Curtis Hodges has scruffy black hair and a trimmed beard the same dark shade of his hair. He has thin legs that look like they’ll never end and hands that have most definitely palmed a basketball. Curtis Hodges is also 6-foot-8.
Walking through the Arizona State locker room, there is no one taller than the ASU tight end. If he were to walk into the Sun Devils men’s basketball locker room, only four players would rise up more than his 80-inch frame. On the football field, on ASU’s Tempe campus, it would be a rarity if he didn’t look down at someone.
Everyone seems to understand Hodges’ height. Sometimes, though, he needs to remind himself of it.
“I always tell myself, ‘I’m too big, I’m too strong,’” he said. “I just have to make sure mentally I know that I’m always bigger and I have to dominate when I’m out there. It’s not about them, it’s about me.
Problem is, Hodges has only caught four passes this season. As a whole, the ASU main trio of tight ends -- Hodges, senior Tommy Hudson and freshman Nolan Matthews -- have only hauled in six passes for 63 yards and no touchdowns.
When the Sun Devils signed Matthews -- a 6-foot-5, 243-pound, three-star tight end from Texas -- in December and moved Hodges from the receivers room after last season, it seemed like the Devils were signaling the rebirth of productive and successful tight ends in Tempe.
In July, ESPN put together rankings for which school produced the most talent every position, placing ASU’s crop of tight ends -- which, most notably, includes, Todd Heap and Zach Miller, No. 8 all-time. Since then, ASU quarterback Jayden Daniels has only thrown at his tight ends nine times in 140 pass attempts.
“I’d like for it to increase (targets to tight ends),” offensive coordinator Rob Likens said. “It’s one of the things we looked at in the bye week was tight end production, how we can get more tight end production, what we can do?”
Hudson, a redshirt senior who has caught just 16 passes in his collegiate career called the situation with ASU’s tight ends in its offense “a weird dynamic.” The Sun Devil tight ends are all capable of being receiving threats and making plays.
And, though they haven’t done much of that this season, the Sun Devils are winning. Because of that, Hudson said, the tight ends continue to do their part -- whether that means catches or not.
“Same old thing,” he said. “We get an in-game plan stuff and we’re not pushing for the ball and being greedy.”
When asked about his group’s low reception total, tight ends coach Donnie Yantis echoed a sentiment shared to him many times by coach Herm Edwards. Selflessness over selfishness. Yantis knows the size of the trio in his room, and how that size presents problems for defenses.
Does he think they should probably have more catches? Sure. But, to him, that’s not everything. To illustrate that, he shared a story from ASU’s upset at Cal. Late in the game, Hudson had gotten a little banged up. He went over to the sideline and told his position coach to put Hodges in the game.
He knew ASU needed to most capable tight end in the game, OK with the thought, that in that moment, it wasn’t him.
After five weeks, Hudson, Hodges, and Yantis can agree on one thing: the tight ends have improvements to make. Hodges graded out the group at a B+. Yantis handed them a B-, saying the 80 percent grade also represented the Sun Devils’ winning percentage.
“We haven’t done anything spectacular,” Hudson said. “We haven’t been asked to do a whole lot, as much as last year. We’ve been kind of vanilla with what we’ve done as a tight end group.”
“When your time comes to make the play, make it. We could go make that game-winning touchdown. If it happens week one or week ten, it doesn’t matter the significance of that play is going to be the same. We just have to be ready.”
Last season, Hodges had that opportunity.
On the road against a then-undefeated Colorado team, Hodges lined up as a receiver on the outside. The Sun Devils were three yards away from the end zone. Down a touchdown early in the fourth, ASU decided to go for it on fourth down.
Quarterback Manny Wilkins quickly looked right and fired a high fade for a rarely-utilized lengthy receiver. Hodges lifted his 6-foot-8 frame in the air, trying to high point the ball over the Colorado corner on his hip. The ball fell to the ground and the Sun Devils went on to lose by a touchdown.
“I remember that play,” Hodges said. “That was definitely a play I should have made it and it’s mostly technique, but at the end of the day, you have to go up there and get it. Unfortunately, I didn’t do it that play but moving forward that’s the plan.”
Hodges wishes he had that one back -- maybe, too, that he had a little nudge before the play of someone reminding him of his size. In the coach’s booth that day in Colorado, Likens was definitely thinking about it.
Now Hodges is hoping it’s thought about moving forward, that he can string big catches together and garner the confidence in his hands and height that comes from being a highly-looked-at target.
“You don’t realize how much you can do and once you make a big catch you go, ‘Oh, this isn’t too bad. I can actually jump over these people,’” Hodges said.
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