Rick Barry is Making Up for Lost Time -- Alaska and Beyond

Rick Barry is a basketball legend, not only a Hall of Famer, but a member of the 1996 list of the top 50 players of all time. Casual fans might recall him for his unorthodox underhanded free throw shooting (and resulting .900 free throw percentage), but his accolades and achievements go much deeper than that – the 6’7” Barry was the NBA Rookie of the Year, the 1975 NBA Finals MVP, an eight-time NBA All Star, a four-time ABA All-Star and the only player to lead the NCAA, ABA and NBA in scoring. Perhaps just as impressively, all five of his sons played or play professional basketball, including Scooter who won an NCAA title at Kansas in 1988 and Brent who not only won NBA championships with the Spurs, but also won the Slam Dunk contest in 1996.

For most readers of this website, that’s certainly impressive, but not as important as the fact that Barry is one of us: an obsessed and devoted angler. He spent the early years of retirement pursuing various professional ventures, golfing and biking, but after a serious bike accident he was introduced to fishing and took to it immediately.

Now the 76-year-old is looking to make up for lost time on the water. He goes to Alaska up to four times every summer, and has been to the Amazon, and makes more than the occasional foray out the back door of his Florida home to catch a few bass.

HPFC: You’re obviously an adrenaline junkie, and while fishing has moments of excitement it’s typically not as fast-paced as basketball. Why are you so interested in it?

Barry: You hit it right there. That’s what it’s really all about. Every strike is an adrenaline rush for me, and that’s why I love Alaska. I tell people and they don’t even believe it. One time I was up at the lodge – and I’m anal about it, I counted a hundred and something fish – and some guy asked me how I did that day, and he was shocked when I told him. One day last year I went out just me and the guide, and they took us out up above the Copper River and dropped us off. They used the motor on the boat to take us up the slough to go where hardly anybody goes. The guides all know that I’m very serious about my fishing, and I take care of the guides, so they love it when I come. We have a good time but they know that I’m serious about my fishing. That day the guide told me we had to get at least a hundred day because we told the guys that’s what we’d done. I told him that if we don’t get at least a hundred just you and me and this raft going where no one else is going you may not make it back to the lodge today. We got a hundred so fricking fast, I told him we needed to see if we could get to two hundred. We moved and changed flies so fast that day, and we only stopped because we got back to where they were going to pick us up, and I remember the number 24 because that was my number, and we had 224 hookups. It was incredible, and I was exhausted when we got back to the lodge. So we get back and the guys said, “How did you do?” He told me they had 60 or 70 fish, and then he asked again, “What did you do?” And I said, “You really don’t want to know.” He insisted, and I told him 224. “What?” One of the rivers up there I caught 112 char and 100 of them were 20 inches or more.

HPFC: Is there a particular species that gets you fired up? Big rainbows, or one of the salmon species?

Barry: I don’t care what it is. I can be fishing with a three-weight rod and get little small trout. Every time I get a strike it’s just awesome. I really need to get that shirt, my wife was going to get it for me, that says “The Tug is the Drug.” When you feel it, and set that hook, I don’t care what’s on the end of it. That’s another reason I love Alaska, with the barbless hooks, so I can get those things off quicker. I don’t want to waste time. I want another strike. I want to get them back in the water, unless I want to get a picture of them

That’s another great story I have. Last year I caught a 32 ½ inch leopard rainbow trout. The lodge I stayed at, in 37 years they’ve been on the river it’s the largest rainbow. We were bulldogging for them – they’d drop an anchor down and let it drag so the guide can control it and we’d go backwards drifting, and you’re casting and you’re fishing. So I get the hit and the fish jumps out of the water and we can see that it’s a 30-incher. The guy that I was with was great about putting us on fish, but he was not a very good netter, so I’m fighting the fish, he’s jumping and I get him up to the boat. You know how when you’re fighting a fish and he gets the net under him you let a little bit of slack out of your line. For some reason I kept the line tight. The fish is bigger than the net to begin with, so if he can get him in it head first he can get him up but the thing falls out of the freaking net. Thank God I didn’t let the slack out. So I had to fight him again, I get him in and we measure him and it’s 32 ½ inches. But here’s the thing that kills me – I get the guide to take a picture of my buddy and me holding it. The fish turns his head and snaps one picture with an iPhone. I mean, come on, you can take nine million pictures. I say to my friend, “Clifford, take one for me,” and he takes one with his finger over the lens, so I can only see half of my face and the fish has its head turned again. When they’re in the water, you can see all of their beautiful colors, so we put it in the net and got another picture, but I wanted a great picture of me holding it.

