Hendrick and Alderman, fishing a Ranger Banshee Extreme, caught their fish in two to three feet of water, sight fishing a rattling Jig and Berkley Gulp tail.

"We only traveled a couple of zip codes today, about 20 miles";said Hendrick, "Yesterday we had to change our plane because of the weather, and wound up out on a flat that I don't usually fish. We caught 4 or 5 fish, but didn't get a chance to upgrade until real late in the day."

"Today we headed right to that spot and just waited for the fish to bite. I was happy that my partner got this chance, since this is his first tournament and now he's going to be hooked just like the rest of us."

Hendrick and Alderman's 22.79 pound total was good for a cool $15,000.00 cash.

Bringing up second was the ERA Dennis Realty of Tampa sponsored team of Clay Eavenson and Alan Marsh. Their 20.41 total pushed them past 3rd place's Chris Wittman of Ft. Myers and Tom Winrow of St. Augustine.

Interestingly enough, as Clay Eavenson and Tom Winrow stood on the stage, two team members competing against each other, we found out that they were both former Minor League ballplayers who were part of the New York Yankees.

Captain Clay told Redfish Country:
"Capt. Tommy Winrow and I both were drafted by the New York Yankees. Tommy was drafted in the second round by the Yankees as a left fielder in '97 (or '98, I can't remember for sure) and I was drafted by the Yankees in '96 as a pitcher.

We hooked up one year as teammates and became fishing buddies along with the now big league pitcher with the Cincinnati Reds, Brandon Claussen.

We were the "three amigos" as far as fishing goes. We would spend every moment away from the field either wade fishing for reds and snook or driving around looking for bass ponds to fish in. The fishing bug hit us hard here in the Bay area. We spent everyday at the ballpark talking about either the fishing trip the day before or where were going the day after to land the big ones.

Well, I was released in 2000 and Tommy walked away from the game, on his own, last year and we both pursued fishing as both a hobby and a career.

This was the first event that we ever competed against each other and we both found it funny that 8 years after we met on a professional baseball field that we were again standing next to each other at a professional sporting venue.

This time it was fishing."

Clay Eavenson (L) and Tom Winrow (R)