Ken writes:

That's a bunch of hooey. An experienced caster can take a fly rod
out back of the fly shop, cast it and fully evaluate it in five or
ten minutes ... or less.

if you had thrown in the caveats that:
1.Said caster could evaluate it fully with
the given line type and weight at hand
2. Said caster could evaluate the CASTING
(as opposed to fishing) qualities of the rod
and
3. casting quality is but a small portion of
the overall nature of a rod.
then, I might have agreed. That said, some rods take time for one to adjust to.
Some rods with limited casting ranges are great fishing tools for certain
intended purposes.
In the final analysis, the qualities of a flyrod are WAY more subtle that
casting qualities, and of such a personal nature I would hesitate to steer
anyone toward any given rod maker or especially specific models.
Tom
p.s. Just play with lots of rods, buy one or two and enjoy. If you don't like
the rod, that is why they created EBay....unload it, and try something else.