HPFC: So are you a person who sets goals about particular sizes of fish you want to catch?

Barry: My goal is a hundred. It’s the number. I want to get a big one, and I want to get a picture of it, but I have so many pictures that I don’t need more pictures. If I do catch a picture-worthy fish, I’m fine, as long as I get strikes. It’s an adrenaline rush.

HPFC: Are you a purist on dry flies or some other style? Do you prefer to catch them one way over another?

Barry: I don’t care. I’ll do whatever the hell we have to do. Now, I prefer it. One time we were fishing for grayling – and I know that it was the same fish because it was crystal-clear water – it took me five times to get him. I watched. He came up, he missed the fly, he went back down. I cast again, he goes for it, and I got too excited and pulled it out of his mouth. Five times and I finally hooked him. Stuff like that is cool. Even if I didn’t get a lot, that experience that day made the whole day.

I was floating down the river one time with a great guide who I go out with all the time and he pulls the raft over and says there’s a good-sized fish right over there but I don’t know if you can get it in there. I said, “Let’s try.” So we get out, and I’m in my waders, and I made a side cast to try to get the right amount of line out, keeping it right above the water. I throw it in there, not quite enough. I throw it again, and as soon as that thing hits the water the fish hits. Boom, 22-inch rainbow. So that day, even if nothing else happened, that was worth it right there.

HPFC: So why fly fishing? I read that your fishing partner and former teammate Clifford Ray doesn’t like to fly fish.

Barry: Well, up there in Alaska, on a lot of rivers you have to fly fish. He’s a spin caster. We spent a whole week at the lodge and he never used a spinning rod, he fly fished the entire time and he had a great time. One day, between the two of us, we hooked 120 silver salmon.

HPFC: Do you think that your athleticism helped you become a competent fisherman?

Barry: Yes, I think so. Hand-eye coordination, picking things up, like learning to do the double haul. It’s no coincidence that the better you can cast, the more fish you’re going to hook. I’m still not the greatest caster. I still always tell the guides that if you see something I could be doing better, I’ll take any pointers you want to give me.

HPFC: So you’re coachable?

Barry: Yes, despite what people say. People say, “He was a bad practice player.” I say, “Bullshit. I had bad practice coaches.” Give me something to do that’s meaningful and worthwhile and I’ll work my ass off doing it. I want to work. I want to be told how to get better, and I listen to my guides. Some of those guides are unbelievable how well they can cast.

HPFC: You were obviously known for your unconventional free throw shooting style. Is there anything you do on the water that is similarly unconventional?

Barry: No, not really. I do whatever they tell me. I’ll do a side cast, backhand, whatever. A lot of time if the wind’s blowing I’ll cast over my left shoulder, not righty. If the wind’s blowing right to left I’m not going to cast on the right side, especially if I’m fishing with one of those big streamers because I don’t want that to hit me in the head. At least I’ve never hooked myself yet.

HPFC: Are you a gear snob? Do you care about the brand of the rods you use?

Barry: I use whatever rods they have at the lodge. I have some really nice rods, but I generally don’t take them with me because the lodges all have the right stuff. They even have the boots and waders so you don’t have to schlep those things all the way up there. I have boots and waders down here in Florida and I have them at my house in Colorado, but a lot of places down here if it’s nice you usually don’t need them. You can just use shorts and water shoes. I don’t like the cold. You’ll never see me ice fishing.

HPFC: You’ve done Alaska a lot. You’ve been to the Amazon. You’ve caught tuna and roosterfish. What other places are still on your bucket list?

