Jennifer Combs: East Texas Tornado

In nearly two decades of writing about professional bass fishing, I’ve learned that the wives are often better information sources than the anglers themselves. They can also be more opinionated and occasionally cliquish, which means that if you piss off the wrong one you are likely frozen out of the inner circle for life. Conversely, make the right friend or friends and you get all of the really juicy info before everyone else. 

In most cases, I get to know the husbands first, and then get introduced to the wives. In the case of three-time TTBC champion Keith Combs, I believe I interviewed him over the phone circa 2010, but didn’t actually meet him face to face until a few years later. Meanwhile, on a trip to Venice, Louisiana, to catch some redfish, my friend Scott Secules and I ended up staying at the same lodge with his wife Jennifer and her parents. Even though I eventually spent more time in the boat with Keith, I can say that I fished with her – or at least near her – first. In more recent years I’ve visited them in East Texas to fish and have stayed at their lovely home several times. When Keith and I went to Alaska in the summer of 2019, Hanna invited Jennifer to Mexico, and she traveled with us again in 2020.  

As one of the wives who is not on the road full-time, a lot of fishing fans probably don’t know much of Jennifer’s story. It’s a good one, and while they’re better together, even on her own she has a lot to say about the fishing life. Here’s her history, in her own words: 

HPFC: Did you fish before you met Keith?

COMBS: I grew up in a fishing family. My mom and dad fished a lot of couples tournaments. My brother fished a lot. My sister was the only one that didn’t. My parents scuba dived also, so we’d go out and go waterskiing or swimming and everybody else would want to go fishing, but we’d have to take her skiing before we could go fishing. They had my playpen in the bottom of the boat before I could even walk. That was on Belton Lake. We fished a lot for whatever – bass, perch, we did a lot of crappie fishing in the spring, pretty much everything. When I was about 12 or 13 I started fishing tournaments with my dad. My mom still jokes about it that when I got old enough to fish tournaments I kicked her out of the boat and she lost her spot.

HPFC: So how did Keith come into the picture?

COMBS: I grew up on Belton Lake, fishing tournaments there. Keith also cut his teeth fishing tournaments there. He started fishing a lot around middle school, and when he got into high school he was already dominating all of the local stuff. I can remember my parents would come home from a Wednesday night jackpot and they’d talk about this young kid, fishing out in the middle of the lake, and bringing in 10-pounders. He was like 16 or 17 years old and no one knew what he was doing. I was younger – there’s a five and a half year difference between us – so Keith didn’t know that I existed at that time, but we knew of each other later just from fishing against each other.

In 2005-2006, we were both fishing the now-defunct FLW Texas Tournament Trail. It was a pro-am deal and it was huge, 200 boat field. It was a really good trail and I fished it as a co-angler. We’d talk a little bit here and there but then in 2006 we actually drew out together at Texoma. That was the first time we had any meaningful conversation. That’s not how we started dating, but how we really met.

HPFC: Was he guiding or fishing for a living at that point?

COMBS: No, he was still working for Texas Hydraulics. By that time he’d worked his way up into a management position over quite a few people. He had a pretty good deal there. He’d worked it out so that he could work long hours four days a week and fish on the weekends. I had a crush on him for a long time. He didn’t know that. He didn’t know that I existed. When we fished together that day, if you know anything about Keith he’s all business when he’s fishing a tournament. After we fished together I figured he wasn’t too impressed by me or didn’t like me very much. It wasn’t until sometime later that he reached out to me and wanted to know if I wanted to go fishing. I had a boyfriend at the time – I failed to mention that – who also fished as a co-angler. He was not happy that I drew out with Keith Combs, so when Keith reached out to me a month or so later and asked me if I wanted to fish a Wednesday night jackpot on Stillhouse Lake, I wanted to, but I had to say no because my boyfriend wouldn’t like that very much. I thought that was probably my one chance and I didn’t hear from him for a while, but a couple of months later I lost the boyfriend and Keith and I went out a few times, hung out a few times. I really liked him, but he was getting ready to move to Del Rio. He was going to quit his job, move to Del Rio, and start fishing the FLW Tour. That’s five and a half hours from my house, so it wasn’t a very good way to start dating somebody. He moved, we went our separate ways, and I thought it wasn’t meant to be.

