Apparently, we have reached the point in professional bass fishing where one world championship simply isn’t enough.
Actually, depending on how you count them, there are at least five in 2026.
The most recent entrant is The Champions, a new event scheduled for Oct. 28-Nov. 1 on Old Hickory Lake near Nashville. World Bass Enterprises calls it the “first-ever world bass fishing championship,” and it will bring together 60 anglers from the Bassmaster Elite Series and Major League Fishing’s Bass Pro Tour.
There will be three days of competition and an astounding $3.25 million-plus purse. The winner gets $1.25 million—that's million, folks—second place gets $500,000 and third gets $300,000. The top 15 advance to the final round.
That is an impressive pile of money, but there is a small problem with calling it the world championship.
There already is one. Or more.
The 2026 Black Bass World Championship will be held Sept. 27-Oct. 4 on Lake Hamilton in Hot Springs, Arkansas. It is the 20th edition of the event and is sanctioned by the Confederation Internationale de Peche Sportive, the international sport-fishing governing body recognized by USAngling.
Twenty-three nations are scheduled to compete, including the United States, Canada, Australia, France, Italy, Mexico, South Africa, Spain, Portugal, Romania, Serbia, Venezuela and several others. The American team includes Kevin VanDam, Scott Martin, Dustin Connell, Drew Gill, Ott DeFoe and Dakota Ebare.
That one actually has countries competing against countries. There are gold, silver and bronze medals. It is much closer to what most people would expect a world championship to be.
There is no $1.25 million check waiting for the winner. In fact, there's no monetary prize at all—gold medals, ala the Olympics. The event has still attracted a slate of top U.S. pro bassers, which we would guess will be a little like the NBA competing against the rest of the world in basketball, though time will tell.
Then there is the Ultimate Angler World Championship, scheduled for Sept. 27-Oct. 3 on Lake Guntersville in Alabama. It bills itself as the “world championship bass fishing tournament” and offers a $500,000 first-place prize, with more than $1 million in total prize money. The field is expected to include about 200 anglers from professional, collegiate, regional and amateur competition.
Here's the part that makes this one different: the State of Alabama is helping pay for it.
The Alabama Department of Conservation and Natural Resources says state legislators appropriated $1.6 million for the Ultimate Angler event, with the money going toward the tournament at Goose Pond Colony Resort near Scottsboro. ADCNR Commissioner Chris Blankenship said the department was approached by Unified Pros about helping put on an event that would bring anglers from different tournament circuits together and showcase Lake Guntersville and Alabama's outdoor resources. Like, we need MORE fishermen on Lake Guntersville? But I digress . . . .
The state's involvement goes beyond putting its name on a banner. ADCNR, the City of Scottsboro and other state and local organizations are partners in the event, with state agencies also participating in the Ultimate Expo and conservation programs.
The Ultimate Angler is invitation-only, but that doesn't mean somebody simply phones a few famous pros and tells them to bring their tackle. Invitations are earned through sanctioned qualifying events. The list includes tournaments affiliated with MLF, B.A.S.S., NPFL, Alabama Bass Trail, WON Bass, American Bass Anglers, college fishing and other organizations. The highest-finishing eligible Unified Pros member in those events earns a berth, with additional qualification routes for top anglers in some major circuits.
There isn't a separate championship entry fee, either. Anglers have to be members of Unified Pros, with membership costing $500 for a year, and they must qualify through the sanctioned events. Those qualifying tournaments, naturally, can have their own entry fees.
So while the national teams are battling for the world championship on Lake Hamilton, another group of anglers will be battling for a world championship on Lake Guntersville.
Same week. Two states. Two world champions available.
And we haven't even gotten to the established league championships.
Major League Fishing calls REDCREST its world championship. The 2026 edition was held April 17-19 on Table Rock Lake, with 35 MLF anglers competing for a $702,000 purse and a $300,000 first-place check.
B.A.S.S. has an equally strong claim from its own perspective. Bassmaster describes the Bassmaster Classic as the “world championship of bass fishing.” Dylan Nutt won the 2026 Classic in Knoxville and collected $300,000. The Classic's published payout total, including contingency awards, was $850,500.
So we have a world championship for the international governing body, a world championship for B.A.S.S., a world championship for MLF, a world championship on Guntersville and now a new world championship intended to settle the argument between B.A.S.S. and MLF.
Somewhere along the way, somebody forgot to reserve the word “world.”
The Champions is particularly interesting because its $3.25 million purse is being financed by a man who is not a tournament-industry veteran.
Brian Bird, 51, is an Eastland, Texas, entrepreneur who built an electrical construction company from what he describes as “a Ford Ranger, some hand tools and a pager” into a business generating hundreds of millions of dollars annually. He sold the family-owned company in 2023 and stayed on to oversee the transition.
World Bass Enterprises has likewise said it is funding the event independently, with no outside investors. Excel Sports Management is handling executive production, including strategy, commercial sales and production support.
And the $3.25 million purse is only part of the undertaking. The Champions includes a huge outdoor expo, entertainment, fan activities, lodging and expense money for competitors, media and production operations and a post-tournament pro-am.
Bird is apparently putting a substantial amount of his post-electrical-company fortune into the proposition that bass fishing needs a single, definitive championship. Could he be on his way to becoming the next Ray Scott?
The folks in Alabama appear to have a somewhat different proposition: put up public money to stage a championship that brings the various bass-fishing tribes together, put it on one of the country's most famous bass lakes and see whether it can become the Masters of bass fishing.
The question is whether the sport can agree on what “world champion” means.
If it means an international competition in which nations send teams to compete for medals, the answer is already established: the Black Bass World Championship on Lake Hamilton.
If it means the championship of a particular professional circuit, B.A.S.S. and MLF already have those covered.
If it means assembling anglers from virtually every major circuit and letting them settle the argument on Guntersville, the Ultimate Angler has a pretty good claim.
If it means putting the best-known pros from B.A.S.S. and MLF together and offering the biggest purse anybody has ever seen, The Champions has another argument entirely.
At this rate, we may eventually need a world championship to determine which world championship is the real World Championship.
And somebody, no doubt, would call it the World Championship.
– Frank Sargeant, Editor, The Water Wire