Snap decision: Hollidaysburg native’s career blossoms after position switch
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In the summer of 2017, Hollidaysburg native Luke Rhodes took a gamble and made a career-changing decision.
The former Hollidaysburg Area High School and William and Mary College football linebacking standout, who was signed by the NFL's Indianapolis Colts in December 2016, made the switch to long snapper at the beginning of the Colts' 2017 training camp.
Prior to 2017, Rhodes had never played the long snapper position. Now, he is one of the NFL's best at the job.
In June 2019, the Colts rewarded Rhodes with a four-year, $4.85-milllion contract extension, making him the NFL's highest-paid long snapper. Rhodes was also selected as an alternate at the position for the 2020 Pro Bowl.
Rhodes, 28, who will accompany the Colts into Pittsburgh for a 1 p.m. game with the Steelers Sunday at Heinz Field that is very important for both teams, accepted the challenge of learning the new position three years ago and ran with it.
"It was a great challenge -- something that I had never done before,'' Rhodes said in a recent telephone interview. "I was hesitant for a minute because, obviously, it was a career decision, and I knew that if I went for it, I couldn't go back.
"So that was kind of the risk that I assumed. I knew that whatever I was asked to do, I could figure out a way to get it done, and (the move has) really paid off for me.''
Rhodes made the adjustment by using the same indefatigable work ethic that enabled him to buck the odds from being an undrafted NFL free agent out of Division I FCS William & Mary to getting signed and released by the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in 2016, before being signed to the Colts' practice squad in October of 2016.
"I knew that I would be taking the hard road, as an undrafted player out of a small college,'' said the 6-foot-2, 238-pound Rhodes -- the son of Doug and Margaret Rhodes of Hollidaysburg. "But I knew that if I could just get my foot in the door, I could work hard enough to get to where I am, and it has definitely shown in the last couple of years that my hard work has paid off.
"I've kind of established myself among the snappers in the league,'' added Rhodes, who is married (wife Hannah) and a father (their son, Marshall, is 3 months old). "(The Colts) are doing well with our operations on punts and field goals, and my success is just a credit to all the people who have helped me and to the work that I've put in.''
A weight-room and workout warrior who has always been in top physical condition, Rhodes enlisted the help of a professional long-snapping coach after his first NFL season in 2017.
The long-snapping instructor, Kyle Stelter, owns and operates a company based in Eau Claire, Wis., known as Special Teams University. Stelter -- a former small-college and semi-pro football long snapper himself who once had a tryout with the New York Jets -- currently trains seven NFL long snappers, as well as more than 200 long snappers on college teams and many more high school long snappers.
Initially, Rhodes had been working with Stelter virtually via FaceTime videos, but during the last offseason, Rhodes made the trip to Wisconsin to work with Stelter face-to-face.
"He did really, really well,'' Stelter said. "He is an extremely hard worker who has gone from playing linebacker in high school and college and never having long-snapped, to being one of the top long snappers in the NFL, which is a really cool accomplishment.''
Rhodes' natural athletic ability helped him adjust to the long-snapping position, and it was only a matter of tweaking some minor things after that, Stelter said.
"I think he picked it up really quickly,'' Stelter said. "He has natural ability, and one thing that I see with a lot of the athletes who I coach in the NFL is that a lot of them are really good athletes and can naturally perform well.
"However, once they become more of a technician and learn more about the position, things just become a lot easier for them. For him, it was just a matter of tweaking some little aspects and making sure that he was fully confident in what he could do.''
Rhodes' physical aggressiveness on the field has helped him to block and tackle at the long-snapping position. Rhodes has three solo tackles to his credit this season.
"I think that he has really good speed and accuracy when it comes to his snaps, but I think that what really separates him is what he can do after the snap, with his blocking and his coverage,'' Stelter said. "He's always the first guy downfield, and he's known for being extremely physical when it comes to blocking.''
A video of Rhodes pancaking an NFL opponent is one of the favorites among Stelter's long-snapping clients.
"Luke de-cleated a rusher as he was coming through the 'A' gap,'' Stelter said. "The guy was coming through, and Luke knocked him right on his back. Not many snappers can do that. Luke has kind of become a snapping legend because of that video.''
Tyke Steiner, a certified physical trainer who co-owns and operates the CORE physical therapy and sports training facility in Altoona, has worked with Rhodes for more than two decades, since Rhodes was 12 years old and first professed his dream of playing in the NFL.
Steiner said that Rhodes' hard work has made that dream a reality.
"Luke is one of the most gifted athletes I have worked with in this area, by far,'' Steiner said of Rhodes, who has appeared in all 14 games with the Colts this year after having played in all of their games during each of the 2017-19 seasons -- including two playoff games in January 2019. "Some of the stuff that he has been able to do since he was a young kid has been astonishing, to be honest with you, and his work ethic is what really sets him apart.
"He will outwork anyone,'' said Steiner, who last worked with Rhodes last summer on their regimen of speed, agility and strength and conditioning drills. "He just will not stop working. There is a league full of very talented people in the National Football League, but you have to have a (good) work ethic to make it, and he has really put his time in and worked very, very hard.''
That goes back to Rhodes' high school days as a three-sport athlete at Hollidaysburg, when he and Steiner would meet at 5 a.m. for workouts.
"He's been dedicated from day one,'' Steiner said. "He told me the first week that I met him that he wanted to play in the NFL.''
The COVID-19 pandemic has disrupted the entire world in 2020, but Rhodes said that its effect on the Colts' season, and on him, has fortunately been minimal so far.
"Honestly, for me, it's been pretty smooth,'' said Rhodes, who credited his father -- a former NCAA Division I college football standout at Navy -- for his tremendous positive influence on his personal and professional development. "Our team has been very good about managing and not having many positive cases, so we've been lucky with that.''
This season, Rhodes and the Colts are prominently in the playoff picture in the AFC.
Indianapolis, which has won six of its last eight games, is currently tied with the Tennessee Titans for first place in the AFC South Division. Both teams have identical 10-4 records with two all-important games left on the regular-season schedule -- including the Colts' matchup Sunday with the Steelers, who opened the season with 11 straight victories but have now lost three games in a row.
"Our team has done a fantastic job this year,'' Rhodes said of the Colts, who have won three games in a row. "We've come along, especially here later in the season, and played well in all three phases of the game. I feel like we're just hitting our stride, and we're coming together and getting hot at the right time.''
The Steelers game will be special for Rhodes, whose Colts lost, 26-24 in Pittsburgh last year but will play with no fans at Heinz Field Sunday due to the state's COVID shutdown.
"Even though there won't be fans there, it's still cool to come back home and play a game against the team that I watched growing up,'' Rhodes said. "Every game matters now in December for us, and Pittsburgh's a great team. It will be a good game.''