Vinny Simms Jr.’s largest ever blackfish sat at a healthy 6 pounds when Captain Rob Taylor of Newport Sportfishing Charters positioned the Reel E-Z over a piece of structure that Rob had found on his Humminbird Side-Imaging sonar while cast-netting menhaden back in the spring. As he filled the livewell with the lively striper candy, he marked the spot on his electronics, and added it to his rotation for the coming tautog season.

October 21 was his first day tog fishing the piece. The first couple fish hooked were uninspiring. Small sea bass. But the next was considerably larger. Simms, who’d never tangled with a tog more than a quarter the size of this one, followed the instructions of Captain Taylor, fighting the fish on spinning tackle with a locked-down drag. Despite the heavy pressure, the massive tog still bolted from the surface all the way back to the bottom well into the fight.

Eventually, the fish tired enough for Rob to secure the catch. On board, it measured 34 inches long (two inches longer than the previous state record caught with Captain Connor MacLeod in 2021), and an unofficial weight on a Boga Grip marked the fish at well over 20 pounds.

The official weigh-in happened in the early afternoon at Quaker Lane Bait and Tackle, where the certified scale there registered 22.33 pounds, beating the previous record by about 12 ounces.

Captain Taylor credits the willingness of Simms to react quickly during the fight and the sturdiness and abrasion-resistance of Seaguar fluorocarbon for making the catch possible.

Congrats to both Vinny and Captain Rob on a remarkable catch.