Gulf Champion Renegades Begin Journey to Cabo

A little over a week from spraying the champagne in Orange Beach, Alabama, the Gulf Division champion Third Coast Renegades are already making their way to Cabo San Lucas. The Zane Grey Championship Playoffs don’t start until approximately a month from now, but one pivotal member of their club is already traveling south of the border. 

At Port Everglades in Fort Lauderdale, FL Magnifico, The Renegades’ 60’ Spencer Sportfishing boat, was loaded onto a cargo ship through Cross Chartering Yacht Transport. A league sponsor in 2026, Cross Chartering Yacht Transport is the official yacht transport company of SFC and offered their services to the four clubs that have qualified to contend for the title. SFC Insider was given permission to board the ship and watch as Magnifico was loaded. Called a “LoLo,” short load-on and load-off, means the cargo ship is equipped with its own cranes that can load and unload its own cargo. Departing this week, the ship will eventually traverse the Panama Canal and arrive in San Jose del Cabo in the next several weeks. 

Just before the boat was lifted, I found three of the Renegades’ crew: Captain Drake Sawyer, and mates Justin “Sparky” Delassus and Drake Beasley leaving with a smaller boat bringing them back to shore. For the Renegades, this is a journey they know well, as they visit the Baja every Fall/Winter season for charters to Mag Bay and to compete in the Bisbee’s tournaments. As seasonal Cabo residents, the boat is no stranger to the Zane Grey Championship Playoffs. Frazier and the crew of Magnifico competed in 2024’s edition, the last of SFC’s Open era of competition partnering with Jaselyn and Toby Berthelot of Rising Sons. Last year, they competed alongside their former Third Coast Renegades’ roster finishing in second place. 2026 is their first year of full-time SFC competition and look to be the first to sweep the division title and league title. 

Last season, Atlantic Division Champion Lights Out Boston Angling Club shipped its 62’ Viking to Cabo San Lucas for the 2025 Zane Grey Championship Playoffs. The club elected to keep the boat in the region for the winter before returning to the United States under its own power ahead of the 2026 SFC season, competing in several tournaments along the way.

The 2026 Zane Grey Championship Playoffs return to Cabo San Lucas for the third consecutive year on October 17-18. The two-day postseason tournament will bring together the Atlantic Division Champion New Jersey Sea Birds, runner-up South Florida Sails, and the Gulf Division Champion Third Coast Renegades and runner-up Gulf Coast Cowboys with the winning angling club taking the league championship.