Barry: I had a great experience with Ray Floyd. He’s a member of a private club for Atlantic salmon. The first time I went up there I had a big one on the first day and for whatever reason the guide was backing up. Everyone else was running down the river with their fish and he was backing me up. I lost the fish and that was the only fish I hooked in five days. That was ok because I hadn’t seen Raymond in a long time. He had just lost his wife recently and it was great just to spend time with him. He invited me back and I said to myself I had to at least try to catch one of these Atlantic salmon. Of course we were using spey rods, a very interesting thing, and I hooked a few of them. That was fun. I enjoyed doing that.

The other thing I really want to do – and it’s a long way to go – is to go to Kamchatka, Russia. I also want to go down to Argentina. And I want to go heli fishing in Nimmo Bay (British Columbia). It costs more to go to Nimmo Bay than I made in my first year of playing basketball.

HPFC: If you don’t mind my asking, how much did you make as a rookie?

Barry: I was the second player picked in the draft and I was offered $12,500 and I had to make the team.

HPFC: And what’s the most money you’ve ever spent on a fishing trip?

Barry: Probably up around ten grand. It gets up near that amount when you start adding in airfare and the tips and all that. One day I’ll make it up to Nimmo Bay, but I still kind of work for a living. That’s up there on my bucket list. The saltwater stuff I have no real desire.

One time when I was going to another lodge near Sitka, I’d hurt my ankle on the golf course. I was driving and the thing hit my ankle and I thought I just had a badly bruised ankle, but when I got up there it was hurting so bad that I thought the thing had to be broken. We had to go out in boats to fish. You could catch as many as you wanted, it was just insane, but I couldn’t walk. The other guys walked up the trail – George Gervin, the Iceman, went with me – but the guide towed me in a little raft up to where we needed to go fishing. I stood in that cold water, and I didn’t stop to eat lunch. I told them I can eat lunch any time but I’m hooking fish. They just kept pouring in and I hooked a hundred and something. I don’t think I moved 10 feet the entire day.

One time we went for char or Dolly Varden, I don’t remember. The sockeyes were in and we went to this one river – it was a great flight to get there, and as we headed down the river he told me to stay in one spot. There was a little slough coming off and he said there’d probably be a lot of fish sitting in there, waiting for the eggs to drop on the fish that are all nesting up there. He waved me over and it was nuts. Probably seven, eight or nine out of every 10 casts I’m hooking up. One older guy that I didn’t know was there was fishing on the main part of the river, I waved him over and told him to fish there. He said he didn’t want to take my spot, and I said, “Trust me. There’s more fish here than you could ever dream about.” It was just insane. I hooked one and a bear comes. I kind of stood there and a bear comes. I didn’t do any fighting and he walks away. We had a bunch of fish that we were going to take home that were in the water down by the main part of the river. They smell all of that stuff, so we were afraid that he was going to go down there and get all of the fish that we’d caught.

The experiences with the bears are just amazing, but here is the one that will never be topped, trust me. We’re on this one river and we’re walking in. It’s tough, that’s a lot of hiking. We get up to once place around lunchtime. It’s a little gravel bar. While they’re getting set up, I went to walk down just a little bit and the water is maybe 15 feet wide or something. I go and I cast. Boom, catch a fish. Cast again. Catch a fish. You get lucky sometimes – you go to a hole and you might get five, six, or seven fish out of it. Twenty four consecutive casts I hooked a rainbow. They sat there in astonishment. One time I figured I was done and I just let it go further and further and got another one. Amazingly, my number is 24, and on the twenty-fifth cast I didn’t get a fish. There is no way I will do that ever again if I fished every day for the rest of my life.

HPFC: You’ve mentioned Raymond Floyd, Clifford Ray and George Gervin. Among professional athletes, other than yourself, who’s the best and who’s the worst angler?

Barry: Clifford is a great fisherman, but he’s not a great fly fisherman. He goes out all the time and he catches tons of fish. When my son was at the College of Charleston, I went there to watch him play ball and Clifford came up to visit and we were out driving around. We saw this nice boat, motor and trailer. Clifford loves to fish so much, I told him, “You need to get a boat, man.” I had a guide who had taken me out for redfish, and I had him drive over to take a look at this boat, motor and trailer. He came over and said, “That’s a hell of a deal. It’s a brand new trailer, the motor is great. That’s a great deal.” So Clifford bought it, and he drove it back to Florida and a couple of weeks later he calls me: “B” – he calls me “B” – “I just wanted to thank you for talking me into getting a boat. I love my boat.” He goes out all the time. It’s a flats boat and he fishes Mosquito Bay and all around there.

