Muhammad Ali, Michael Jordan, Tiger Woods, Wayne Gretzky. In their primes, they were unquestionably the best at their respective games. In our sport, however, I argue that it’s impossible to single out one athlete as the greatest.

Not long ago, many fans bounced Kevin VanDam’s name around in that category, but that may not be fair due to the sport's two (and now, really, three) separate tours, where not every competitor goes head-to-head.

But one event brings such competition into the arena each year: the recent Toyota Texas Bass Classic, where FLW and Elite pros square off to settle the score. And, once again, Brent Ehrler showed he can fish with anybody.

Ehrler is truly a phenom. He’s won FLW’s biggest titles; he’s set records in MLF formats. Now a competitor on the Elite circuit, Ehrler is certainly holding his own as he settles in, currently in the Top 10 in the points race.

I’ve admired Ehrler’s career accomplishments from afar for quite some time now, knowing there would come a time when the fans would toss his name around when talking royalty. Following his most recent win, I decided to call him and attempt to learn his secrets.

What does it take for a guy to win eight major events with FLW, make a run at nearly every AOY title and sweep the TTBC? My questions started at the very beginning of it all, to uncover the building of a champion.

Ehrler was born in Southern California into a family of successful dental professionals. While his parents were not avid anglers, they presented plenty of opportunity for a young Ehrler to get hooked on fishing with regular trips to major Western waterways throughout his youth.

Ehrler’s ability to vividly remember the details of these first fishing experiences is almost mystical. It was his recollection of his early adventures that really transitioned our conversation.

He vividly remembered the first day he ever went fishing, occurring at the age of 3 or 4. In his now 38-year-old mind, Ehrler could still see the bluegills biting his worm over three decades ago. He described himself as “a very active child," but able to sit still almost immediately as a toddler and fish for hours.

As his drive to fish increased, Ehrler’s life, even as a small child, seems to have been sent into a series of events that would propel him to pro bass fishing’s highest plateau. At a very early age, he was given a small stack of Bassmaster Magazines by a family friend. Although still too young to read, Ehrler cherished the periodicals, and mounted each of the best pages in large, three-ring binders. Such completed the little man’s library of “references," possibly mimicking those of his father’s dental journals.

Once, on the way to Lake Havasu for the family’s summer vacation, Brent’s mother referenced the binders and read to him the proper way to rig a plastic worm as he sat in the back of the family RV, rigging and unrigging his first artificial bait. Upon arrival at the lake, Ehrler immediately rushed down to the dock to try his new creation.

Here again, Ehrler’s mind leaves us wondering just what we’ve gotten ourselves into: “I remember running out on that dock and dropping (the plastic worm) into the water. Immediately, a bass came over and ate the worm."

One fish, zero casts.

Not surprisingly, Ehrler was forever changed into an artificial-only bass fisherman.

A handful of years later, the Ehrler story again makes a leap forward with his first exposure to the world of pro bass. Then, around the age of 12, Ehrler’s father took him to a Bass University seminar. The key speaker was Rich Tauber, then one of the only West Coasters to have a national presence in the bass world. Ehrler met Tauber and hit it off, and the following year they fished together for the first time on a guide trip that Brent’s father purchased.

Throughout his teenage years, Ehrler terrorized California bass, fishing out of a small inflatable Zodiac that his dad rigged with a trolling motor. Undoubtedly, while his peers were off doing the things that Southern California kids do all summer, Ehrler was adrift in his small boat in the middle of nowhere; alone and desolate, learning.

I asked Ehrler if he likely discovered more about fishing during those early days than he often does now, surrounded by a $100,000 worth of equipment. Before I could finish my sentence, he emphatically confirmed.

For a minute, I’m taken back to my own thoughts experiencing isolation with only the fish; mine coming on a hot summer afternoon on the shores of a small backyard pond. Seven-year cicadas still scream in my mind, a lunker I nicknamed Methusula sucks under my floating Rapala, as if in slow motion in the crystal-clear spring water.

Coming back to the man of the hour, Ehrler continued with me down his timeline. From the raft came a small aluminum boat, from there, his first bass boat. Ehrler went through the motions in college, but no structured major really interested him, and his grades reflected it. However, in competitive fishing, he found something he could strive for. Somehow there, in Southern California, likely among the Western skate and surf culture of L.A.'s youth, a young man found his calling in a sport so far removed that his friends had probably never heard of it.

Around 2000, Ehrler competed as a boater on the WON Bass circuit and in the B.A.S.S. Western Invitationals. But it was the arrival of the FLW Tour to the West that changed Ehrler’s life forever. He won Angler of the Year on the EverStart circuit, the EverStart Championship, and a short time later the Forrest Wood Cup. By happenstance, a career path seemed to have been chosen for him.

I wondered aloud whether his parents supported this crazy lifestyle early on, and Ehrler confirms it: along with his brother, they financially supported Brent in the early stages of his career. But, even more importantly, they never discouraged his quest to earn a living in something that must have been totally foreign to them. I doubt many parents could hold back their opinions on the life choices of their children, given such circumstances.

Now an established superstar, Ehrler continues to possess a set of lofty goals each season: qualify for a national championship; win at least one major event. In fact, he claims at times to be somewhat frustrated when a tournament practice session doesn’t leave him with a fair shot at winning. For him, it seems to be everything.

Immediately, I think of all of the times I’ve seen other tournament anglers strive simply to get a check, yet, for Ehrler, such an accomplishment is nearly regarded as defeat. Again my mind immediately parallels him with the other greats of the sport, both in this era and those gone by.

At the end of our conversation, Ehrler explains his goals for the future, but I admittedly tune out. It’s pointless, I can already guess them. And, assuming Ehrler stays healthy, he’ll accomplish them all. The Bassmaster Classic title. Angler of the Year. Whatever else he sets his mind to.

All from a California kid, alone and adrift in a little raft with a 7-horse motor, whose parents never said he couldn’t.

(Joe Balog is the often outspoken owner of Millennium Promotions, Inc., an agency operating in the fishing and hunting industries. A former Bassmaster Open and EverStart Championship winner, he's best known for his big-water innovations and hardcore fishing style. He's a popular seminar speaker, product designer and author, and is considered one of the most influential smallmouth fishermen of modern times.)