Local filmmaker supports promising try at big-league tour
Leo Roth
Staff writer
There were many days when Matt Sphar worked as a tree surgeon that he wished he could make a living fishing bass tournaments full time.
For the past three years, the Rochester Bassmasters club member has competed professionally on the B.A.S.S. Tournament Trail's Northern tour, consistently cashing checks. Still, after the weekend tournaments were over Sphar would find himself back up a tree or working construction.
"I can remember climbing trees, being up there doing dangerous stuff, basically playing Russian roulette with my life, and just thinking, 'Man, if I could just keep going with the bass fishing and get out of this,'" said the 1997 Attica High graduate and two-time state B.A.S.S. Federation Angler of the Year.
Sphar's dreams are about to become reality.
Thanks to a major sponsorship deal with Henrietta philanthropist, filmmaker and bass-fishing enthusiast Greg Polisseni, the Pavilion, Genesee County, resident won't be going out on a limb when he starts competing in the prestigious CITGO Bassmaster Elite Series starting next Thursday on Lake Amistad in Texas.
The 11-tournament Elite Series is the major league of tournament bass fishing with the world's top anglers competing for $11 million in purse money. ESPN purchased B.A.S.S. (Bass Anglers Sportsman Society), the focal point of a $72 billion sport fishing industry, six years ago to anchor its outdoors lineup.
Sphar qualified for the Elite Series by finishing eighth out of more than 200 pros on the Northern Tour last year. No Rochester-area bass angler has ever made it this far.
"It's the NFL," said Sphar, who will fish against the likes of Kevin VanDam, bass fishing's career money leader with $2.5 million, and Michael Iaconelli, the 2006 B.A.S.S. Angler of the Year.
"I've already experienced a lot of it with the Northern tour, but this is a lot more exciting. I'm trying not to get too caught up in it and get flustered by whom I'm competing against."
As a rookie, Sphar may be a small fish, but his climb up the ranks, not to mention trees, makes him a compelling story. So is his hot-looking rig.
As part of his sponsorship deal, his 20-foot Triton bass boat has been shrink-wrapped with a movie scene from The Alphabet Killer, Polisseni's soon-to-be-released psychological thriller that was shot in Rochester.
The movie is loosely based on a string of unsolved murders here in the 1970s in which the victims had the same first and last initial. It stars Eliza Dushku and Timothy Hutton.
Sphar's truck and clothing will also promote the movie in what Polisseni, 37, agreed was a win-win transaction.
"Absolutely. It's a gift that gives Matt, who I have grown quite fond of as a person, the opportunity to go out and give full-time bass fishing a shot, and it gets me some good advertising for my movie," said the president of the Polisseni Foundation.
"It's original," Sphar said. "Nobody else has advertised a movie yet fishing. So it is pretty cool."
The Rochester Bassmasters think it's pretty cool, too, to have one of their own make the big time. Sphar is a fierce competitor, but he's also humble and fun-loving, friends said, with a million-dollar marketing smile.
"He's as nice a guy as you'll ever want to meet," said club member Chuck Salvaggio. "He's an amazing person. He's so quiet and he snuck up on everybody. He just took the New York scene by storm and he hasn't stopped. He's doing it. Everybody's pulling for him and living vicariously through him because he's so good."
While it's one thing to be good enough to qualify for the Elite Series, it's another to actually go on tour. The entry fee for each event is $5,000. While Top 50 finishers double their investment, there are travel and equipment costs, so, just like pro golf, it usually takes sponsors to get started in big-time bass fishing.
Sphar's wife, Becky, and Salvaggio, worked over the winter to find a backer for Matt, but nobody would bite. Through a mutual friend, Rush restaurateur Joe Montesano, Salvaggio and Polisseni were put in touch.
"We hit the fishing jackpot," Salvaggio said. "Once Greg heard about Matt, he put two and two together. We're talking major exposure."
On the 30,000-mile Elite tour, which runs from Texas to California to New York to Florida, an estimated 450 million people will see Sphar's boat being towed. More will see it on the water and on television.
"Even if I didn't care about bass fishing, I'd have taken advantage of this for the advertising," Polisseni said. "It's basically a rolling billboard with his truck and boat going back and forth across the U.S."
Helping local athletes get started professionally is in Polisseni's blood. His late father, Gene, was senior vice president of marketing for Rochester payroll giant Paychex, which sponsored NASCAR driver Brett Bodine and still sponsors pro golfer Jeff Sluman.
www.rifles-n-rods.com
www.gosalmonfishin.com
LROTH@DemocratandChronicle.com
Leo Roth
Staff writer
There were many days when Matt Sphar worked as a tree surgeon that he wished he could make a living fishing bass tournaments full time.
