The month was August. The year was 2013. My buddy Casey and I had spent that whole summer fishing like it was our second full-time job. Now, I’d love to tell you that I caught way more fish than Casey, but that would’ve been a bold-faced lie. (In reality, Casey was casually out-fishing me like it was a competitive sport he’d been secretly training for.)
From 2013 through about 2015–2016, our routine was simple: load up my two-man bass buggy, hit a pond, film the chaos, edit the footage, and upload our masterpiece to my YouTube channel. We even had a name for it—Bass Commander—because “Two Idiots in a Boat” didn’t exactly scream brandability.
We got so into it that I even spun up an Instagram account, where people from all over would email me photos of their biggest catches. I’d slap the Bass Commander logo on them and upload the shots. It blew up. For a while, we were basically the ESPN of fish selfies. That is, until it started eating up every waking second of my life. Then I tapped out. (Even bass lords need sleep.)
The Day the Bass Fought Back
So there we were, one particular August day in 2013, absolutely slaying largemouths in our honey hole. I mean, it was ridiculous—fish were hitting our flukes before they even had time to sink. It felt like Mother Nature was apologizing for every skunked trip we’d ever had.
We were capturing pure gold for Episode 2 of Bass Commander when inspiration struck me. And by “inspiration,” I mean the dumbest idea of my adult life.
“Hey dude,” I said. “Let’s turn the camera on and get a shot of us both releasing our fish at the same time.”
Those, my friends, were my famous last words.
The moment we leaned over the same side of that tiny bass buggy, physics laughed in our faces. The boat tipped, and before we could even say ‘GoPro stop recording,’ the trolling motor, the battery, our tackle, the poles, my iPhone, and—oh yeah—us were all in the pond.
It was fast. It was furious. It was… Boatmageddon.
Where Was Spielberg When We Needed Him?
Of course, we had multiple GoPros running (because we were basically Hollywood at this point). The perfect camera—the one mounted high on a pole, pointed directly at us—would’ve captured this aquatic disaster in all its glory… except I forgot to put it in waterproof housing. The second it hit water, that footage was toast.
Luckily, the trolling motor GoPro caught enough of the chaos to make it into Episode 2. And yes, we actually titled it “Boatmageddon.” Because, if your boat flips and you don’t give it a blockbuster title, did it even happen?
Casey: Hero of the Deep
Now, here’s the wild part. Casey’s iPhone survived (waterproof case—he’s the smart one). But the thing that still blows my mind is how he somehow managed to hook our boat battery with his foot and drag it back up like Aquaman moonlighting as a lineman.
Keep in mind, we couldn’t touch bottom. It was about 7–8 feet deep. Yet Casey’s toes became the crane operator we never knew we needed. We got everything back… except my iPhone.
Fun fact: my phone also had a waterproof case, and the battery was still charged. We actually thought we could come back later with snorkel gear, call it from Casey’s phone, and spot it glowing underwater like Atlantis. Nope. The Oklahoma moss was thicker than Joe’s skull during fantasy football season. The phone was gone for good.
The Aftermath
It wasn’t fun in the moment, but it’s been comedy gold ever since. The big lesson? Two grown men should never try releasing fish off the same side of a two-man bass buggy. That boat is basically a floating teeter-totter.
For the record, we were so dedicated to Bass Commander that we went back a couple days later and staged a reenactment—with my dad (shoutout to Wally Young, future Oscar nominee) filming from shore. The actual flip was real, but the post-flip footage needed some Hollywood magic.
So yeah—between the YouTube episode (“Boatmageddon”), the 2018 podcast reflection, and now this blog, the legend of Bass Commander’s most chaotic day is well preserved.
And while I never found my iPhone, at least I found the one thing that really matters: content.
👉 Watch Episode 2 – Boatmageddon here
👉 Listen to our 2018 podcast reflection here (skip to 20:35)