Yeah, Tony, I remember those Mudflats days. I lost a corker there one night too, around 1987-88. Never even slowed it down before she hung me around a lobster pot. The other memorable fish I never saw was whatever that freight train was I hooked up with at Montauk in Sept 2000---the one that ran off 150 yards of 50# braid without ever slowing down---but I'm pretty sure that one was a shark or a tuna, not a bass.
OK lures only---let's see:
40# on the nose, white 3 oz smiling bill jig w/red rind, Wasque Point 1993. Tony----you shoulda been there
The only Lepers that ever joined me out there in the wee hours were Brad and Roland. Brad almost got spooled one night out there too before he busted the fish off. Roland got a nice 25#
Plenty of 35-40 on jigs from that spot.
29# in the Canal on one of Brad's first Hawg polarises---the one he made special for me, loaded up then shot with styrofoam so it would still float--July 1992 at Aptuxet, fishing with Tommy McCauley and Lefty Marchand. May they rest in peace. Can't remember too many +/- 30# or better fish I took on plugs. Everything over 35# I ever caught came on either eels or jigs.