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It’s the end of another long Bassmaster Elite Series tournament day, and what appears to be a retired and discarded hook that lost a fight with a pair of needle nose pliers lays on the floor of Greg Hackney’s boat.
“Oh, no, it’s fine, I bend all of them that way on purpose,” Hackney is quick to explain. “I bend them off-center like that anytime I’m rigging a wide-gap hook into a Senko-style bait, a Caffeine Shad, or a soft plastic minnow type lure.”
“My theory is that because that hook point is bent out, and off-center from the eye, it’s bound to catch some portion of the bass’s mouth when I jerk,” said the Quantum pro.
“I mean if you think about it … when that point is perfectly in line with the eye, and you jerk, there’s a good chance that the hook point is going to bury straight into the lure and never hook the fish. You know what I’m sayin’?” asked Hackney, looking for a head nod to a question he already felt confident he had the answer to.
How do you argue with a guy who has made well north of 2-million bucks as a pro angler? And perhaps more admirably, is still trying to be better at his craft.
Hackney’s purposeful mangling of a perfectly good 75-cent hook is totally understandable in his quest to add a few more hundred thousand bucks to the more than two million he’s won so far.
“I wanna do better than I’m doing,” said Hackney in a moment of heartfelt confession. An awkward moment actually, considering it was coming from a guy who has qualified for 10 straight Bassmaster Classics.
“No, really, “ said Hackney. “I mean … I’ve had a great career, but I just feel like I should be doing a lot better.” “I’m even trying to eat better. Eat more protein, eat more vegetables, and eat more regularly during tournament days from the package of food that Ken Hoover (sports nutritionist) packs for me.”
Most of all … he strives to be better tomorrow than he was the day before. “Heck, I haven’t eaten a french fry in days,” grinned Hackney in conclusion, as he bent another wide-gap hook point slightly sideways with his pliers.
Amid a fishing trip on the bass-starved Ohio River in the summer of 1987, Alan McGuckin’s Dad told a then 16-year-old “Guck” — “I don’t care what you do for a living, just promise me you’ll do something you love.”
Originally from Pittsburgh, McGuckin considers himself a blue-collar kid, who has been richly blessed to live-out the best piece of advice his dad ever gave him for many years now in the Tulsa area.
After earning a degree in ecology at Juniata College in Pennsylvania, where he placed radio transmitters in largemouth bass to track their habitat preferences, he moved his life to Oklahoma in 1992, where he earned a Masters in Zoology and Fisheries under the direction of Gene Gilliland at the University of Oklahoma, before then embarking on what’s now a nearly three decade long career as a marketing and media veteran in the fishing industry.
His career spans 28 years of wisdom-rich marketing experience working to strengthen brands and increase sales for Lowrance, Terminator Lures, Toyota, Yamaha Outboards, Boat U.S., Carhartt, Costa, Quantum, Vexus Boats, and Zebco.
- Member of the Bass Fishing Hall of Fame voting committee, as well as a Board of Directors member for Keep the Tennessee River Beautiful
- Co-piloted the Terminator brand of premium lures from its birth to more than 10 Million pieces sold between 1997-2006.
- Has authored and published more than 800 stories on Bassmaster.com, along with several other popular bass fishing websites.
- He has generated $3 Million dollars’ worth of branded digital media since 2020, as a content creator.
- Serves as emcee for hundreds of guests at the annual Toyota Bonus Bucks Owners event.
- Avid angler, who fishes nearly every weekend when not on the road working.
- 13,000 followers on Instagram @GuckFishing.
“Guck” lives just north of Tulsa, OK at Lake Skiatook with wife Sherrie, an elementary school principal who also loves her job, and has a genuine passion for slinging a Rapala Brat crankbait on shallow points and habitat-laden flats.
