Would you turn it in to TPWD, sell or donate it to BPS (if that’s legal), turn it loose, or other?

Second thing I would do. (After I changed my pants). Would be to call my lawyer

I don’t believe you can legally sell a game fish.

My livewell dont work. Snapping as good measurement pics as possible and scale it. Then toss her back as my anger slowly grows for never fixing my livewell.

If I had a functioning livewell...i really dont know. Im a big time fish care hippie....to the extent I try to really adhere to the "hold your breath" idea I saw on a jimmy houston show. He was joking the way he does, but said something like imagine having to hold your breath, and chucking them back asap so they could start breathing again. That was a insightful and truthful perspective...so its always in the back of my head.

If we are talking at the present giving it to TP&W would be off the table because apparently there have been enough SAL's this spring to fill their breeding/hatching system to capacity according to what I've read on this forum. You'd either have to turn it loose or parley it into cash somehow if that is possible. I figure if nothing else you could probably get out there and state what you caught it on, the line you were using, reel, rod, boat, motor, TM, sonar, etc. and get some sort of return and there is also the possibility of having it on video, you'd become an instant You Tube phenomenon; all this, and still be able to release it if you have it officially weighed.

i was told a few years ago that I may have caught the Fork record Spotted Bass, we were novices and were fishing under the
515 bridge with road-runners. I hung a nice bass, weighed it on our scales, took a picture, and released her back to be caught another day. Later a friend guide of ours send me a message telling me that was probably the lake record spotted bass we had released...
heII I didnt even know what a spotted bass was,...

Sell to highest bidder or get a free replica? Easy decision, no guarantee a fish that size or age would live past this year anyway. It's just a bass and it's left behind plenty of genetics....

Johnny Morris would probably be your best option. He's got 5 billion reasons why he wants a fish like that.

Correct, you can't sell it. But you can lease it.

What about trade it for some gift card donations to my fishing habit? Hello BPS.

World Record you say....

In Texas...
SAL would like to not only have it in the record books, but also the genetics to be shared
Ensure I'm present when they release it back into the lake it came from

Outside TX....
WR, replica, and make sure I was present with cameras when it was released back home

I know I would be devastated if anything happened to while I was getting it weighed and in any record books.

First words out of my mouth would be……….
Never mind, don’t feel like going back to ban camp.

my utterances when I caught my pb of 14.8 would have got me a permaban doubled.

I will say the last thing published by TPWD regarding Share Linker was a little confusing. They took the 17.06 from Ivie but they don't want to take any more from Ivie. They want fish from other lakes to test genetics

It's illegal to sell a game fish in the state of Texas. However, it is legal to donate it. You must fill out a "wildlife resource document" outlining who caught it, where it was caught, the date/time and who is receiving the resource. This MUST be done for the transaction to be legal.