Cooper
Hodges.
Cooper
Hodges.
Appalachian St.
"A four-year small-school mauler with a seventh-round price tag, Hodges has done what late picks must do — carve out a roster spot on toughness and special teams while the ceiling debate waits."Pre-draft read
Hodges was a four-year fixture at right tackle for Appalachian State, starting all 51 FBS games of his career without missing one. He wins with grip strength, a wide base and a finisher's temperament — a gritty, drive-your-feet-on-contact blocker who was the anchor of one of the Sun Belt's best lines and earned PFF third-team All-America honors as a senior with an 85.3 blocking grade.
The NFL projection always pointed inside. At 6-4, 305 with adequate-but-not-elite length and average foot quickness on the edge, his tackle tape did not translate to NFL pass sets against speed. Inside, the strengths travel: the hands, the leverage, the toughness in tight quarters. The question was whether his movement skills would hold up even at guard, where second-level climbs and pulls demand more range than his testing suggested.
Inside-zone or duo-based run scheme that keeps him in tight quarters as a positional blocker — pass sets must be short and protected
Year 1: practice-squad development with guard conversion; ceiling: interior swing reserve
Wide-zone or movement-heavy schemes that demand second-level range and pulling from their guards
Everything about the NFL case depended on the guard conversion sticking — and the knee never let it happen.
Hodges left Boone with one of the most decorated résumés in App State history — 51 consecutive starts at right tackle across four seasons, four All-Sun Belt selections (first team in 2021 and 2022, second team in 2019 and 2020) and PFF third-team All-America honors as a senior in 2022. He was the constant on lines that powered record-setting Mountaineer offenses, and his durability was flawless: he never missed a start in his FBS career.
The scouting case was straightforward and honest. The floor traits — experience, play strength, hand usage, competitive toughness — were NFL-caliber. The ceiling traits were not: average athleticism, adequate length and a tackle's body without a tackle's feet. Every projection slid him inside to guard, where his grit and technique could play and his range limitations would be hidden. That kind of projection — productive college tackle to conversion guard — is one of the oldest day-three bets in the draft.
The board priced him accordingly: a late-round, high-floor interior depth piece. Jacksonville, stacking offensive-line depth behind its young core, took him at 226 and announced him as a guard, betting that 51 games of Sun Belt starting experience would translate into a reliable interior reserve.
- 01
Iron man
Started all 51 FBS games of his career at right tackle, never missing a start across four seasons at App State.
- 02
Decorated producer
Four-time All-Sun Belt (first team 2021-22) and PFF third-team All-American with an 85.3 grade in 2022.
- 03
Grip and finish
Strong hands latch and control; drives his feet on contact and plays with a finisher's edge to the whistle.
- 04
Leverage and base
Plays with a naturally wide, powerful base that holds up against bull rushes in tight quarters.
- 05
Position flex
Four years of tackle tape with a guard's projection gives a staff two spots of emergency depth in one body.
- 01
Foot speed
Average lateral quickness and pass-set range; edge speed beat him in college and only gets faster.
- 02
Position conversion
Has never played guard in a game; every projection inside is theory, not tape.
- 03
Second-level range
Labors climbing to linebackers and pulling across the formation; best in a phone booth.
- 04
Level of competition
Sun Belt defensive fronts offered few NFL-caliber tests, leaving real projection risk.
| Yr | Team | G |
|---|---|---|
| 2018 | App State | — |
| 2019 | App State | — |
| 2020 | App State | — |
| 2021 | App State | — |
| 2022 | App State | — |
| Career | — | 51 |
Offensive linemen accumulate no box-score statistics. Career totals verified against App State's official athletics site: starts at right tackle in all 51 FBS appearances, 51 consecutive starts through the 2022 regular season. Per-season game splits are not published for linemen, so they are left blank rather than estimated.
A dash means the figure is not published by a source we trust — never a zero we invented.
Decorated college lineman who converted to guard and carved out a multi-year reserve role.
Gritty, strong-handed college tackle who became a quality NFL guard once moved inside.
Small-school tackle whose guard conversion never stuck beyond practice squads.
Everything above is the pre-draft evaluation. This section is what actually happened — updated year over year.
Hodges' NFL story was written by injuries more than evaluation. He spent his rookie 2023 season buried on Jacksonville's depth chart, appeared in nine games with one start across his Jaguars tenure, and then the knee gave out — he was waived with a failed physical in June 2025, landed on the physically-unable-to-perform list, and was not activated until January 2026.
Jacksonville waived him in April 2026, ending a three-year stint that produced nine appearances and one start. The honest retrospective: the profile was a high-floor reserve bet and the floor never got tested — the knee injuries removed any chance to find out whether the technique and toughness could beat the athletic limits at guard. For the 226th pick, nine games and one start is a miss, though the kind of miss that says more about luck than about the evaluation.