“Plain and simple, you win.”

That was Larry Nixon’s advice on how to gain sponsorships as a pro bass fisherman, as told to Terry Batisti in an interview for the Bass Fishing Archives website.

Nixon, known in the industry as “The General,” was characteristically forward, direct and blunt. He never spoke of “knowing someone" or marketability, or even mentioned the term “social media."

Just win, baby.

At the time, I credited Nixon’s answer to the old-school mentality of days gone by. Back in the era when men like Ricky Green, Tommy Martin and Bobby Murray were racking up paychecks, the thought of bass fishing sponsorships was still in its infancy. Manufacturers were becoming aware of tournament influence in the bass fishing market, but up until then, there were no dominant players in the marketing aspect of it.

Remember, this was before most television fishing shows and their insanely popular hosts, even before sport show seminars on the Hawg Trough, Classic Outdoor Shows, or Bassmaster TV.

Back then, the biggest influence on the newly generated buying market was the guy who just won a tournament, regardless of how “polished” he was.

So, to me it made perfect sense that an old-school guy like Nixon, born and bred in the trenches, would suggest that the best way to gain support is through winning. He and his cohorts used to look for places to cash their Top-10 checks just to put gas in the tank and get to the next derby. Literally.

I was reminded of The General’s comments while reading an interview with recent Forrest Wood Cup qualifier Roy Hawk. Hawk mentioned that he is “all in” when it comes to fishing, and that he often doesn’t have a plan for gas money home if the event goes sour.

Hawk went on to say that he plans to fish the FLW Tour if he can find sponsorship for “the $6,000 I need for the deposit by the first of December…” Remember, the complete FLW entry fee cost for the 2015 season is $25,800. That leaves Hawk with over 19 grand worth of stomach butterflies.

Will he find the support to pursue his dream? Perhaps. He's a stick out west, and his résumé includes a six-figure payday on Lake Mead.

Hawk’s story is not unlike that of Paul Mueller, also in the news this week. Mueller, relatively unknown until his big run at the Classic last year as an amateur, will again appear at the Big Show in 2015 due to his qualification as the B.A.S.S. Nation champion. Along with the Classic berth comes an invitation to the 2015 Elite Series, and Mueller plans to pursue such a bid if he can gain proper support. He, like Hawk, has some name recognition from previous performances and believes that will carry him in the right direction.

But will it?

When a guy like Nixon talks of winning performances, he means traveling to the biggest tournament at the time (the Invitationals), win or seriously threaten to, and go on to the next one. Again and again.

I’m fairly certain he doesn’t mean triple-A tournaments, national events derived from club-level regionals or team fishing leagues.

But today’s a different age, right?

As many of you know, I own and operate a promotional company in the hunting and fishing industries. I’ve been deeply involved in all aspects of marketing and sponsorship opportunities, from both sides of the fence, for over two decades. And I can tell you first hand, today things are, indeed, different. Well, sort of.

Here’s the underlying factor: When it comes to finding marketable professional anglers and endorsers of their products, manufacturers are really in no hurry. For the most part, for every marketable young or up-and-coming pro with a decent regional track record, there’s three more just like him standing in line. And rarely does a “true gem” come along who understands the business of fishing and can perform well at the national level. There’s a reason for this, and it’s not what you're thinking, as I’ll explain.

But first, let’s look at the idea of timeline. If a new name comes on the scene and appears to have what it takes to compete (as in our examples earlier), one would think that sponsors would be fighting each other off to get the first shot at this guy. But, in reality, that’s not the case.

You see, pro fishing supporters don’t really need to risk it on new blood. There’s already plenty of proven winners out there, most of whom would gladly entertain proposals of new sponsorships, no matter how entrenched they are with their current supporters. This is somewhat unique to fishing for two reasons: first, sponsorships are, overall, piddly. Although it may come as a surprise to some of you, $300 or $400 a month isn’t a whole lot of money to companies with revenue in the millions. Many pro fishermen provide exposure that would cost those same companies 10 times as much if they hired an outside ad agency to perform the same task.

Secondly, no pro/sponsor relationship is ever “safe." We all see the news of fishing-related companies being bought, sold or acquired regularly, and oftentimes new management understandably takes a different marketing direction. Other times, the existing management just takes a different direction with advertising dollars. Nixon himself can be seen as a prime example of this, as one of his longest-tenured supporters, Berkley, let him and other legends of the sport go in the recent past.

So potential sponsors are smart – they wait until a guy proves himself, over time, on the pro tour. Just like Nixon’s example set some 40 years ago. Why hire Mr. Triple-A when a long-time, proven pro is more than willing to clear up jersey space?

Finally, we need to explore the “true gem” theory we mentioned earlier. I know what you’re thinking: I’m going to try to convince you that most pro fishermen are marketably inept. But that’s far from the case.

In this day and age, in order to even be a successful pro, you need to be groomed in the ways of business and marketability. Guys like Gerald Swindle and Scott Martin remind me of movie stars.

But, in order to compete, these guys can’t be responsible for much marketing past that of competitive performance; it’s simply unrealistic with today’s extremely high level of competition. Take it from me, while e-mail is a functional way to excel in the pro fishing business, it’s not nearly as productive as graphing creek channels.

What I’m trying to say is that, to really hit the highest level of sponsorship in fishing, a guy’s got to win. And to do so, he needs to spend as much time as possible in the pursuit of bettering himself at competitive fishing.

This will likely come as a disappointment to our newest hungry competitors. But it’s a reality: Winning is everything. It was imperative in the early days of pro bass, and is likely just as important now. Nixon was right all along.

But then, we all knew he would be.

(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.)