Hawkeye Conversations: Abdul Hodge

In this edition of Hawkeye Conversations, we catch up with one of the best linebackers of the Ferentz era, Abdul Hodge. We stroll down memory lane about his recruitment out of Florida and why he chose the Hawkeyes. Then we dive into his playing career, his relationships with Chad Greenway and Norm Parker and wrap up talking about his time in the NFL, his post football business career and now coaching linebackers at the University of South Dakota.

Q: What do you remember about your recruiting process like and how does a guy from Florida end up at Iowa?

HODGE: Back when I was in high school a lot of schools were recruiting south Florida. That included Iowa, who was trying to get guys out of my area.

They had gotten guys like Benny Sapp, George Lewis, Mo Brown, Fred Barr, and Colin Cole. I had known of Colin Cole and Fred Barr because when they were in high school they had a really great defense. We looked up to those guys and they ended up at Iowa, so it was a big deal and news in south Florida.

Then one of my high school teammates and good friends was Benny Sapp and he ended up at Iowa too.

So you go through the recruiting process and Bret Bielema was the linebacker coach at the time and he recruited the area. I actually bumped into him in my junior year when he was down recruiting Benny.

I wasn’t super highly recruited coming out of high school and one of my visits was to the University of Iowa. It was good and I enjoyed it. We get five visits, so I figured I could go to Auburn with David Walker, who was a good friend of mine and actually ended at Iowa eventually. So I looked at it like I will take the first two visits for fun and then use my last three to get serious about it. That was my plan.

So, I went to Auburn and enjoyed the game against Georgia. It was awesome. Then my next visit was to Iowa and remember, I am only going to Iowa, for the most part because of Benny. I really wanted to just go hang out and enjoy the recruiting process. As it turned out, I really ended up loving Iowa. It was more than I thought it was going to be. I met all the players and got to spend time with guys like Bob Sanders and Dallas Clark and they talked a lot about the young guys coming up in the program.

I sat down with Bret and I met Norm Parker and that was awesome. They told me how I could develop in their program. Then I sat down with Coach Doyle and that was probably one of the most influential meetings for me because at the time I was probably about 195 pounds. I sat down with him and he explained to me how he was going to develop me into a Big Ten linebacker was huge.

We were in the high school playoffs and we ended up losing and I was supposed to go to Wisconsin on my next visit. Coach Ferentz and Bret Bielema came down and met with me. I felt confident that Iowa was the place for me because I was able to see other guys from my area having a lot of success at Iowa and they were playing in a top conference. I trusted the staff that was there and the vision they had for me and I made the decision to commit to Iowa.

I tell that story because the first two visits were supposed to be feeling out the recruiting process and having fun with it and it worked out that I fell in love with Iowa.

Q: Did you ever have second thoughts about it since you had more visits to take or were you just done and felt totally comfortable with Iowa?

HODGE: You kind of get over it because the recruiting process is pretty long for high school kids. You talk to a lot of people on the phone and you get a lot of letters. More importantly, I felt at peace with the decision. The only thing I had to worry about was finishing up school. I think it really just eliminated a distraction because coaches were trying to get you on the phone all the time. A lot of times the more visits you make the more difficult the decision is because everyone recruiting you has a great story to tell. When I made the decision it was easy to stick with it because I knew what I wanted from my college experience. I always wanted to play at the next level and feel what it was like to play in the NFL and I wanted to go to Iowa that was the biggest school in the state, almost like an NFL team in the state of Iowa.

The guys at Iowa get treated really well and you get the feel and sense of what it is like at the highest level. I also had looked at the depth chart and saw the guys there and the guys that were coming in and more importantly I saw guys from Florida that were playing.

When I visited it was a great group of guys. We had Chad Greenway, Mike Follett, Brad Banks, a lot of guys who kept in touch after the visit. I was talking to Matt Roth after the visit. I think he might have committed first. It was him and Blake Larsen. They were All Americans in high school so I knew they were putting together a class that was pretty special.

Q: What’s Bret Bielema like as a recruiter? It had to be tough for Iowa to open up a pipeline in south Florida?

HODGE: It’s really about relationships and being able to connect with people and he did that. He also played the game at a high level at Iowa and you could tell he had a lot of pride in being a former Hawkeye player. He was passionate about bringing players to the school he played for.

That had a lot of influence on me and it was also important that he was going to be my position coach. A lot of other school, like Auburn, it was an offensive coach that was recruiting me, so I didn’t meet the linebacker coach until I got on campus for a visit. At Wisconsin it was the receivers coach recruiting me. Being recruited by my position coach was huge for me at the time.

