I have run quite a few different catfish rods over the years. Some I liked and some I didn’t. A big part of finding the right rod is personal preference. After my orange and black rods fell apart several years ago and the company wouldn’t stand behind their products, I went searching for a better rod and a company that would stand behind their products. I tried 4 different rod brands before I settled on the rods I have now. Each of those 4 I tried were all very popular but each one I found things I would like to change. I knew there were a number of things that I was looking for in a rod and I was tired of trying new ones so I put together a list of what I wanted.

My list included a rod blank with the perfect mixture of Carbon and S glass.
I wanted a rod with new technology rather than the same old rods I’d been seeing for the last 15 yrs.
Aluminum reel seats were a must as I had been breaking the plastic ones pulling planer boards.
10 or more line guides that were heavy duty with no inserts.
Cross Cut EVA foam grips were important to me so that my rods set in my rod holders snug instead of continuously rocking back and forth when pulling planer boards in big water like my cork, composite, or x grips that were on my previous rods.
Fluorescent color for lighting up at night under UV.
And lastly a company that would stand behind their product more than a year or 2. .

I called around to various rod manufacturers and asked question and for one reason or another I kept on moving. I had seen a new rod company on the market that I was hearing a ton of good stuff about called Mad Katz. I searched and scoured the internet for any negative information I could find and there just was not any to be found. I called them to inquire about the rods and when I started asking questions about the rods the man on the phone told me to hang on, Matt Knight is the owner and he’s walking through the warehouse now and I will let you talk to him. He proceeded to ask me about my style of fishing and what rods I had been running. He told me about the lifetime guarantee his rods had. He told me that he had sold 77k rods in his first year of business only 3 came back broken and that was due to shipping. If you’ve been around the catfish world the last 2 yrs you’ve probably heard of Mad Katz. With so many good options of rods out there today, what makes one rod different than the next? Well I learned from trial and error by buying and trying until I came across Mad Katz. They treated me like family from day one. After using the rods I instantly fell in love with them. The quality is top notch. They met every one of my criteria I was looking for in a rod. Here we are almost 2 yrs later and Mad Katz has grown into the most popular catfish rods in the game. They sold 177k rods last year. How on earth was a new Catfishing rod company able to break into the business and take over so quickly?

#1 the rods are incredible. Top quality and durability. I love the blanks and action and weather you want a new school fluorescent rod to light up at night under UV like me or an old school looking rod with simple colors, Mad Katz has a rod color for just about every taste.
#2 the company and the guys running it are top notch. I tried many different rods and none of them welcomed me in or treated me anywhere close to the way Matt Knight and Mad Katz did. We are family.
#3 they stand behind their product with a lifetime warranty.
# 4 when you buy a Mad Katz rod weather it’s 1 or 10 you become part of a brotherhood and a family. Ask anyone that owns one and they will tell you the same.
#5 you will never hear a single bad thing about them from anyone who has actually owned one. You might hear someone say they don’t like the colors but that’s just haters because they offer just about every color under the sun including black handles and even some that are cork for old school guys. They have basic color rods that are black, red, white, and most any other color you can think of. Some guys might say they are too expensive at $90 but try and find a rod that compares in features like aluminum reel seats and you will find that price is actually a great bargain considering what the competition sells their comparable rods for. The biggest difference for me is the company though. Nobody backs their rods like Mad Katz and nobody gives back to its anglers like Mad Katz do.

I love Mad Katz so much that I have promoted them to all my friends and fellow anglers and sold over 2000 rods the last 2 years. In doing so they have now sponsored my fishing adventures and I love everything they are about. I am a proud Mad Katz Sponsored Angler and my 7 yr old son is about to be their first sponsored youth angler. If y’all want some incredible catfish rods run by a top notch company that gives back to their costumers more than other rod company in the world then head over to www.madkatzgear.com and check them out.

Ask any of the guys on this forum about Mad Katz and they will tell you the same.

Those are fancy like Applebees !

Shannon, that's good...

I will be the first to jump in here and say that what Chris is saying is 100% true. I have 12 Mad Katz rods. 6 Green Signature Series and 6 Venom 2.0. A few weeks ago I had an issue with one of the Venom Rods. The top eyelet had come loose from the side brace and the line would sometimes get stuck. I sent Matt a message st 5:56 am and he responded at 5:57. No joke. He hit me right back. He said call this number, talk to Mike and lets get you a new rod. I sent him a couple pictures of what had happened and he apologized for the issue. When I talked to Mike, he said we can send you a new rod and you can send the old one back, or I can send you the new one for a drastically reduced price and you can keep the old one. I chose the later and I may see about soldering the broken one but I am really happy with the service. Later that day I got a message from Matt asking if Mike took care of me... Tell me you've ever had service like that...

