KANSAS CITY, Mo.—Jack Rudnay has no trouble tracing the roots that led to a lifetime as an avid fisherman.

“When I was growing up, we were so poor that I didn’t have toys,” said Rudnay, 61, who was a four-time Pro Bowl center for the Kansas City Chiefs. “I would play in the outdoors.

“I remember digging up my own worms, going down to the creek and catching big suckers. I thought that was the greatest thing in the world.

“Even at that age, the outdoors was my temple.”

Not much has changed. Throughout his playing days with the Chiefs, from 1970 to ’82, Rudnay remained passionate about his fishing and hunting. And he remains that way today.

He lives far off the beaten track in central Missouri, in a home that overlooks his private lake. He wakes up in the morning to see bass swirling in the shallows—a longtime dream.

“To live out here and have bass in your pond and turkeys and deer in the woods, that’s always been my dream,” he said. “I’m very fortunate to have all of this.”

Rudnay grew up in Ohio, fishing and hunting whenever his football schedule would allow. He starred at Northwestern and was taken by the Chiefs in the 1969 draft.

Not long after he arrived in Kansas City, he became friends with punter Jerrel Wilson, who also was an avid fisherman. It wasn’t long before the two were fishing together whenever they could break free.

“On my days off, I’d always be out fishing,” Rudnay said. “That was my way to recharge. During the offseason, I’d stay down at Stockton Lake. I fished almost every day and I learned a lot.”

Rudnay eventually became a guide at Stockton and still remembers some of the trips in which he helped people catch bass. But it was a trip with teammate Ed Podolak that sticks out.

“I took [Ed] out bass fishing for the first time, and it was one of those days when the fish were really hitting,” Rudnay said. “Well, Ed cast his topwater lure over a tree branch, twitched it a little and a bass came up and took it.

“He set the hook, and he started reeling, but the fish was up in the air. He turned to me and said, ‘Now what?’

“I told him to just open the lid on the live well. I took the boat over to where the fish was hanging, cut the line and the bass fell right in the live well.”