I look at things the same way when I am now out recruiting. If the position coach isn’t reaching out and building the relationship, that’s something to think about in the recruiting process. I feel like you need to know the person who is going to be coaching you and how they are going to be coaching you. You have to have that bond before you got on to campus

Q: You have mentioned the guys from your home area made you feel comfortable with Iowa. Was that mainly Benny Sapp or was it also Colin Cole?

HODGE: It was 100% Benny Sapp. We went to the same middle school and had known each other for a long time. He was a really great football player and person. He had a good personality and was an influential person in my home area. He was a really big name back home, especially when he was younger and everyone knew about him.

We were teammates in high school at Boyd Anderson and we built a good relationship there. When you get an endorsement from people you feel good about it goes a long way. Plus, Benny played right away, so the opportunity to do that was huge for kids from our area. Guys from south Florida are willing to go anywhere for a great opportunity.

Q: On that visit you meet this country guy from South Dakota named Chad Greenway. Did you guys immediately hit it off?

HODGE: When you go out and hang out, you kind of start building a friendship. I remember Coach Bielema telling us both that we both needed to get to know each other.

I remember he was talking to me and Roth and he said, Abdul, that’s what a true middle linebacker looks like. (laugh) Roth was a true middle linebacker when he got to Iowa and Chad was more of an athlete/safety and I was more of a WILL linebacker. Roth was like 6-4 and 230-240 pounds. He was huge. We all got bigger and ended finding different positions.

I thought he did a great job of introducing us and kind of recruiting all of us together. He told us this was going to be a really great class that you would be playing with over the years. The chemistry was there right away for all of us and those guys were really taking the process pretty seriously and those were the guys you wanted to be with.

Q: In your first year, you ended up working on getting bigger and stronger. That meant a year with Coach Doyle and not playing in games. Was that tough for you?

HODGE: Not necessarily. The program was really tough, but we had great coaches in high school that kind of prepared me for college. I just came in with an open mind and trusted in the process that was laid out by Coach Bielema, Coach Doyle, and Coach Parker. They had your best interest at heart and you just had to dive in and go with it. I had seen them do it with Fred Barr and Colin Cole. You see what they are doing with Bob Sanders and Dallas Clark, who was a walk-on linebacker and the next thing you know he’s a star tight end. You see what they were doing with Robert Gallery, who came in as a tight end and ends up being a first round NFL pick.

You just have to trust their plan and you know it’s only a matter of time before you get on the field and contribute.

Q: When you came to Iowa, Coach Ferentz was still really building the program and the culture. Could you feel that right away when you arrived?

HODGE: They had a couple of big wins at the end of the year before I got to Iowa and those guys share those stories with you. They tell you, we are close and headed in the right direction. We knew there were some really good young players coming along and we knew our class was going to be really strong.

More importantly, I have always been a person who wanted to be a part of something special and something new, and leave a legacy. Not just jumping on a bandwagon and being a guy. I wanted to be a big fish, at least that was my mindset when I arrived. You also want to bet on yourself and be successful. Iowa had the resources to make that happen for all of us. They were developing their players and I knew from my own success, I was 195 pound WILL linebacker at the time and I knew strength and conditioning was going to be a big part of it for me. I had to trust the people at Iowa and that they were who they said they were and they did that. The story they told me when they were recruiting me was the same story I experienced when I got to Iowa and it’s not like that everywhere else.

Q: When you arrived on campus how quickly did you notice Bob Sanders running around out there and the different tone that he set on the practice field every day?

HODGE: (laugh) The minute you meet him. Bob Sanders the person, he would sweat through his nose. (laugh) He was really serious about the game and a hard work in every aspect of the game. He gave 110% and you see him flying around in practice and playing at a really high level that sort of stuff is just contagious on the football field.

Q: The 2002 season was your first year with the team. That had to be an amazing year for the program and for you being it was your first year, ending up in the Orange Bowl.

HODGE: With our 2001 class, all of the freshman except Matt Roth ended up redshirting. The following year, in 2002, we really wanted to contribute. We didn’t want to just be on the sidelines in uniform. We wanted to find a way to contribute.

The staff told us that if you wanted to get on the field that you had to prove it on special teams first. Being a competitor, if you give me the chance to run down the field and make a tackle, I’m going to do that. We really accepted our roles and there were a few other games like Purdue and Northwestern where we went into kind of the Raider package where I could contribute there too.

