I got out on Lewisville this weekend on Sat and Sun late afternoons to do some fishing and attempt to locate a few hybrids. I have had no success on Lewisville the last several times out as others have posted similar results. But, on Saturday on our third stop we found a huge school of baitfish mixed with the large archs. Using 4 in day glo sassy shads we got 11 in the boat between 20 and 24 inches and they are fat and fighting!! We were slow rolling the sassy on the bottom and had not had a bite in quite some time. It was getting late and I decided to change it up a little and crank the sassy fast which was the ticket - my rod tip bent over and I yelled to my buddy to throw out and crank it. As soon as he did he had one on his line as well. These were not the size fish we had been catching. We kept talking back and forth about how huge these fish must be. We fought these fish for what seemed an eternity. We could not get these fish off the bottom of the lake. I was just standing there looking at my pole bent over with a huge feeling of uncertain anticipation and could not do anything. It felt like a brick on the end of my line. Finally mine fish starts coming up. Since my buddy was fighting his fish in similar fashion, I reach back to grab the net and turn around to get just a peek at the monster throwing my bait and taking off. OHHHH it hurt. OHHH it hurt. SO I run to the other side of the boat to help by buddy. His fish was under the boat, so I get the trolling motor to turn us to get a better angle. In doing so he lowered his rod tip and - you guessed it - gone. OHHHHHHHHHHHHH NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!! Oh no oh no oh no. We casted into the night wanting just one more bite - which did not happen. We had a great day of fishing but missed what we will never know. The boat ride back was a long one for so it seemed.

We went back out sunday wanting one more shot. NADA. ZIP.

Nightmares will continue I am sure. Shoulda woulda coulda.

Been there too many times. Ouch.

Terrible! However, it's that kind of experience that will keep you coming back, just as much as the good days. I know the feeling. I hooked a big hybrid about a month ago, and as it was taking drag and fighting me, I remember thinking, I just want to see it. I was lucky enough to actually boat it, but I remember the feeling.

So, swimming a Sassy Shad got their attention? Were you letting it drop to the bottom and then cranking, or just casting and cranking? Where about were you?

We were throwing 1/2 oz jighead sassy and letting it sink to bottom and slowly bringing in, stopping and letting sink to bottom again - often getting hit when we quit cranking. There was a ton of baitfish so we were trying to stay under them.
We changed it up at the last and were cranking fast tyring to stay above the baitfish school when we got hit by the monsters. We were on a windblown bank on main lake casting toward bank.

That makes a lot of sense from what I saw on my graph. The majority of the time, the stalkers were on top of the schools, not below. Day Glo sassy's you say... hmmm...
Glad to see someone has them figured out!

I had a 15 pound blue cat do me that way once. It simply wouldn't move for the longest time until finally it cooperated. Probably the only thing that saved me was the heavy line. Plenty of those in LL. Just a thought.