Johns Crews begins the 20th season of the Bassmaster Elite Series with a distinction held by only two others.
“Only three of us have fished every single Elite Series tournament so far,” he said, naming Steve Kennedy and Bill Lowen. “It’s really kind of hard to believe, honestly, that I’ve been fishing the top level of the sport for so long. I feel like the three of us are maybe the Cal Ripkens of professional fishing.”
Well, that’s with apologies to Rick Clunn, the all-time B.A.S.S. iron man with 507 events in his 50 years. Clunn, 78, however, retired from the Elites last year, leaving Crews as the current Bassmaster with the longest successive tenure. With 236 tournament entries, Crews stands 43rd on the all-time list, ahead of both Kennedy (206) and Lowen (196).
With two Elite titles, 13 Classic appearances and $1.68 million in earnings (30th all-time) while also running a successful bait company, the 46-year-old from Salem, Va., feels he’s had a solid career, and he’s far from done.
Down at the pond
Like most pro anglers, Crews’ love of fishing came early in life. He plied the pond in the back yard of the family home in small town Jetersville, Va.
“I was just infatuated with going back there and catching the bass,” he said. “Didn’t really care about the bluegill. Even when I was little, all I wanted to catch was the bass.
“Once I started reading Bassmaster Magazine and then watching the Bassmaster tournaments on TNN back in the day, I said I wanted to try some of these tournaments.”
At 15, he fished his first with a cousin, a team tournament on Smith Mountain Lake. It was love at first bite. After playing baseball, basketball and golf through high school, his interests soon focused solely on fishing. While in college, Crews joined a bass club and further broadened his horizons.
“The fishing bug was getting me. I just wanted to fish more,” he said. “I really struck up my dedication to fishing when I went to college. With the bass club, we fished all over Virginia, from the Potomac River to Smith Mountain to Buggs Island. It was an absolute blast. Some of those guys are still my friends. That part is really cool.”
To test himself and learn more, Crews began traveling to fish pro-level tournaments, and his progression continued. Upon graduation, he hit a crossroads.
“After college, I thought I could try to start a career and fish at the same time, or I could just try to fish and see what happens,” he said. “I decided I was going to go all in on the fishing.
“I was still basically living at home and had no problem cutting expenses. I just scratched and clawed my way along before I qualified for my first Classic and made it on the tour.”
Crews Missile blasts off
Working with Spro, Crews designed a number of baits, including his signature Little John crankbaits. Seeing another need, he then struck out on his own.
“I was designing, prototyping and promoting baits,” he said. “I love that process, and then I realized I wanted to do it on the soft plastics side. I made a business plan and utilized all the contacts I had in the industry and started up Missile Baits.”
Since being called “Crews Missile” by a mentor since high school, Crews’ choice for his company name was simple. Getting it rolling was not.
“Whenever you think you know a lot about something, start a business in that field,” he said, “and you realize you don’t know as much as you thought you did.”
Crews’ business degree from Randolph-Macon College near Richmond served him well. His successes probably lies more in his fascination with fishing and what he wants from lures. In that, he’s been quite prolific.
“I’ve got at least 20 different baits I’ve designed with Missile, and 20 or so for Spro,” he said. “It’s been really cool to be able to see them on the market with people catching fish on them.”
Crews has learned a lot in his 15 years of bait design. Development of hardbait and soft plastics are so different, he said, yet the processes of prototyping and testing share similarities.
“The farther you go along with it, the better you get at it,” Crews said. “Once you know what you want the bait to do, you have to figure out what it takes to do that.”
Among his Missile lineup, Crews said the D-Bomb was one his team nailed from the get-go. That style of creature bait was relatively new a dozen years ago and offerings were flawed, so Crews worked on perfecting it.
“I wanted to create a ribbed-body version with very thin tails that would allow it to be a bulky bait,” he said, “not have too much action on the fall, but then would have some action as the bait was basically just sitting there with the slow moving appendages on the back.”
The D Bomb is now a staple for flipping and pitching.
A little help from friends
In his first years on the Elites, Crews found more than just running mates in Ish Monroe and Mike Iaconelli. Both have been instrumental business associates.
“It’s really cool that our top two promoters are some of my friends from the tour,” Crews said. “Ish has been our No. 1 pro staff angler from Day 1. He is still a huge asset for the company and helps us in many ways to this day. A lot of our successes is attributed to him.”