For the past three years, the Rochester Bassmasters club member has competed professionally on the B.A.S.S. Tournament Trail's Northern tour, consistently cashing checks. Still, after the weekend tournaments were over Sphar would find himself back up a tree or working construction.
"I can remember climbing trees, being up there doing dangerous stuff, basically playing Russian roulette with my life, and just thinking, 'Man, if I could just keep going with the bass fishing and get out of this,'" said the 1997 Attica High graduate and two-time state B.A.S.S. Federation Angler of the Year.
Sphar's dreams are about to become reality.
Thanks to a major sponsorship deal with Henrietta philanthropist, filmmaker and bass-fishing enthusiast Greg Polisseni, the Pavilion, Genesee County, resident won't be going out on a limb when he starts competing in the prestigious CITGO Bassmaster Elite Series starting next Thursday on Lake Amistad in Texas.
The 11-tournament Elite Series is the major league of tournament bass fishing with the world's top anglers competing for $11 million in purse money. ESPN purchased B.A.S.S. (Bass Anglers Sportsman Society), the focal point of a $72 billion sport fishing industry, six years ago to anchor its outdoors lineup.
Sphar qualified for the Elite Series by finishing eighth out of more than 200 pros on the Northern Tour last year. No Rochester-area bass angler has ever made it this far.
"It's the NFL," said Sphar, who will fish against the likes of Kevin VanDam, bass fishing's career money leader with $2.5 million, and Michael Iaconelli, the 2006 B.A.S.S. Angler of the Year.
"I've already experienced a lot of it with the Northern tour, but this is a lot more exciting. I'm trying not to get too caught up in it and get flustered by whom I'm competing against."
As a rookie, Sphar may be a small fish, but his climb up the ranks, not to mention trees, makes him a compelling story. So is his hot-looking rig.
As part of his sponsorship deal, his 20-foot Triton bass boat has been shrink-wrapped with a movie scene from The Alphabet Killer, Polisseni's soon-to-be-released psychological thriller that was shot in Rochester.
The movie is loosely based on a string of unsolved murders here in the 1970s in which the victims had the same first and last initial. It stars Eliza Dushku and Timothy Hutton.
Sphar's truck and clothing will also promote the movie in what Polisseni, 37, agreed was a win-win transaction.
"Absolutely. It's a gift that gives Matt, who I have grown quite fond of as a person, the opportunity to go out and give full-time bass fishing a shot, and it gets me some good advertising for my movie," said the president of the Polisseni Foundation.
"It's original," Sphar said. "Nobody else has advertised a movie yet fishing. So it is pretty cool."
The Rochester Bassmasters think it's pretty cool, too, to have one of their own make the big time. Sphar is a fierce competitor, but he's also humble and fun-loving, friends said, with a million-dollar marketing smile.
"He's as nice a guy as you'll ever want to meet," said club member Chuck Salvaggio. "He's an amazing person. He's so quiet and he snuck up on everybody. He just took the New York scene by storm and he hasn't stopped. He's doing it. Everybody's pulling for him and living vicariously through him because he's so good."
While it's one thing to be good enough to qualify for the Elite Series, it's another to actually go on tour. The entry fee for each event is $5,000. While Top 50 finishers double their investment, there are travel and equipment costs, so, just like pro golf, it usually takes sponsors to get started in big-time bass fishing.
Sphar's wife, Becky, and Salvaggio, worked over the winter to find a backer for Matt, but nobody would bite. Through a mutual friend, Rush restaurateur Joe Montesano, Salvaggio and Polisseni were put in touch.
"We hit the fishing jackpot," Salvaggio said. "Once Greg heard about Matt, he put two and two together. We're talking major exposure."
On the 30,000-mile Elite tour, which runs from Texas to California to New York to Florida, an estimated 450 million people will see Sphar's boat being towed. More will see it on the water and on television.
"Even if I didn't care about bass fishing, I'd have taken advantage of this for the advertising," Polisseni said. "It's basically a rolling billboard with his truck and boat going back and forth across the U.S."
Helping local athletes get started professionally is in Polisseni's blood. His late father, Gene, was senior vice president of marketing for Rochester payroll giant Paychex, which sponsored NASCAR driver Brett Bodine and still sponsors pro golfer Jeff Sluman.
www.rifles-n-rods.com
www.gosalmonfishin.com
LROTH@DemocratandChronicle.com