LookBack #6…8/2007:
The Billionaire Bass Club
After Inside the Outside #5 it seems that ESPN is digging this stuff.
“So what’s next,” one of my several thousand bosses asked.
“Um.”
“Need something big we do, BIG.”
“I know the guy who owns the Buffalo Bisons and he fishes and makes creme puffs and wicked cheesecake and is a billionaire.”
“Perfect great go….”
“To Buffalo?”
“Yep…and bring back some damn cheesecake.”
…and so that was all it took to go inside the Outside once again…
…for Bass & cheesecake with a billionaire. Can’t make this stuff up.
“Keep it real and stay in awe.”
“Many men go fishing all of their lives without knowing that it is not fish they are after”
Meet Bob or as he prefers to call himself…
…The Crown Prince of Cream Puffs.
Bob Rich is the “Rich” of “Rich Products” which makes the above mentioned Creme Puffs, cheesecake to die for. ice cream, cheesecake, a bunch of other stuff, and cheesecake.
He also owns, wait, best to let their PR guy explain: “Bob Rich also, the Buffalo Baseball Hall of Fame, the Buffalo Sabres Hall of Fame, the Greater Buffalo Sports Hall of Fame and the National Baseball Congress Hall of Fame. In 1999, he became the second angler ever to be inducted into the South Florida Fishing Hall of Fame. He serves as President and CEO of Bison Baseball Inc., Northwest Arkansas Baseball Inc., and Morgantown Baseball Inc. He is also the past Commissioner of the National Baseball Congress, an organization of amateur and semi-pro baseball leagues operating in the U.S. and Canada.”
Pretty wordy PR stuff…but take this from me, to me, he’s just…”Bubba.”
“db I’m changing your nickname, you are now sb...sb for skunked barone”
Turns out BR had been reading me, “You get skunked a lot, don’t catch much, do you.”
I keep telling myself…cheesecake…cheesecake…cheesecake…
On this day Lake Erie was being lake EERY even the parking lot lady thought we were crazy to go out fishing…
…I agreed with her, and yet, AND YET…
…we still launched.
Yep…we did…cheesecake…cheesecake…cheesecake…
Bob has his own boat guy who takes him out, dude’s name is Jim Hanley, another bud and buffalo guy so…
…I trust his instincts, you know, sort of…cheesecake…cheesecake…cheesecake…
So okay, Bubba here has a lot of money (and desserts) and can be all cEO’d up but…
…if you really want to know the true dude, put a fishing rod and reel in his hand and…
…some water under his arse and it turns out he’s an ANGLER at heart, he may love all the stuff he does and owns but fishing is his LOVE other than family…
…and possibly cream puffs.
And then we suddenly look up and around us…uh oh!
So we pull in the lines and head back only to run smack into a pretty big thunder storm with a bunch of lightning to which we duck for cover under A BIG OLD COMPLETELY IRON BRIDGE of which none of us in the boat knew if that was a bad idea or not…but we did a bunch of wide eyed lookin’ at each other wonderin’ though.
Once the storm passed without anyone in the boat passing on we headed back to dock but…
…as we did we idled past this urban dock, not sure if the people in the boat knew why I took so many photos of it…but…I did so because this is the very dock, without the words painted, that as a small child I went “fishing” with my Grandfather, Clay. I was glad it was raining then, those were only raindrops on my cheeks if anyone noticed.
Here’s the deal, this Bob Rich guy can fish, loves to fish, a true sportsman…
…so look past the bucks and check him out, I’m not saying that because we are friends but because he’s the real deal with family and fishing.
Once the story was done but before heading out of town HAD to stop and get one…
…possibly three Buffalo famous Beef on Weck…then jump on the thruway headed East, radar-detector on high facing a story deadline, and, um, you know…several cheesecakes in the back seat!!!
Click here to read the original Billionaire Bass Club story on the mothership that is ESPN
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