ere’s a fish tale: Former “Eight is Enough” TV star Willie Aames wrestled with a black marlin for 21 hours during the 2005 Bisbee’s Black & Blue Marlin deep-sea fishing tournament in Cabo San Lucas.
“His hands were nothing but blisters,” said Wayne Bisbee, who owns and directs the tournament with his sister, Tricia Bisbee, of Newport Beach. “He was a mess, an absolute mess.”
Aames, who grew up in Orange County, wet his pants yanking in the near 400 pounder. That’s because the Bisbee’s tournament doesn’t allow an angler to let go of the rod when reeling in a big one.
Welcome to tournament fishing, with its roots in Newport Beach.
Wayne Bisbee’s father, Bob, started the tournament in 1980 from his Balboa Island fueling dock and tackle store. He used the tournament to market his business.
When Bob Bisbee retired in 1990, Wayne Bisbee took over and turned the tournament into a business, adding entry fees and sponsors.
Tricia Bisbee works from her Newport Beach home and communicates with her brother, who now lives in Plano, Texas, via laptop, cell and BlackBerry. They talk everyday, she said.
The Bisbee Black & Blue tournament, in its 28th year, is one of the most popular tournaments for billfish (think marlin and sailfish), with millions of dollars in prize money up for grabs. This year, it’s set for late October.
|
|
Cabo flotilla: boats head for Black & Blue contest |
$4 Million at Stake
Last year, 166 teams with names such as Fortuna, Carpe Diem and Fighting Irish, competed for $3.8 million in prize money. Anglers come from all over the world, including Australia, Tahiti, Japan, New Zealand, Switzerland and Russia.
The tournament makes money on entry fees, which are about $5,000 per boat, and corporate sponsors.
It has about 48 sponsors who pay $5,000 to $200,000.
One of the largest sponsors is Snell Real Estate in Cabo San Lucas. Other sponsors include Body Glove snorkeling gear, part of Foothill Ranch-based Chapman-Walters Intercoastal Corp., and Monaco Rare Coin, a rare coin dealer in Newport Beach.
Tricia Bisbee is in charge of publishing the annual tournament magazine and signing up sponsors. She expects all of last year’s sponsors to return this year. She also expects to round up a few new ones from the recent Miami International Boat Show.
The goal is to sign up national sponsors such as a soda company or a clothing brand, she said.
Billfishing tournaments haven’t been able to lure national sponsors yet. The sport isn’t mainstream enough.
“You have to have the coverage,” Wayne Bisbee said.
The event gets some coverage on ESPN, and Bisbee is working on a few reality TV ideas.
Tournament expenses include marketing the contests and dinner, venue rental and other costs for kickoff parties. Bisbee’s has two full-time staffers, one in Cabo San Lucas.
The baddest fishing team out there is Newport Beach-based Bad Company, owned by angler and entrepreneur Anthony Hsieh, who started Irvine’s HomeLoanCenter.com and sold it to LendingTree LLC in 2004. Bad Company collected the most prize money in 2006.
The team has three boats in Newport Beach, Cabo San Lucas and Hawaii that compete in about a dozen contests throughout the year.
Hsieh’s passion for fishing fueled his recent buy of Crow’s Nest Yachts, a yacht dealer in Newport Beach.
His team of 15 years fishes on Viking Yachts, a boat maker that also helps pay for the team’s expenses, such as fuel and salary for the fishing team. Some of the team positions are captain, anglers, a spotter and a deckhand.
Steve Lassley, who used to be a commercial fisherman in Orange County, manages the boats for Bad Company as captain. It’s his full-time job.
Every year, Hsieh pays $1.2 million to keep the Bad Company team in action.
“They’re the golden children,” Wayne Bisbee said.
In one year, Bad Company won about $4 million from the Bisbee tournaments, he said. Bisbee’s has other smaller contests throughout the year and has recently teamed up with three Catalina tournaments.
Altogether, about 1,000 anglers and 200 boats take part in Bisbee’s tourneys. Most of the participants own their yachts. Many of the anglers are from OC. Most from Missing Lenk’s team are locals, including Dale Lenk and Shep McCook from Newport Beach.
No other tournament pays as much as the Bisbee’s Black & Blue contest.
But anglers don’t fish for the money. Often, they’re already wealthy and have boats equipped with high-tech gadgets that practically fish themselves. Some have their boats freighted in from the East Coast.
Anglers do it for the sport.
They enjoy the hunt, the mystery and the adrenaline rush, Wayne Bisbee said. He characterizes billfish anglers as type A personalities, highly competitive. Hsieh is the dictionary example of a type A personality, he said.
“His business is fueling his hobby,” Wayne Bisbee said. “It’s an addiction.”
Most anglers are men. There are only about 12 women involved in the tourneys, he said.
Bisbee gets out to fish once in a while. The biggest fish he ever caught was more than 500 pounds.
“Everybody wants a 1,000 pounder,” he said.
Hsieh named his umbrella company Granders, a nickname for a 1,000-pound fish.
Fish caught during the tourneys that are too small,less than 300 pounds,are released for conservation. Others are donated to feed the poor in Mexico.
Rich Man’s Sport
It can cost a lot of money to be in a tournament. Boat rentals run $3,000 to $8,000 to $3,000 a day, Tricia Bisbee said.
She said she would like to see a boost in the number of families entering the tournament as part of a family vacation.
“Anyone can do it,” she said. “You don’t have to be a professional.”
In fact, most people aren’t.
“The reality is a regular working guy who goes out on a fishing boat can win,” Wayne Bisbee said. “There’s a luck factor.”
The guy out fishing with his family can be the Tiger Woods of fishing for a day.
