Crossing Paths
Deakins and Davis met nearly a
decade ago at a BFL when Davis’ dad,
Jeff, fishing as a co-angler, drew
Deakins as a boater. At the end of the
fishing day, Jeff introduced his son to
Deakins, and they exchanged phone
numbers.
“About a year later, I called Marshall
about something unrelated to fishing,”
Alex recalls. “Before we hung up, I said,
‘We should go fishing sometime.’ And
he said, ‘OK, how about tomorrow?’”
The next day the two shared a boat
for the first time and quickly realized
each had something that could benefit
the other.
“I’ll never forget that day,” Alex says.
“We caught about 30 pounds together.
At one point we doubled up, both catch-
ing 7- to 8-pounders at the same time.
“I’d call it a case of old school meets
new school,” he continues. “Marshall has
a ton of experience that comes from 40
years of being on the water, but he does
not keep up with all the new tackle like I
do. I’m constantly ordering and trying
new lures, equipment and technology,
so I bring a lot of the new-school stuff to
the table. Basically, when we combine
his old-school experience with my new-
42
school tricks, we both benefit in a big
way, which is what happened that first
time we fished together, and we’ve been
best friends ever since.”
Getting to Know Davis
Deakins admits that at first he was
hesitant about loaning out his lifetime of
fishing experience on Guntersville to a
23-year-old who called himself “The
Spinnerbait Kid.” But his concern about
Davis taking advantage of his wisdom for
personal gain was quickly extinguished.
“The first thing that impressed me
about Alex was his ambition and work
ethic at his age,” Deakins says. “When I
met him, he worked long hours as a
stock clerk at a grocery store while
starting up a fishing guide business on
the side. He works hard at everything
he does.”
From there, it didn’t take Deakins
long to establish trust with Davis.
“Even when I showed him some of
my best places on Guntersville, he hon-
ored them,” he says. “I never saw him
on those spots in a tournament or with
clients; he was determined to find his
own places.”
In terms of sharing tackle knowl-
edge, it was Davis’ deep understanding
of swimbaits that intrigued Deakins the
most.
The “swimbait craze” had just reached
the shores of Lake Guntersville, and
Deakins admits he knew knothing about
them.
“Alex educated me on the right
sizes, colors, heads, line and places to
fish them,” Deakins recalls. “He knows
so much about the new stuff that it
blows my mind. And his willingness to
share it with me is really where our
friendship began.”
Deakins says Davis helped break him
of throwing the same old lures in the
same old spots, and convinced him that,
over time, fish get conditioned to certain
lures and fishing holes can “go dead.”
Yet, sometimes, a new approach
can make an old hole new again.
Before this first lesson from Davis,
Deakins says he used to deep crank
with the same plug year after year.
“Then one day Alex shows up with this
giant crankbait called a [Strike King] 10XD,”
Deakins recalls. “I thought he had lost his
mind. But I can’t tell you the number of big
fish we have caught on that thing.”
Deakins also recalls being schooled
by Davis on a lipless rattler made by
Jackall called a Disk Knocker.
FLWFISHING.COM I APRIL 2018