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by bassnomad

A season in the life: Andy Morgan’s AOY year

Morgan started off the 2016 season with a healthy Day 1 bag at Lake Okeechobee. Photo by Joel Shangle.
You could tell from Day 1 at Beaver Lake that Morgan was headed for another Top 12. Photo by Joel Shangle.
Yet another Championship Sunday sunrise greeted the GOAT at Beaver Lake. Photo by Joel Shangle.
Morgan bagged up his record 61st Top 10 at Beaver Lake. Photo by Joel Shangle.
The GOAT shows off a Pickwick Pair. Photo by Joel Shangle.
Livingston pro Andy Morgan loads up at Pickwick Lake. Photo by Joel Shangle.
“The fish are thataway,” Morgan said as he hopped to a new spot on Day 2 at the Forrest Wood Cup. Garmin photo by Joel Shangle.
Morgan was ready for Day 1 morning at the Toyota Texas Bass Classic. Photo by Joel Shangle.
Time to make room for some more hardware at the Morgan residence. Photo by Joel Shangle.

As I write this, the man with the best (most fitting) nickname in professional bass fishing is likely hunkered in a ground blind in Nebraska, waiting for a chance to bring yet another monster mule-deer buck back to his home in the hills of East Tennessee.

How scary-good is Andy “The G.O.A.T.” Morgan that he didn’t pick up a fishing rod until about a week before the 2016 FLW Tour opener on Lake Okeechobee, and then went out and won his third Angler of the Year title in four years?

He’ll do the same next season, too. I texted the G.O.A.T. last week to ask him about the 2017 schedule, and got the following in response: “Hell, I ain’t even thought about it.”

Typical Morgan.

Not that he doesn’t care – he’s maybe the only tour-level pro as fiercely competitive as Kevin VanDam – but the fishing off-season is as much a business to the G.O.A.T. as the FLW tournament season. He might not be filming 52 episodes of a hunting show like he’s done in previous years, but he’s still out there hustling.

Come February, when we all show up at Guntersville to kick off the 2017 season, Morgan will have flung more arrows than bass baits in the previous five months. And he’ll be the favorite to pick up an unprecedented fourth AOY in five years.
-Joel Shangle