Ike and Crews collaborated on a lineup that includes a smaller jig series. Iaconelli came up with the concept and tasked Crews with developing compact flipping and swimming jigs.
“Ike does a great job of promoting and talking about them and giving ideas what he wants for the projects, and then we go out and do it,” Crews said. “Nobody had a midsize, compact lure like Ike’s Mini Flip. And Ike’s Micro Jig was one of the really first ones out there — I got my butt whipped with it the other day.”
Ike’s successes include an Angler of the Year title and a Classic crown among his eight tournament wins, and Monroe has won five Bassmaster crowns. After fishing another circuit, Iaconelli returned to the Elites on a Legend’s exemption, and Monroe is trying to requalify through the Opens.
Several of Crews’ most recent pro staffers have picked up the torch. Elites emblazoned with Missile include longtime friend Ed Loughran III, Bryan Schmitt, Caleb Sumrall and Logan Latuso.
“I’ve known Ed since I was 15,” Crews said. “He and I were friends for a long, long time before he qualified for the Elites, even back when I was in college when I was stepping up my fishing game. I’ve learned a lot from Ed. He was one of my big mentors.”
Schmitt, from Deale, Md., and Loughran, now in Richmond, Va., room with Crews, creating a regional power triangle of sorts. Loughran’s win last year on Lake Champlain completed a household Elite slam.
“Ed’s talked about it numerous times. He felt like he was the odd man out,” Crews said. “I had two blue trophies, Bryan had two and Ed didn’t have any. He’s been a very accomplished angler for many years and now it’s kind of cool for it to come full circle.”
Rising up with the tide
The highlights of Crews’ career are his two Elite titles, both on tidal fisheries. His first, on the California Delta in 2010, came by a single ounce. He well remembers fishing the well-known Italian slough, a deep canal with hydrilla on both sides.
“Every single flip you made, you had to pull that slime off the bait,” he said. “The bite was not fast and furious, so a lot of guys, after 15 minutes of pulling the slime off your bait ever single cast, they got frustrated and would leave.
“Maybe I was only one stubborn enough to stick with it and stay in there.”
His second title came at the St. Johns River out of Palatka, Fla. Although tides are minimal there, Crews feels an advantage on any tidal fishery because of his experience. He made cuts his first two events at St. Johns then posted fifth- and second-place finishes before winning in 2022.
“There was a little period early on I didn’t like the St. Johns too much,” he said. “It wasn’t like the James or Potomac, but then I started to figure it out, the stuff they did, and it just started to click.
“It’s a place that I really like. I feel comfortable on tidal fisheries. The fish have tendencies, types of areas they like based on whether the water is low, high, incoming or outgoing.”
In this year’s season opener, Crews’ and the Elites will be making their eighth visit to the St. Johns. Last year’s 68th didn’t leave Crews with a great taste in his mouth, so he plans on switching things up in hopes of a good start on the nine-event series.
“I don’t like to fish where I’ve fished before, but I’m going to try to recycle some now,” he said. “The St. Johns is an awesome place to start. I always like to fish there. La Crosse is a great place to end the year, an awesome place, and everything else in the middle looks like a lot of fun.
“A lot of people have the Pasquotank River circled. I think it’s going to open a lot of people’s eyes. They have some big fish there, and it will be interesting to see what we all bring to the scales.”
Focusing on goals
Feeling he’s had a decent career, Crews said there’s more he wants to accomplish. After making 13 Classics since 2005, Crews has missed three in row.
“Definitely more wins and get back into the Classic a number of times and try to make a run at that,” he said. “The last couple years have been uncharacteristic. My whole goal this year is to get back to being where I knew I can be — a top 30 AOY guy. That’s where I’ve been historically.”
“The Classic, it’s a really hard tournament to win. You can’t slip any of the three days. I want to get a couple more shots at trying to win one of those.”
As for how much longer he fishes competitively, Crews said he’ll know exactly when to hang it up – when it stops being fun.
“I still have fun. I enjoy going to the tournaments,” he said. “I enjoy the whole process of figuring out practice, figuring fish out and adjusting during the tournament. I think that’s a lot of fun.
“I’m just going to have outlast Kennedy and Lowen, so I can be the longest standing Elite Series angler to fish every tournament. I have to set the Cal Ripken benchmark. I can tell you this year, if something happens, they might have to put me on a stretcher and throw me on boat, and I’m just going to go and fish.”