I'd like to back up what you guys are saying one hundred percent. I've owned a ton of different rods in my life and the Mad Katz are the best quality rod I've ever owned and will likely be the only cat rod I own going forward. One of the few companies I've dealt with that makes you feel like you're one of their most important customers. After purchasing just two rods from them, I got a thank you email signed by Matt. I commented on the website contact email and got a personal response from Matt. Not one of his employees, not an auto-reply response, but the owner of the company sent me a personal email thanking me for my interest and for my business. They are the real deal and worth every penny of the surprisingly low price point.

100% agree with what Chris said. He turned me onto them and I bought 1 to try and see if I liked it. Then my son won a MadKatz in Chris’s tournament last year . Then this year I got 3 more for Christmas. They are incredible rods for drifting.

Neat thread!

Wish I could say the same. Mine are falling apart after a year and there great warranty is you pay shipping and half the cost for a new rod. So there basically still making money to replace a damaged rod. As for the blanks there the exact same as all the others coming straight from China.

Have you actually called them and spoke to them Chris? I told them I had a tiny bubble in the paint after a year and that I didn’t expect a new rod but just wanted to let them know and I had a new rod in 3 days and didn’t pay a penny for shipping. I’m betting they didn’t ask Tim to pay for shipping either. As far as the blanks I know they went through 200 blanks testing them so not every blank in the same. I’ve owned a dozen different rod brands and the blanks were different on all of them. Some better than others but all were different from the next. Sucks that you aren’t satisfied but you are the only person I have ever heard say anything negative and I know several 100 guys that are now running them including most of my angling buddies and guide buddies. We all love them.

I've had the same experience from Pro Angler, in the 15 years I've used them I had one break at the rod tip and Tex gave me a new rod at zero cost and I kept the used rod.

I have the 'orange and black' rods from Whisker Seeker, four of them, and I love them.

That said they are only 18 months old, so no telling if the handle cork goes bad or other problems, but so far I am super impressed. I use and abuse them pretty bad, I know that.

The one thing I don't like about the Mad Katz, and I have used them a fair bit on another boat, are the cross cut foam handles. They just don't feel comfortable in my grip to me. But yes I'm an old dude, and smooth cork just feels better in my hands. Chris is right on though in that the cork handles on mine don't sit as well in the rod holders. As Chris stated, a lot of this is personal preference.

The rod technology has come a long way. I started out with two cheap as chips Ugly Sticks at less then. $40 each, and they still perform pretty good to this day.

El Gato,

Man you said some stuff about "old school guys" above... Dang I resemble that, hate to admit it but I have resembled that since I was about the ago of your Jaxon lol... all bs aside I do like my cork grips and they can be a pita, but I can't help myself, I just like my cork. Now will say not all cork is the same.

I knew all you guys drifting and catching big cats had to be using something special when it came to your rods, heck I have found myself wondering about your choices in reels as well. Being this said mentioned "old school guy" I have been using G Loomis rods for years and I have picked up a few different brands for targeted fishing only to either be totally disgusted with it and gave it to someone that wanted it, or broke the rod while fishing.

I bought one last year, that the guys at our local Cabela's was so proud of and it also has a lifetime warranty, my cousin and I went out to do some fishing after a nice big rain, and right off the bat the live perch I had just flipped out, only been soaking a few minutes while I was trying to organize my mess around me "old school thing again lol" and that rod blew up.

Lucky to be able to get the flathead to the boat and land. I was expecting something way bigger to break that rod, it was a nice 5 pound yellowcat. Nevertheless, I loved the nice cork grips and the aluminum reel seat, the rod blank was just a wimp. Guess I could have got a new one, but I felt lucky I got the fish in and cut my losses there. I have since made a different type of rod all together from it, one not used to catch fish lol.

This last rod that broke with a 5lb flathead cost way more than the price point these MadKatz you tacked up here. I will have to be checking into these for sure, "old school" and all lol. I am not so sure I want my old GLX G Loomis sticks dragging bait anyway. These are from the Era of when Gary Loomis still owned the company and when you sent him one to warranty he didn't replace his reel seat with a fuji, they do now and I don't want a fuji reel seat on my GLX rods, I have never had to warranty one of my G Loomis sticks and now that Japan owns them and replaces Gary's reel seats I want no part of that unless it's one of their newer sticks that already have the fuji seat on it. I do have a few of these. Realistically I guess I have way to freak'n many rods lol. I am getting what did you call it, oh yes "old school" the word old being the main word lol.

So I have been looking around and wondering about all this tackle you guys are using. So glad you brought this up. You guys are taxing out my very limited budget here, over and over again. Not to mention I already need a bigger boat to carry all the stuff I have now. You guys are killing me lol...

Rowdy, yes you can spend a fortune on this stuff but you don't have to. When I started drifting and dragging baits I did it with a Shakespeare Wild Cat rod that cost me $20. You can still get them and they are still about $20. I put a Kast King Rover 40 bait caster on them. The reel was about $40 then. A little more now. My point is you can do this, and do it quite successfully with a $60 rig instead of a $300 rig.

I’d like to see them make a 7’0 ft medium light spinning rod to try out for my kind of fishing.

Shannon, they make the 7'6" spinning in a medium light action...

White Ghost Spinning Rod