VYPE: What year are you? What sports and what activities are you involved with?
Cooper Moses: I am a junior. I am on the WHS football team, wrestling team, track team, and the bass fishing team. I am fishing partners with my cousin, Ty, and my Papa is our captain.
VYPE: How long have you been fishing? How did you get into it?
CM: I have been fishing for my whole life but didn’t really care for it until I tried one of the bass fishing tournaments out, now it’s one of my favorite things to do in my free time on a nice sunny day.
VYPE: What’s your best catch? Where were you and when did it happen?
CM: I caught a 7lb bass at a local pond. When we fished Lake Ellsworth in 2022 in a tournament, I caught a 4.57 largemouth bass and won the Big Bass award.
VYPE: What’s something most people don’t understand about fishing?
CM: It takes dedication and patience. Not a lot of people can sit on a boat for 8 hours at a time for 3 days straight in all sorts of weather. You have to wait out the frustration of not finding the fish and know that eventually it is going to happen. It is also very aggravating when all the time I have put in to be the best I can, somebody else pulls up with a five thousand dollar machine and pulls fish in.
VYPE: What other hobbies do you have?
CM: I love playing football, there’s nothing like Friday Night Lights. I love wrestling and lifting weights. I like to run to clear my mind.
VYPE: What’s unique about growing up in a community like Weatherford?
CM: A lot of people in small towns or cities say that everybody knows everybody, but it’s a different town from when I was in grade school, there are people in my own school that I don’t know. I live close to all of my grandparents and it is very interesting to see the small town of Weatherford grow over time into the town it is today.
VYPE: Talk about a time you’ve faced a challenge in sports or life. How were you able to overcome it?
CM: I had a shoulder injury this last year that took my junior wrestling and some of my track season away from me. I went with the teams and helped out however I could from moral support to taping injuries and sprains.
VYPE: What’s your best advice to a young athlete or fisherman?
CM: Keep your head down in success and keep your head up during failure. There is no winning without failure and learning. Even if the road is tough, everything will be alright in the end, and if it’s not alright, it’s not the end.
VYPE: What are your plans after high school?
CM: I haven’t really had a firm plan for after school. I do have some interest in medical school for orthopedics, but honestly, I am at a crossroads because I don’t know if that life is for me.
VYPE: Where do you see yourself in five years?
CM: I see myself in a boat casting some line in five years either screaming at a screen for football or wrestling. I see myself finally settling in on a career path and having a good plan for the future and what it holds for me and my friends and family.
