The Illinois Department of Natural Resources, Tribune outdoors columnist John Husar, and city officials had worked diligently for years to recruit the Bassmaster Classic as a showcase for the ecological comeback of Lake Michigan in the decades following the 1972 Clean Water Act. Pro fishing is a sport followed mostly in the South, but in 2000, its biggest event came here. With, however, consolations: “You can say what you want about different places,” Kevin VanDam, one of the sport’s superstars enthused afterward, “but the best pizza there is is in Chicago.” But competitors in the tournament 21 years ago faced novel terrors: kids lining up on the shore to zing rocks at their heads, deafening noises from a waterfront metal-scrapping operation, container ships bearing down on them, and a persistent fear of boat-jacking. Contenders in the Bassmaster Classic, frequently referred to as the Super Bowl of fishing, have many things to fear during the annual three-day tournament: a fish slipping the hook, a bass dying before the weigh-in (dead specimens draw a four-ounce penalty), the dreaded “goose,” as in a goose egg - catching no fish at all.