>>118 Yeah, I did look at that website. The webpage says that "would just as soon" means something along the lines of: "would rather do something," right? In that case, the phrase "they would just as soon catch fish" should not mean anything like "釣った魚をすぐに放流していただけだ" as you claim.
Your Japanese translation "釣った魚をすぐに放流していただけだ" presupposes that they actually did catch fish. But the website that you cited above clearly indicates that they just wanted to catch fish.
In consequence, the correct translation would be something along these lines: "むしろ、魚を釣って放流したいと思っていた."