It was a really great experience for me on special teams that year and I felt like I was able to contribute to some really special wins. In one of the game, against Purdue, I was able to contribute with a blocked punt. I played on punt returns and we had one of the top units in the country.

It was a really great season and the depth of that team was really good. What really helped us that year as well was we practiced against that offense every day. That makes you better really quickly. We were going against Robert Gallery, Bruce Nelson, Dallas Clark, and Eric Steinbach every day in practice. That was awesome because we were competing against the best and I think that had a lot to do with our development when some of us became starters the following year.

Q: The 2003 season when you move into the starting lineup with Greenway, if felt like you guys were just ready to go at that point.

HODGE: First off, Chad was coming off the ACL, so getting him back was huge. He had to rehab and I think the medical staff and Coach Doyle did a great job getting him ready to be back out there.

After the 2001 year, Coach Bielema had left and Coach Norm Parker had taken over with the linebackers with Coach Wilson. Now we are in the meeting room with the defensive coordinator, so that allowed us to learn more. You are going to learn about more concepts and what guys are doing in front and behind you. It was really high level teaching.

So when we stepped into the starting lineup, we were ready not only physically, but we were ready mentally because we had a good understanding of the game thanks to Coach Parker. He was so good at teaching the fundamentals and he knew the game of football inside and out.

Q: In that 2003 season when you guys played Iowa State, they had beaten Iowa five years in a row. Did it feel like there was added importance to that game that year in Ames?

HODGE: Earlier that year I remember Jared Clauss got up in front of the team in a meeting before the season. He held up a newspaper that said how many years in a row we had lost to Iowa State. He was passionate about it and almost in tears talking about it. As a kid from Florida, I didn’t really know the history, but when he shared that story I knew it would be game time when we played them.

When you look at guys like Clauss and Gallery, the in-state guys, you know that game matters to them. So you just strap it up and go with them in something like that and that was our mindset going into that game.

I remember that game in Ames and that feeling after we won. It was a great feeling walking off with the trophy.

Q: The other game that year was the Outback Bowl, which had to be special for you to be back in Florida again and playing against Florida in that game. What do you remember about that win?

HODGE: When you grow up in the state of Florida, you look up to the big three schools there: Florida, Florida State, and Miami. It’s like in Iowa, you look up to Iowa and Iowa State as the big schools in the state.

Being able to play again in Florida and have all my family there at the game was huge. Then playing Florida, a school that you grew up watching and remembering guys like Fred Taylor there, it was huge. No matter who you are playing from the state of Florida, you know they are going to have talent and speed.

The thing I will always remember about that bowl prep is not going out one time. We pretty much stayed in and studied the game plan so we were prepared. I think all the guys took that approach. It was a long season, so what’s another ten days or whatever to study them and finish this off. I remember Ron Zook was the coach at the time and Chris Leak was the quarterback and he had taken a look at Iowa in recruiting. They also had a lot of dudes on that team, but we came in and played as a team. Special teams were huge for us in that game and then the next thing you know we are winning by a good amount. That was a really big team effort game and win.

Q: The 2004 season had to have been pretty amazing and the way that defense played most of the season was special given how much was going on offensively with injuries. What are your memories of that season?

HODGE: In 2004, Norm Parker didn’t come with us for the first few weeks. We had that bad loss at Arizona State.

I think that was the first time Norm wasn’t with us at Arizona State and it had a huge impact on us. We are so used to him being with us and we go into the locker room and he’s not there. That was tough night and they took it to us. I remember we had a team conversation after the game trying to process what just happened.

We just buried and moved forward. We put it behind us like it didn’t even happen and I think that important for us. Coach Ferentz got us together once we got back and basically buried the tape from that game. He told us that it was uncharacteristic of us and this is not where our program wants to go, so we are going to put this tape in the ground and we won’t even talk about it again.

Then the way that game finished, we had some great battles that year. The Wisconsin game at the end of the season, they were a top ten team and the winner would get a share of the Big Ten title. I thought they came in riding a little bit of a high horse and they had some highly decorated players on their team, especially on the defensive line. We end up winning that game and getting a Big Ten title at home. It was a great day for guys like Jonathon Babineaux and Derrick Robinson. That game was won in the trenches and it was great for the seniors. It’s pretty amazing that we went from being embarrassed at Arizona State to winning a share of a Big Ten title at home, especially given the adversity.

Q: Do you remember Coach Doyle putting the toilet in the weight room after ASU?

HODGE: (laugh) Yes, that was true. I always look back at that and those things all made a huge difference. If you are going to win a Big Ten Championship, you have to have strong leadership and guys who really believe in each other and trust each other.

