Clark Wendlandt
Andy Morgan:
Confidence comes one “play” at a time
Morgan believes his ways of obtaining confidence over the years have
morphed and improved. Years ago, Morgan came close to winning the
FLW Tour Angler of the Year title several times, but couldn’t quite reach
it. In the last four seasons, he has won it three times, making a remark-
able feat look almost easy.
“Back then, if I was in the hunt for an AOY near the end of the season,
I got to looking too far downfield at the end zone before I even crossed
the 50-yard line,” he says. “I wanted to long-bomb it for a touchdown
when a field goal would have done it. In the final tournaments, I would
lose focus of my game, my tempo and my rhythm. As a result, my confi-
dence just evaporated.”
These days Morgan has corrected his playbook to keep his confidence
building through the season until the very last cast.
Despite the football references, Morgan is not a hard-core football
fan. If asked to choose a favorite team, the University of Tennessee is it,
but he admits that as a competitor he can’t help but admire the
University of Alabama’s dominance of college football and Nick Saban’s
coaching style.
“His philosophy is pretty simple: This play, right now, is the most criti-
cal play of the game, so just focus only on executing it perfectly and noth-
ing else,” Morgan says. “And then he treats the next play the same way,
and so on. If his team carries that strategy out – winning the little battles
play-by-play – it wins the game. He doesn’t focus on the end zone or how
far they have to go to score. It’s just one play at a time. Win those battles
and you’ll end up in the end zone.”
Morgan says he has incorporated Saban’s strategy into his own fishing.
“Make this next pitch the
most perfect pitch,” Morgan
says. “One pitch at a time, one
decision at time, one move at a
time. Every little thing is a tiny
battle. Just win those mini bat-
tles one at a time and you’ll
win the war.
“I have said it time and time
again,” he concludes. “Slow and
steady wins the race. That’s the
philosophy that I’ve learned
and molded into my own game
over time. Honestly, it’s a
rather conservative strategy,
but that’s how I build my confi-
dence through a tournament
Andy Morgan
and through a season.”
FEBRUARY-MARCH 2017 I FLWFISHING.COM
THE OBSESSIVE
TRAIT
While cultivating confidence
and quickly recovering from mis-
takes have a lot of latitude as far
as being learned and applied,
other prerequisites for closing out
wins are more innate. The obses-
sion to succeed at bass fishing is
something that, according to
three of our pros, you either have
or you don’t.
Clark Wendlandt: “When I think
of pros who seem to have a
unique ability to close, one word
comes to mind: obsessive. Very
talented fishermen usually have
extremely obsessive personalities,
and that’s not something you can
really learn. I know I’m that way.
I’m obsessed with the outdoors.
I’m obsessed with competition. I’m
obsessed with being the best in
the outdoors on any given day.
And it’s not something I can turn
off. It’s just who I am. Whether I’m
hunting or fishing, it’s like I have
tunnel vision the entire time I’m
out there. In my opinion, you have
to have that trait to succeed in
high levels of any professional
sport, including fishing.”
Andy Morgan: “In my outdoor
pursuits, I am pretty obsessed with
progress. I’m not saying I need to
catch 10-pounders or kill big bucks
every time I step foot in the out-
doors – far from it. It’s just that
whatever my quarry is at the time,
I want to feel like I got a little clos-
er to it by the end of the day. If I
dedicate a 10-hour day to the
woods or water and don’t have a
better idea of what those critters
are doing, I’m not very happy
about it. And I’m not sure if that’s
something that can be taught.”
John Cox: “Fishing is the only
thing I’ve ever done where I feel a
great sense of accomplishment
and satisfaction. Some guys get a
sense of accomplishment from fix-
ing cars or building things. Mine
just happens to come from this
need to figure fish out. I think I can
build confidence and learn faster
from mistakes, but the obsession
to do this is something I was just
born with.”
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