As flawed as it may be, the Maryland YOY index has been used as one of the prime stock assessment tools to manage the fishery for a long time. The data didn't lie in the mid to late 70s, when there were a series of very poor recruitment indices---under 2.0. That's why the fishery crashed in the early 80s. People started seeing a predominance of bigger fish in the late 70s, and very few schoolies in their usual haunts. Within 5 years, some people were lucky to catch 5 bass a year. The managers didn't put any meaningful catch restrictions in place when there was a chance to do something about it, during the period of very poor YOY indices. And in fact, ASMFC didn't even exist--there was no coastwide management authority, and individual states were unwilling to take action. Massachusetts's idea of "conservation" was replacing an unlimited bag/16" fork length reg with a 4 fish per day at 16" and unlimited 24" reg.
The moratorium and the 36" limit were put into place to protect a moderately successful year class. I think it was 1982's year class. That year's YOY index was around 8.0, as I recall. We started seeing bass come back in decent numbers by 1986/1987. By 1989, the YOY index jumped up to 26.0 or better, and that one year's YOY index was used as justification to lift the moratorium and lower size limits.
We've now had about 4 consecutive mediocre YOY indices from Maryland. If ASMFC is serious about a 40% across the board mortality reduction, that should keep us from the brink. I would hope that they would be pro-active about it, and not wait until a crisis happens. The striped bass recovery is one of the Feds' very few fisheries management success stories, and for political reasons alone, one would think that they'd not want to #^&#^&#^&#^& it up.
As far as the overall stock's health--at the bottom, in the early 80s, they estimated the coastwide biomass at 6 million fish. While we may be down from the estimated 50 million fish of a few years ago, the assessments that I've seen still place the overall biomass at over 30 million fish. There may be more to why we're not seeing as many inshore as we did in the recent past years--climate changes bringing warmer offshoots from the Gulf Stream into coastal waters, lack of bait, and so on. Every year you hear reports from tuna guys about how there are so damn many bass out in the EEZ that they can't avoid them.
But there is no doubt that we're on a downward cycle, and changes have to be made across the board. Reduction of the Mass commercial quota by 40% by reducing the quota from 1.1 million pounds to around 600,000 pounds, and amending the rec regs. If you want to keep the same commercial season, reduce the daily bag limit to 15 from 30, and eliminate the Sunday fishery. With this year's gas prices, it won't be worth leaving the dock on Sunday anyway. Either go with a slot limit, or raise the size limit to 34" for both recs and comms. And, one fish a day. 2 fish @ 28" was the worst thing that ever happened to the bass, IMO.