I've belonged to bass tournament clubs in the past, the primary reason for joining - to fish tournaments. I now only belong to one club that weighs in various species but only one of two at a time: bass and panfish. I don't fish tournaments. It occurred to me in the last ten years that protecting fish should always be the rule whether immediate catch & release or after fish are weighed in. Those who run the tournaments ignore my suggestions and the facts about captive fish before release.
The problem as it concerns immediate release in tournaments is that anglers line up holding bags of fish to be weighed. Rarely do the leaky bags have enough water resulting in fish slime removal and stress on the respiratory system, possibly resulting in delayed mortality. I'm talking 5 or more guys lined up with up to a 15 min. delay before releasing fish. Rarely do anglers keep fish and dump them in the water - some floating dead. ("No big deal", they say; "more food for the turtles")
Seems to me that limits should be set so as to harm as few fish as possible. Instead of 30-40 panfish, have a limit of 6 fish per species, keeping the largest of each species for weigh in.
Allow only three anglers in the line at a time with the next angler getting ready to remove fish from the livewell to put into a bag.
Always drain livewells and leave lids open to dry. It goes without saying that enough water should always be in the livewell prior to fish being stored before weigh-in. I add fresh water at times as well as check aerator bubbles. (Excess water goes out the overfill pipe). The corpses of suffocated fish that were going to be releasee ain't pretty nor seeing those floating dead a day after the tournament.
Avoid fish flopping around on any dry coarse surface which removes the protective slime coat. Handling fish properly should be a priority.
Tournaments are fun if that's your thing, but the downside far too often is the negative effect on fish. The more tournament on a lake, the greater the toll. Maybe the above is overkill (pardon the expression), but I appreciate and I'm in awe of nature, from the beautiful colors of fish to fish that slam my lure on the surface to those that attack my lure many times on the
same retrieve. I feel fortunate every time a fish
donates (

) its time out of the water for my personal inspection.
Their existence should not be taken for granted.