Q: That season ends with the Cap One Bowl in Orlando against LSU. I think you had a million tackles in that game. Do you remember where you were when Drew Tate throws that ball up in the air?

HODGE: (laugh) Here’s the deal, that year we played a loaded LSU team. You have Saban coaching that team. The quarterbacks, I mean you have Matt Flynn and Jamarcus Russell. You have one of the Landry’s there with Marcus Spears on defense. I mean I could go on and on. They had Corey Webster too. I think they had six or seven first round picks.

Even walking around and seeing those guys and interacting with them at different events, you could tell they didn’t give us any chance. We felt great about or prep and we knew we had the guys up front, especially on the defensive line. We had Lubke, Roth, Babineaux, and Robinson up front and you have Follett rotating in, you know you have a chance. We still didn’t have many players at running back, but we had Sam Brownlee, a walk-on guy who jumped in and gave a great effort. That was our next man in mentality.

We had some guys. Tate really led us and he had a great attitude and had great guys to throw to like Clinton Solomon and Ed Hinkel. Then in that game, Warren Holloway. A couple of things about Warren. I never saw him once complain about not playing. I also never saw him give anything but 100% in everything he did. Even in practice if he got 1 rep or 50 reps, he’s going to go all out in every single one of those reps.

We ended up getting up on LSU and then they put in Jamarcus Russell. He brings them back by making some big throws and runs. We got the ball back and had a decent return on the kickoff and then the play was called and Tate dropped back and put it in the air and we didn’t know what would happen. Then the next thing you know he ends up scoring. It was a surreal moment that you don’t expect against that type of opponent. It was a huge win for us and for me it was another win in Florida, which was special.

One other thing, that was special for Coach Parker because of everything he had gone through that year. We wanted to have his back and play for him and win for him that season.

Q: You had some of your best games in those last two bowl games in Florida. I think you had 16 in that Cap One Bowl and then 18 the next year in the Outback Bowl against Florida. Was that a case where you elevated a bit?

HODGE: (laugh) Yeah a little bit. I always really got extra focused for bowl games. I always used that time when I was preparing to just focus on that game because we didn’t have school. I never went out and just focused on the game plan. We always stayed in a nice hotel and they were really comfortable places, so it wasn’t just me, but a lot of guys, who would spend our time studying the game plan.

For me, there were never really a lot of distractions at a bowl game. You really almost feel like you are a pro because there was no school and you could just study your opponent and it was an advantage for us.

Q: Are you still as mad as Greenway is about the second Outback Bowl and him being called off-sides on the kickoff at the end of the game?

HODGE: Heck yeah. (laugh) Clearly we should have gotten the ball, but it shouldn’t have come down to that. That game was uncharacteristic of who we were at the time. We gave up a blocked punt in that game, so that put the odds against us. Any time you give up plays like that or have turnovers, the odds are not in your favor. In other games like that we would block a punt, like the previous Outback Bowl. Another play in that game, we had a huge stop on the third down and the sideline was going crazy and then the next thing you know they ran a fake. That game was just uncharacteristic for us.

Q: I also wanted to ask you about Norm Parker a little bit more. That year you guys had the Normism shirts made and were wearing them at the bowl game at practice. Do you still have that shirt and what did Norm mean to you?

HODGE: (laugh) I still have that shirt. It’s still down in Florida.

I talk to guys now that I am coaching in South Dakota about how similar our DC is here and Norm. I talk about Coach Parker all the time and about what a great person he was in my life. He was a great guy and a master of the game. No one knew more about the game than Coach Parker. The most important thing about him is that he used football as a vehicle to teach you about life. He would teach you life lessons about how to treat people and how to go about your business. The biggest impact he had on me was that it wasn’t just about football. He loved football, but he loved to help you in your life. He always kept everything in perspective and reminded us that we were really blessed to be in the position we were in. He would always tell me, Abdul, make sure you go sign autographs for the kids because one day you will wish that someone would ask you for an autograph. He reminded us to never take things for granted in life and to treat people well. Even after I was done playing I was in communication with him all the time asking how I was doing and check in on me.

Q: You get drafted and played in the NFL and then you did some work in the computer and web development industry and now you are in coaching. What made you want to get into coaching?

HODGE: My experience in the NFL had its ups and downs. I had been playing football since I was 8 years old. It was football, basketball, and track for me for many years. I loved the game and wanted to keep getting better from high school to college to the NFL.

