Good god man.......
This is one of the most painful threads I've ever read, and 5 pages of it too.
After wasting 20 minutes of my life reading it I have to say something, better fisherman will catch more fish, period! Just look at steelheading, I truly believe 10% of the people catch 90% of the fish. While springer fishing may be a little easier, steelhead are damn easy to catch once you figure it out.
What does this mean... if those people that know how to catch springers are allowed to catch more fish, they will. The people that don't know how to catch them, well if does not matter if the limit is 1 or a million, they just luck into fish. I feel you are putting too much faith into the whole bite thing, I saw your posts, you limited all the time, I bet a ton of people out there wished they were in your boat that same day, they just could not get it right.

Ha... read that piece of crap I just wrote, just contributing to this painful thread. gotta go