PENSACOLA, Fla. (September 27, 2007) – Twenty-eight of the best redfish teams in the country competed off the coast of Pensacola this weekend. The anglers weren’t alone, as Tropical Depression 10 prepared to bear down on the Gulf Coast. With the weather report looking grim and the fate of the championship undecided, team Lucky Craft’s Greg and Bryan Watts knew they had their work cut out for them.

With great weather during practice and an easy northeast wind, Greg and Bryan found a pattern early in the week and were catching keepers every day.

“We got on the water first thing Sunday morning and by lunchtime, Bryan had a killer crankbait bite going on with the Lucky Craft Flat CB MR and DR,” Greg said. “The fish were laid up on a clam bar at the end of a river, and Bryan smoked them [the fish] in about 30 minutes. I think he caught eight or nine fish on 11 casts.”

On the second day of practice, the Watts brothers went back to the same location during the same tide and the results were the same. The fish were right where the duo expected them to be. Greg and Bryan were able to catch nearly 15 pounds with the Lucky Craft crankbaits.

“We thought that was great,” Greg said. “We didn’t see the need to run to Louisiana, because we had such a great spot. It was about 70 miles from Pensacola, back in Mobile Bay. The crankbait bite was great, and that’s what we really love to do. We would fish the Flat CB MR when the tide was low and the [Flat CB] DR when the tide was up. It only fluctuates about 16 inches or so, but it was just deep enough on the higher tide to need the DR. We had to be hitting the clams to get a bite.”

According to Greg, while they were fishing in practice and the sun was high, Aurora Gold was the best color. However, as the weather moved in on Friday, they switched to Citrus Shad, which seemed to work better in the overcast conditions.

As the first day of the tournament approached, so did the inclement weather. Greg and Bryan had not been back to their spot since Tuesday afternoon, but the changing weather conditions did not deter them from heading there first thing Friday morning, opening day of the 2007 Oh Boy! Oberto Redfish Cup Championship. According to the Weather Channel, Friday would be safe, but the anglers didn’t know what Saturday and Sunday would hold, so everyone was giving it all they had on day one.

“We knew what the fish were doing, but also knew the weather could affect the bite,” Greg explained. “That’s fishing and no excuse, but the bite was a little slim on Friday. We only had about six or eight bites all day, but they were still great quality. With the run we had to make to get there, plus all the idle zones we had to go through, we had about two hours to fish before heading back for weigh-in.”

Even with the change in conditions, the Watts brothers were able to bring in 13.08 pounds on day one, putting them right where they wanted to be – the top five. Sitting in third, not knowing yet whether they would fish on Saturday or have to wait out the storm, they were prepared to stick with their game plan regardless.

“We knew we needed 9 or 10 pounds to make the top five on day two, and I thought I might have another spot we could check out to catch what we needed instead of making the run [and taking a chance the bite would turn off],” Greg said, as he explained how fish can change with the weather. “However, this secondary spot wasn’t part of our original plan, and we decided we didn’t need to stray from the pattern we found in practice.”

After a meeting Friday evening left the fate of day two undetermined, all Bryan and Greg could do was wait. As it turns out, Saturday morning’s take-off was delayed, but the storm wasn’t as bad as expected. All 28 teams hit the water once again to try and catch the two biggest fish they could find. The Watts brothers headed back to Mobile Bay, but found conditions were much different.

“The wind had been blowing northeast all week, which was perfectly right down the cut helping the tide get out and that’s when the fish were happiest – on lower water,” Greg said. “As the storm came through and we ended up fishing on the back side of it, we started getting southeast winds. That packed the water back up into the bay and never let it out. We worked the crankbaits all day long, but couldn’t get the bite to turn on. We think we had one redfish bite, but the fish came off before we could really tell. Then I caught one Jack. Those were the only two bites we had all day.”

According to Greg, he and Bryan made nearly 600 casts in three hours but weren’t able to bring in any keepers. They worked the 200-yard stretch as long as they could, only needing two decent fish to stay in the top five, but it never panned out.

“We do attribute the change in the fishing patterns to the weather change, but that’s nothing new,” Greg said. “We see it all the time. It’s hard to say I know exactly what happened to the fish, but we understand changes in weather move fish. We still had to go with what we knew was working all week and stick with our confidence bite. We’ve always been about sticking to a plan and seeing it through.”

If they had to do it over again, both Greg and Bryan agreed they would do it the same way. After bringing in a third-place bag on day one, Greg and Bryan were empty-handed as they came across the stage late Saturday afternoon, leaving them out of the cut and finishing in 19th.

“It was a good tournament,” Greg said. “The results obviously weren’t what we wanted in the end, but we stuck with our plan and definitely learned something this weekend.”

Now it’s on to the last tournament of the year for the Watts brothers, as the All-Star Last Cast is scheduled for the first weekend in October in Morehead City, North Carolina.

“We are looking forward to that tournament,” Greg said. “I have no idea what it will take to win yet. It is October and we just hope we won’t have any hard fronts come through between now and then. This time of year, the weather dictates everything, unlike the summer when the patterns are really stable. We’ll have to get there, practice, find our game plan and go from there.”