I got drafted by Green Bay and I go there and had some injuries and it didn’t allow me to be myself and that took a toll on me. It’s hard when you can’t be yourself on the field and it does something to you. Even with that adversity, I was really blessed to be part of three NFL teams and play for five years. I look back now and I think it was all part of my path to where I am now.

I went to the Packers and going up against guys like Brett Favre and Aaron Rogers every day in practice. I was there for two years and met a lot of great people there and I am still close to guys like Greg Jennings from that team. Then I end up with Bengals after that and Jeff Fitzgerald was the linebackers coach and Darren Simmons was the special teams coach. They are two of the best coaches that I have been with in terms of teaching the game. I learned a lot there and I grew. Mike Zimmer was the defensive coordinator there at the time. At Iowa, we didn’t do a whole lot of fancy stuff, so that allowed us to play fast and play smart and kept plays in front of us. Zimmer brought multiple fronts and a ton of blitzes. Norm would say, no blitzes on his watch. He would say save those for the next guy. (laugh) Zimmer’s defense required a lot from the linebackers and it taught we a lot and it put me out of my comfort zone, which was great.

I thought I played well on special teams for Cincinnati, especially in 2009 and we made the playoffs. Then I finished up at Carolina and I felt like I had some diversity to my playing career. I had also had some adversity because I hadn’t had a ton of injuries until the NFL.

When I got done after being in Carolina, I wanted to take some time off. I wanted to understand more about me as a person and really develop something outside of football. I always wanted to be an entrepreneur so I got into the web design space. It was fun and I learned now things, but it still wasn’t the same feel to it. It didn’t have the same feeling that you would have in the locker room.

So I end up doing kind of an internship with Tennessee and I am in there with Dean Peas and we are sharing stories about Coach Parker. Then I was pursuing an opportunity in coaching and Coach Ferentz gave me a letter of recommendation and Coach Doyle did the same thing.

I then reached out to Jon McLaughlin, who was an offensive GA at Iowa when I was there and he knew Coach Nielsen had some opening at South Dakota and passed my name along and he had some connections to Iowa. Everyone kind of helped me out and then the next thing I know I am in South Dakota teaching outside linebackers.

Timing wise it was perfect. My wife was finishing up her masters and my daughter was finishing up high school, so that was big for me. I knew I wanted to pursue coaching and she finished up her senior year playing softball and now she’s at Bethune Cookman, so the timing was perfect.

I think I have been able to pull from all of my experiences along the way at Iowa and in the NFL and really teach from it. I think it was important for me to take that time away from football and learn who I was as a person and that was important. I think it helped me come to grips with who I am as an individual and not just as a football player. I will say this, not playing football was almost like losing a loved one because it was such a big part of my life. You have to deal with that and it can be tough, but I had to do that and spend time developing that new identity and spending time with my wife and my daughter and son. It was really important to me to develop something on the business side outside of football as well. One thing I wanted to make sure of is to be able to say that if football was taken away, I could still able to provide for my family. I was blessed to play five years and I invested it into creating something else and support my family. Now that I coach it’s fun for me. I am not coaching to pay bills. It allows me to do this job where I am at peace and I am having fun with it. I am able to do this with a great group of coaches and a great defensive coordinator. I am just blessed to be in a great situation.

Q: Did you find it funny at all that you end up in South Dakota?

HODGE: (laugh) Very funny. If you would have told me that I would be coaching football in South Dakota, there’s no amount of money that you could have bet on that. (laugh) My brother had played in South Dakota at the NAIA level and Greenway is from here, obviously. I had been here a few times, but I had never been here before. I had talked to Jon McLaughlin and Reese Morgan and they had great things to say about Coach Nielsen, but the first thing I did was pull up their web site. Being in that business for a while, I noticed they had a really nice web site. (laugh) My perception came from the web site and what I learned in marketing was perception is reality. It was a nice web site and looking at the roster, I was passionate about south Florida football players because I was once one of those guys. There are a lot of great kids down there just looking for an opportunity to come to a place like Iowa or South Dakota to play football. I looked at the roster to see if they had any players from Florida, which was the same thing I did when I was looking for a college. Their depth chart had guys from Florida and felt good about that. I had connections down there and relationships from coaching high school down there and that would help me in recruiting.

At the end of the day I think Greenway just put some voodoo on me or something and just wanted me to get closer to his home area. It’s been great. I love the Midwest and sports around here. People take so much pride in their college programs and I have been blessed to be part of the University of Iowa, to play for the Green Bay Packers, and now coaching at the University of South Dakota. I feel like I am one of the luckiest guys in the world to be at a place that has such great community support, like I experienced at the University of Iowa.