When Mark Davis had surgery on his right shoulder in September 2004, he knew it could be a factor this season. One big reason he knew that was because he'd had the same surgery on the same shoulder in 1999. But little did he know how tough this year would be.
Four events into the season he's 123rd in the Bassmaster Tour points after finishing 109th, 101st, 93rd and 81st. This is from a guy who everyone knows is one of the best bass anglers ever to get in a boat, who always is ranked in the top two or three in the world, who is frequently in the hunt to win points races, who has won three Bassmaster Angler of the Year (AOY) titles and won three events last year.
The bottom line is that so far, this is by far his worst season yet. And it's so anomolous it begs for an explanation.
What's wrong? His shoulder, which is getting better, and a new carb-free diet, which he's now off.
The Shoulder
Davis reckons he started the season with his right shoulder at "less than 50 percent." After bothering him big-time in Florida, it's gotten steadily better. But still, "even now I just can't fish wide-open," he said. "I just can't go at it the way I need to. And when you do that, when you're not 100 percent, you can't fish the way you normally fish.
"Certain things hurt your shoudler – driving the boat hard, setting the hook wrong, making a wrong cast, casting too hard. A lot of things will cause pain. And also bear in mind that this is the second time I've had that shoulder worked on. I think it's been repaired this time, but I don't want to have to do it a third time, so I'm probably being a little extra-cautious with it.
"But when you can't fish normally – cranking and all that power-fishing stuff I like to do – when you're not 100 percent, you wind up obviously not fishing well. You actually start trying to find fish you can catch on something besides a crankbait. You're trying to make the fish do stuff they're not doing, and it gets into your mental game. You can't compete like that."
The Mental Game
Trying to force-feed fish and not catching them gets in your head. You finish below 100th two events in a row when you're used to being at the other end of the standings, and that gets in your head too. Pain when you're fishing likewise messes you up. "One thing compounds on the next," Davis noted.
"You have a little shoulder pain, it gets in your head and your mental game gets soft. You just don't think right. You don't find the fish you're trying to find, and you start trying to force things and make something happen. You don't go with your natural flow – you're not fishing the way that you fish.
"That's exactly what's wrong with me. I've been trying to change the way I fish, and I know that won't work. Then you're out there trying things you know won't work, and there it is. It's in your head."
A bad mental game means bad decisions, and one example this year was at Guntersville. "Jason Quinn (who finished 10th there) and I found the same school of fish. I knew not to leave, but I surrendered it to him and he winds up making the cut.
"That's so unlike me, making those bad decisions.
"Looking back at this last tournament (Clarks Hill), I should've had a good tournament, but I didn't capitalize on the opportunities I had." He lost some fish he "shouldn't have lost, but when you're fishing good you don't lose those fish. But when you're in a rut, you tend to stay in a rut."
The Diet
Does the low-carb diet fad work? Yeah, but you might not want to do it if you're a pro bass fisherman. Davis learned that the hard way.
"I started a low-carb diet in Florida, and that's a no-no," he said. "It zaps your energy. It works, but you don't have energy and you don't make good decisions. You don't think well. I had to get off that thing."
He quit that diet the last day at Clarks Hill, and that day he caught the first limit he'd caught all year.
"It was a hard lesson," he said – one that other anglers have also learned. "I talked to Tim Horton and some of the other guys who've tried it, and Tim told me he was in the AOY race (last year), went on (that diet) and almost fell out of the Classic."
Climbing Out
"It's frustrating," Davis said about this season. "This has been the lowest point in my career. I'm so much lower than any (other) time in my career.
"I've never had this problem," he said about fishing this badly. "It has really just floored me. Just absolutely floored me."
But that doesn't mean he's moping around about it. A normal eating regimen and an improving shoulder (it's "getting better each day," he said) have him starting to feel like himself again. The only way you can tell from the stats is that he's improved in each tournament, which is good, but he hasn't yet fished like the Mark Davis everyone knows.
Still, there's ample time for that. There's two events left in the 2005 Bassmaster Tour season, and both are lakes he likes. Norman is a classic deep-water lake, which suits his style, especially if he's able to use that shoulder to crank.
He said: "I feel like I'm going to catch them at Norman. I've not felt that way this year yet, and you have to feel like you'll catch them before you catch them."
The last event of the season is at Table Rock, where he won last year. From there it's on to the last season of the Elite 50s. He won two of those events last year and has a good shot at making the Bassmaster Classic via that route this year.
In other words, bet on seeing Davis back in form before summer vacation.
Notable
> He noted that Norman is the first tournament he's looked forward to this year. "Before, I wasn't looking forward to any tournaments. I haven't felt good. That was the bottom line."
> The first time he had the shoulder surgery he was in his mid-30s. Now he's 41, and "it takes more time" to heal, he noted. "When you're younger, you bounce back quicker. My doctor said that athletes in their 20s and early 30s can have surgery and be back pretty quick. But for most people, 40 is kind of that age (where it) takes a while (to recover). So I expect it to take more time (to heal this time), and it is."
