Couple things FYI.

Tak Is One of Us

In case there's any doubt, new Bassmaster Classic champ Takahiro Omori ("Tahk" or "T-O" for short) is one of us.

He's a diehard bass fisherman, arguably more diehard than most of us. He's a good, even sweet, guy, whose fishing suffered a few years ago when his father unexpectedly died and because of 9/11: As has been covered on BassFan.com before, the whole 9/11 thing really got to him, from the inhumanity of it all and because he loves his adopted country that much.

He also climbed his way up the bass fishing ladder in the hardest way possible. No silver spoons, no free boats or free rides from Japanese sponsors bristling with money. Here's his story.

When he was 15 years old, in high school in Japan, he already loved to fish (he caught his first bass when he was nine). But when he saw a copy of Japan's Basser magazine that profiled 1985 Classic champ Jack Chancellor, that's when he decided that that's what he wanted to do for a living.

He started fishing tournaments right then, and after he graduated high school, for the next 2 years (until he was 20) he washed dishes, worked as a waiter, taught children and did other odd jobs to make as much money as he could. "I had at least three jobs all the time," he said. "I did anything I could to save money to buy a boat or to keep fishing tournaments."

He also knew that his destiny was in the U.S. "Back then in Japan there were no pro fishermen. So I said if I want to do this for a living, I had to move to the United States."

He traveled across the Pacific in 1992, which basically soaked up all his money. He wanted to fish tournaments, but didn't have a boat and couldn't speak English too well. He also couldn't get a job because he didn't have a work visa.

For the next 4 years, he fished tournaments as a non-boater, sleeping in his car and learning what he could. In April 1996, fishing on the boater side, he won a boat at the Lake of the Ozarks Central Invitational – his first real boat. He was still sleeping in his car for at least 6 months of the year (in 1995 he scraped up enough money to buy a house on Texas' Lake Fork), but now he could spend more time on the water. He also said that he'd "try any way (he could) to get money to keep fishing."

He started fishing what became the Bassmaster Tour in fall 1998, and over 1998-2001 he had 14 BASS Top 10s (8 in Tour events, never a Tour win) and three FLW Tour Top 10s (one a win). In 2001, at one point he led the Bassmaster Tour points, finished 10th and made his first Classic. "That was a turning point for my career," he said. That Classic, in New Orleans, also was the first time he'd ever invited his mother and father to America to see him. (Six months before that Classic he upgraded from a trailer to a house on Fork.)

"My dad took me fishing when I was a kid, but my parents never paid me anything to keep fishing," he noted. "They said, 'You're crazy,' and thought I would give up." But he didn't.

Soon after the 2001 Classic his father passed away from a heart attack. "That was a real shock," he said. "I couldn't do anything in 2002, and I almost (dropped) out of the (Bassmaster) Tour." He finished 138th in the BASS points, by far his worst year.

But in 2003 he rebounded. He finished 40th in the points and made another Classic, and this year earned a check in every Tour event, finished 9th in the points and qualified for his third Classic.

On Sunday, when he won, he said: "I really wish my dad was here with me." Some would argue that he was.

Winning the Classic was Takahiro's "dream," he said, and I guess it still is. It must seem pretty unreal for him, just like it does for all the other first-time champs.

Like I said at the beginning, Tak is one of us. I might have gotten a few details of his story wrong. Sunday night he was pretty excited, and though his English is pretty good, in the glare of the lights a few sentences might have gotten lost or garbled. But you get the picture.

He came up the hard way, a lot harder than most. How would you like to go a third of the way around the world to an alien culture with a completely different language, with no money, no family, no friends, no job and no boat and try to be a professional fisherman? Can you imagine what kind of drive, dedication and sheer love for the sport that takes? I think I can imagine it, but Takahiro lived it. What a great story.

And what a great champion. As you'll find out over the next 12 months, Takahiro is humble, gracious, friendly (a bit shy) and a damn good fisherman. Take the time to meet him, and listen to what he has to say. Don't be put off by his English. It's pretty good and I'm sure it will keep improving, but he's pretty easy to understand anyway. He has a lot to say, and just remember that he loves everything about American bass fishing, including you.

Why the Braces?

With a smile that big, no one could fail to notice the braces on Takahiro's teeth. Since it's somewhat unusual for an adult to have braces, I asked him why he got them. The answer: bass fishing.

"My teeth were perfect when I left my parent's house (to come to the U.S. to fish)," he said. "With all the traveling and fishing in the U.S., many times I was too tired to brush my teeth. About 12 months ago, (his teeth) started moving, so before they got too bad I got braces."

He's had them on for 8 months and figures he has 5 more months to go.

That Smell...

The minute you got into Charlotte, you could smell it: money. BASS and ESPN must have spent a small fortune putting on this Classic.

The good part about that was this Classic came off looking and feeling like a major sporting event, which it is. And it was great to see that the pros were up to it. I didn't see everything, but from what I saw on TV and in the weigh-in arena, the anglers were at least as articulate, enthusiastic and, in short, professional as athletes in any other sport.

The bad part of the big spending was that it required more people, which meant ESPN had to use some of its cloned, wanna-be-Letterman talking heads, the New York City types with the spiked hair and tiny glasses who wouldn't know a bass from a fencepost. Were it not for Fish Fishburne, Mark Menendez and Shaw Grigsby (and Tommy Sanders), they wouldn't have been able to pull it off.

The amount of money BASS and ESPN spent also seemed to make more than a few industry people at the show nervous. They wondered whether ESPN was going to spend BASS into a hole. Time will tell, but since this is a business, I'm assuming that fear is unwarranted. Still, it was interesting to see how many people in the ESPN/BASS family were unsure.

That Sound...

The sound you heard was a bubble popping. As Scot Laney said, the American Chopper guys weren't too friendly to their fans. I wish I could tell you I had the pleasure of meeting them: I met them, but it wasn't a pleasure (except for Mikey).

It's hard not to smile when 13,000 people are roaring for you in an arena, but the real test is one on one. That's where the OCC guys fell down (not just with me), but it's where the anglers shined.

Maybe it was fame and money that ruined the OCC guys, or maybe that's just their personalities. Regardless, so far neither fame nor money have ruined bass pros, which is just one reason why this sport is so great.

Jay Kumar is BassFan's CEO.