It may have been decades ago, but Highland Village resident Bill Hodge still laughs every time he tells the story about the day he showed up to register himself and his brothers, Ken, Presh and Ray, for a soccer league in Lewisville.
The foursome, in their late 20s and 30s at the time, had been in the league for several years, steadily helping their team win match after match while moving up the ranks from the lowest Division V to Division II. They initially played just to keep in shape but, with help from a couple of skilled teammates and athletic friends, were successful enough to keep advancing.
They ultimately decided to stick around for another season, and all that was left was to drop off the payment.
That is, until the league commissioner added a caveat at the registration table:
Only one Hodge per team.
“I said, ‘Ha, that’s funny,’ and he replied, ‘Well, it’s not meant to be. You guys are too rough.’ He was dead serious, so I said, ‘Give me my check back, pal. If I can’t play with my brothers, we’re not playing,’” Bill said. “I told the guy, ‘You’re accusing us of being bullies, but you have officials out there. If we get out of hand, they have yellow cards and red cards to exert control. In all the years we’ve been playing, we’ve had one red card among us—and it was Ray, the goalie. We weren’t mean, but our dad always taught us not to let the other guy know you were hurt, and that doesn’t factor well in soccer.”
After tossing around a few more heated barbs, the commissioner relented. The Hodge boys could be on the same team.
But looking back years later, Bill and his brothers sort of understand why the league felt it needed to create new rules. After all, Bill, Ken, Presh, and Ray played every sport imaginable growing up and while at nearby R.L. Turner High School in Carrollton. They eventually went to college on athletic scholarships. Ray chose basketball at Weatherford College, while his brothers made their names as star wide receivers in football. Ironically, Ray was later offered a football scholarship to North Texas State, where he would have been a teammate of Mean Joe Greene. But he chose marriage instead.
Ken and Presh were both high school All-Americans. Ken went to Baylor. Presh went to Oklahoma and, later, UNT. Bill played at Trinity University when its football program was still in Division I. He became an All-American and was inducted into the school’s Hall of Fame in 2003.
Bill was invited to a Dallas Cowboys training camp out of college. He later won a gold medal at the Senior Olympics. Meanwhile, Ken played in the North-South College All-Star Game on Christmas Day in 1964 alongside Roger Staubach, Bob Hayes, Ken Willard, John Huarte, and a host of future NFL stars.
After sustaining a potentially career-ending injury in an intramural basketball game, Ken was later invited to an NFL camp with the Houston Oilers but suffered another injury, which thwarted his comeback attempt. Later in life, Ken was selected to carry the Olympic torch through Dallas before the 2002 Winter Olympics, alongside a group that included Staubach.
Ken also has the distinction of outrunning a charging hippopotamus on a golf course in Africa, utilizing a “football move” to save his life. But that story is for another day.
After college, when all four brothers found themselves together again in southern Denton County, they participated in city and recreational leagues. They won city championships in volleyball, basketball and soccer, as well as state and national titles in softball and flag football. Bill won back-to-back national racquetball titles.
“We weren’t very popular with the local competitors in those leagues,” Ray said. “We surrounded ourselves with talented guys, and many of the guys that competed against us for years even became teammates and friends over time.”
Ken agreed, adding, “I would have rather scored a soccer goal in front of 30 family members than haul in a touchdown catch in front of 35,000 people. To me, it was pure, unadulterated fun playing with my brothers. If we weren’t playing team activity, we played two-on-two games amongst ourselves. We had numerous pushing and shoving matches but, in team play, everyone knew that if you got into an altercation with one brother, the other three were quick to join in.”
Their parents instilled that tight family bond and love for sports from the moment they could walk. Their dad was a jock who excelled in baseball and soccer, and as soon as his boys were old enough, he quickly got them up to speed. Even their sisters joined in. Ruth, now 86, was a cheerleader and the toughest girl on the block. Ann, now 75, held her own, too.
Despite being a moderate-income family, the Hodge boys always had the best gloves and athletic equipment available. And when they weren’t traveling for work, not a day went by that their dad didn’t hit fly balls and grounders or throw a football to them in the street or on a field somewhere.
No sport was off limits: racquet sports, baseball, soccer, football, anything competitive … even card games and dominoes.
“We made a lot of long, hot drives to Waco to watch Ken play football,” Presh said. “Our parents never missed a game; in fact, I think they made it to four of our games in one week at one point. We always enjoyed playing whatever game we could.”
Ken agreed, adding that their parents’ love for watching them compete never wore thin.
“During the week, they’d turn us boys loose in the backyard to play dodgeball. We called it ‘hittin’ ball’ back then,” He said. “I was four or five years older than my brothers, but I never felt like I was taking advantage of them. They could throw and catch with the best of them. Our parents would leave early that morning, and we’d still be in the backyard when they returned after dark. We weren’t interested in anything else … just sports and girls.”
Those Saturdays in the backyard were more than simply passing the time. They were where the Hodge boys learned to compete, laugh, talk a little trash and, most importantly, do it all together.
That dynamic followed them from the backyard to the playing fields—and stayed with them for decades.
Sadly, those days have long since passed. Bill is the youngest of the bunch at 76 and still plays neighborhood pickleball weekly. But he, along with Presh, 77; Ray, 79; and Ken, 84, hung up their cleats a long time ago. They have traded athletic gear for joint replacements, back surgeries, and care.
That said, they wouldn’t change a thing.
The Hodge boys have never strayed far from one another—or from the countless stories and trash-talking that remain as fresh as the day they happened. And good luck separating them anytime soon.
