This is similar to what room-clearing teams use. Safety is foremost. Enter an area slowly. If on a boat, sit back for at least 20 minutes if unfamiliar with surf patterns at a spot. Leave the engine running. If fishing from the shore, watch the surf for a while before fishing and never turn your back to the waves. Many rocks may not hold any bass and some only hold them on certain sides. Find this out by 'slicing the pie'. Just as tactical assault teams gradually work around corners in a building, cast to an edge of a rock and on subsequent casts, slowly move your boat around it so you can cover different angles of the same spot until you know it's 'clear' (this almost always requires a trolling motor for boat positioning). If on shore, move to new positions while casting to the same rock. Many times, anglers make only one or two casts to a rock and leave the spot thinking there's no fish there, when in fact, the bass never even saw their lures. Cover all the angles.
Make short casts. Gradually fish your way into a spot. This gives you a better chance of landing a big bass lurking in nasty rocks. Too long a cast, and a hooked fish can go downward or sideways into the rocks because you have no line control or leverage. I have lost some big ones before I figured this out.
