I would be careful with the braided fishing for reds. If you do the flip and strip that most red fisherman do you will likely have the line tangled in the reel. I also think you will have problems with the braide doing wraps aroung your fingers and those reds will put a big hurt on you. I would suggest tapeing on a fly reel to your new rod.... Much easier to control. You only are fishing with about 20-30 feet of line and never need to reel in so the reel in the back of reel seat works the best. I use mono on a fly reel and it works pretty good but I think fly line works good too. You do snag some sometimes and when you do they really rip off the line so if you have the braided around anything.......lookout!!!!