No offense, and no, it doesn't make THAT much difference really. Depends on what lures you are using, how you like to work them etc etc.

Yeah see thats totally different to what i was told by certain members of the "trade"! One went so far as to tell me i had wasted my money and that i needed to buy a 10000(same retrrival rate) and i waste wasteing my time till i got another reel! I know these guys need to make money, but it wasn,t even what i'd asked them about! I know a 20000 is heavy weight, but my out fit has the same balence as my salmon rod an reel(diawa firewolf/banax iso 5000), like you said Capt'n, its how you use it, not how big it is! Though mines as big as they get!

Here is my two cents worth, it all comes down to what you are doing, if you are popping there is no real need to get to fussy with your line rates and so on, it just comes down to the weight of the reel and what you are happy with and if you dont mind the bigger reels, with stick baiting IMO the line rate is key, swimming lures with slower reels means you have to work quite a bit harder to get the correct action to get a fish to bite, IMO the stella 10k is the ultimate top water reel be to popping or stick baiting, it light, has loads of drag and a quick line rate  

u sure do reed and right good for a southisander did u go to skool in the nortiland?