HPFC: So he’s in South Texas during the heyday of Amistad and Falcon. How do you end up reconnecting?

COMBS: He moved away, and we didn’t get in contact for a long time. I started seeing someone else and got into a serious relationship and Keith would contact me every six or eight months. It was always the same: “Have you been fishing?” That was his way of testing the waters, I guess. He did invite me to come down to Amistad. I had to decline because I was in a relationship. Years later, the end of 2010, that relationship ended, and that’s when Keith maybe realized that I was one he probably shouldn’t let get away. We started dating and we’ve been together ever since.

HPFC: So did you get to fish much in South Texas?

COMBS: Yeah, I got to go down and fish Amistad with him, but only one time, because just a few months later he ended up moving to East Texas. But that one day we had a really good day. I had about 25 pounds for my best five.

HPFC: So fast forward to the life of a wife of a touring pro. What are the best and worst things about it?

COMBS: My situation might be a little different than most. Because I was so passionate about bass fishing before I started dating Keith, in a way it’s like he’s fulfilling my dream, too. When I was a freshman in high school, in my ag class, at the beginning of the semester you had to fill something out about what you wanted to be – I put down that I wanted to be the first woman in the Bassmaster Classic. Obviously that didn’t happen but that was a dream of mine for a long time. The best thing is getting to watch someone you love achieve his dreams, and in a selfish way maybe achieve some of yours.

HPFC: And the worst thing?

COMBS: People think, “You’re married to a professional fisherman. You must get to fish all the time.” That is not a true statement. Before I moved to East Texas to live with Keith – we did long distance for over a year – I had free rein over my dad’s bass boat. I was at the lake every chance I got. During the spawn I would do everything in my power to get off work early, get home, get the boat and go to the lake. I don’t do that now. We go fishing every once in a while. My parents come and visit and we go fish. But overall I’d say that I fish less than I ever did. He did build me my own 4-acre lake, so any time I complain about not being able to go fishing he says that he built me a lake.

HPFC: What’s the biggest fish you’ve caught out of your lake?

COMBS: Last year in March I caught an 11-pounder.

HPFC: So why would you ever want to go fish anywhere else?

COMBS: I’m greedy [laughs]. No, it’s because I live in Texas and I’m surrounded by some of the best bass fishing in the world. On days like today when it’s 70 degrees and sunny and light winds there’s nowhere I’d rather be than on the lake somewhere.

HPFC: Why should someone make East Texas their next vacation spot?

COMBS: You’re surrounded by so many bass fishing opportunities. We live on Rayburn, which has been ranked number one on Bassmaster’s “Top 100” list. It’s one of the greatest lakes in the country, but we have so many other great lakes, too. We’re an hour from Toledo Bend, two and a half hours from Lake Fork, two hours from Lake Conroe. We’ve got some great smaller lakes that are within 30 minutes or an hour. It’s the greatest place.

HPFC: Are there lakes within Texas that you haven’t fished that you still want to visit?

COMBS: I’ve been to most of the really good ones, but I haven’t always been their best times, so I would like to revisit some of those fisheries, like O.H. Ivie, that’s the hot ticket right now. I’ve been there two times and I think in those trips combined I may have caught five fish, and certainly nowhere near the teeners that they’re catching now.

HPFC: In addition to fishing around home, I know you also pre-practice with Keith sometimes. Where have you been with him?

