Southern Crappie Rods are a good lower price option they are also some very tough and very good rods for spider rigging. I would also recommend going ahead and buying the 14' to start. I started with 12' and would have saved alot of money if I had just bought 14' to start. You can look over on the personal adds on here and there are several folks selling rods right now. I dont think you would be going wrong with a BNM bjgp or pst either.