Of the ones that I’ve fished with, the one who probably does the best would be Raymond Floyd. Here’s a story about that. I hadn’t gone bonefishing because everyone said you’ve got to be able to cast perfectly. I wasn’t going to do it until the point where I could cast into the wind, double haul, whatever. I had to make sure that I was not going to embarrass myself and had a chance to hook a fish. I had several chances but I didn’t go. Finally Raymond invited me down to fish for bonefish. He said is son was going to come down, but he couldn’t come down until a certain day, so if I wanted to come down for three days I could do it. This was in Florida, so I drove over to his house. Raymond has done very well for himself, so we fly over in a little turbo prop plane to the Bahamas. We get picked up at the airport, they take us over to a Donzi boat, which takes us out to this yacht. I have my own room on this amazing yacht. We’re eating stone crabs and lobster. We get up the next morning and I figure it’ll be Raymond and I. No, no. A boat for him with his captain and a boat for me with a captain. I go out and I catch my first bonefish, which was really cool. He takes off, heading for the mangroves. Raymond had said don’t worry about stuff, I have a rod and reel for my son, brand new, all geared up. The fish stops, and all of a sudden all of this line is coming out of the reel and the fish takes off again. The fish goes, the extra line gets caught on the handle of the reel, and I lost the fish. The line couldn’t go out anymore and the fish breaks off. I told Raymond that whoever the hell got this for you, you need to call them up and ask what kind of bullshit is this? You go to a place to get a great rod and reel and get them set up, and when the guy put the two lines together put slack in the line. They weren’t secured together. Knowing my luck, if he kept going another 6 feet, he would’ve pulled all of that through the eyelets, but he had to stop and that line comes out and gets hooked on the reel and he comes off.

HPFC: You are the patriarch of a very successful basketball family. Do your sons fish?

Barry: My son Scooter would love to go, but they’re raising kids, doing stuff, they’re not fishermen. I mean, I had gone out one time with my father and I caught a 2 ½ pound Jersey bluefish. I thought I had a whale on the line. That was the only experience I had. I hardly ever fished at all. One time later in my life when I was playing ball I got to go out in Montana and fly fished for one day. One time we were at a golf event in Anchorage and I went out there and caught a king salmon. When the guy flew back to pick us up, he said, “What the hell are you doing with that fish? You don’t have a tag for it.” I really didn’t get into it until my buddy Scott Minnich who’s been fishing for 40 years took me. I went out with him and I really got into it. As a result of that, I’ve had a lot of great experiences, a lot of stuff that I’ll remember forever. I just wish that I had gotten into this earlier in my lifetime. I just think about all of the fishing that I’ve missed out on being able to do over the years.

HPFC: It sounds like you’re making up for it pretty well, though.

Barry: I have, but you may have heard the story about my wife. I was trying to catch a 30 inch trout for years. I was out George Gervin’s roast in San Antonio and they had a trip up to one of the lodges up in Alaska. I know what they cost. I was bidding against a guy and fortunately he dropped out. I got a deal that was better than two-for-one. I got the deal, went up there and took my wife. I’ve been trying to catch this 30-incher, she goes up there and we’re fishing a small connection between two lakes that we flew out to, and I’m catching some nice fish. Some 18- to 22-inchers, I think it was char. My wife hooks up and gets a 35 ½ inch char. They put her on the cover of the brochure and on the website. The funny thing is that she was getting a little cold and had decided to go in when she hooked up, but she got it in. I got the picture of her doing it. She catches her 30-incher the first time she’s ever out there. So I said to her, “How did you like it?” She said it was ok. I asked if she’d like to go again and she said, “Maybe in five years.” That was about eight or nine years ago. I told her that the only good thing about it is that she’s saving us a lot of money. I’ve always been jealous of Larry Csonka who gets to go on all of those trips and gets paid for it. Paid. To fish. You’ve got to be kidding me