsten weight, and a Koppers Live Target frog.

His baits are below – check out that frog. Think it’s been mashed a few times?!

Note: All of the above pattern info and more will be on BassGold soon.

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Tip of the Day

Forget smallies ’til later.

If you have a choice, that is. This is about JT, from the above post, and states it as best as I’ve heard:

> He readily admits that he enjoys the opportunity to visit northern lakes and tangle with the smallmouth. However, he follows a simple rule, based on seasonal patterns: He’ll target largemouth during June and July tournaments and consider smallies only during August or September events.

> Reason being that smallmouth spawn later than largemouth, so the earlier summer events find the brownies on the skinny side. Once the smallmouth have had time to recover from the spawn and pack on the weight, they have legitimate potential for winning late summer events.

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Quote of the Day

To get to fish a Classic on your home lake is a dream come true.

– Jason Christie, talking about his Open win giving him an entry to fish the Grand Lake Classic. Will it be an advantage? Only if he’s fished there a bunch in February….

 

Shot of the Day

St. Clair Open competitor Al Farace had to tape his hands he was catching so many fish. Never had to do that, but would love to have to!

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