COMBS: You asked earlier about the best things about being married to a pro fisherman, and one of those is the opportunities that I get. I know that I’m fortunate to be able to travel to some of the greatest lakes in the country. Falcon in its heyday was unlike anything you could imagine. When Keith would tell me stories about what was going on, before I ever got the chance to go, I really thought he was full of it. I would never have believed how incredible it was unless I got to experience it, and thankfully for two years I got to go there when it was just amazing. I’ve been to upstate New York – St. Lawrence River, Champlain. Those places are just gorgeous, the weather is awesome, and the fishing is amazing. Most southerners don’t get to experience smallmouths that much. We actually had smallmouths in Lake Belton growing up, so I have caught plenty of smallmouths in my lifetime, but it’s nothing compared to up north. Probably one of the most amazing smallmouth days I’ve ever experienced was when I went with Keith to Bay de Noc to pre-practice for the AOY Championship in 2014. The week that we were there we saw one other boat the entire time. Those fish were just untapped. I’ve never seen anything like it. We were burning spinnerbaits in a foot of water and you’d just see these giant black mambas coming. It was epic. They’d be right by the boat, you’d pitch your bait down there and they’d hammer it. It was like they’d never seen a bait before. Mille Lacs was another one. The first time they went there for the AOY Championship, we went up there to check it out and to pre-practice. That’s where I caught my personal best smallmouth, five pounds four ounces. That was incredible. Those fish are just so different than the ones down here. Down here they’re pressured so much and up north it’s amazing.

HPFC: Are there still other places you want to go or other species you want to catch?

COMBS: I probably can’t list all of the species because I want to catch everything. I don’t care what I’m catching. I just love fishing, period. I love perch fishing, bass fishing, saltwater. The species are endless. As far as destinations I’ve been fortunate to go to a lot of great ones in the United States, but there are plenty of others I haven’t been to. I want to go to Alaska, but Keith went there without me and now he says he won’t go again because he’s already been there and done that. I don’t know if I’ll ever check that one off the bucket list. Florida is one place that I have not been that I’d like to experience. When you hit it right j—whether it’s sight fishing or flipping – I would like to experience that one time.

HPFC: What do you like to eat in the boat?

COMBS: Honestly, when I’m fishing I’m usually not thinking about eating very much. We usually carry some almonds or peanut butter crackers, but when I’m out there I want to fish and not worry about food.

HPFC: When you get off the water, what do you like to eat? Where have you had great meals?

COMBS: I’m going to say NOT in South Dakota, because the people in South Dakota do not know how to season their food. While I enjoyed our time up there the food was definitely not a highlight. We had some good pizza and pasta in Upstate New York. Venice, too. I haven’t talked about Venice, my other favorite place.

HPFC: What do you like about it?

COMBS: Everything. If I could have a vacation home in Venice I would. It’s like you’re literally driving to the tip of the world. There’s nothing out there, maybe a couple of restaurants that are not open on Sundays – we learned that the hard way. Your phone doesn’t really work, but the fishing is epic. You never know what you’re going to catch. You can catch bass and sharks and tarpon or snapper, redfish, trout. It’s awesome. One day we stopped at a place, I don’t remember the name, and we had snapper. It was so fresh and so good. That was definitely one place that I remember. At Champlain we had a great steak for my birthday, and at Mille Lacs we had great walleye.

I also love Lake El Salto in Mexico. Mexico is a bass fisherman’s dream. You should have it on your bucket list. The fishing is incredible, but even if the fishing wasn’t that great the whole experience is awesome. Anglers Inn is top notch. They treat you like royalty. The food is great. The people are great and the fishing is just a bonus.

HPFC: What is one non-fishing item that you take on every fishing trip?

COMBS: I would have to say my cell phone because you have to have a camera. You never know what you’re going to catch or when you’re going to have to take a picture. That’s not a very exciting answer, but it’s true.

HPFC: Looking ahead in time, ten years into the future, what is your hope for what you’ll have accomplished by then?

COMBS: For myself, I would like to catch a ShareLunker, which is a bass over 13 pounds, and I would like to see Keith win AOY.