On Monday, Oct. 7, Pizza with the Pros welcomed Philadelphia Eagles Social Media Manager, Erin Hodges. Growing up in Omaha, Nebraska, Hodges played sports her entire life. Originally, she wanted to be a doctor but quickly realized that her love came from business and social media. At the time, social media wasn’t the most popular thing, but that didn’t stop Hodges from pursuing it.

Hodges decided to attend New York University and participate in its Sports Management program. There, she interned with many different teams, places, and leagues, including Vayner Sports, Colorado Avalanche, the National Women’s Hockey League, and the U.S. Olympic Committee.

Hodges went outside the box to gain as much experience as she could in the sports world in various ways.

“I didn’t stick with just football and hockey,” said Hodges. “I just kind of wanted to explore what was out there. That’s probably one thing that I employ you guys to do because you might know you want to work in football, I want your job with the Eagles, but the more experiences that you guys can have, you might learn that you love something else and there’s hundreds of jobs out there. There might be only 32 in football that you might want.”

After interning at six or seven different places during college, Hodges worked her first job in sports as the Digital Coordinator for the Tampa Bay Rays during the 2020 season. After the season, Hodges wanted to continue to grow, so she spent the next two years as the Manager of Digital Media for the Colorado Rockies.

Hodges’ favorite two sports growing up were hockey and football, so when she was asked to be the senior manager for digital strategy for the San Jose Sharks, she couldn’t say no. For the next two years, she spent her time there building the social media account and website. However, the team had struggles on the business side that required Hodges to move on.

After moving on from the Sharks, Hodges got the opportunity to be the Social Media Manager for the Philadelphia Eagles, her current job. For the Eagles, everything on all social media platforms such as Instagram, Twitter, Snapchat, TikTok, Facebook, and YouTube is run through Hodges and her team.

When Hodges finished up her story, she received high praise from Neil Hartman.

“That’s an amazing story right there and in a short period of time,” Hartman said. “You are one committed person, like you are all in and that’s what we emphasize to our students all the time because there’s people like you out there that are all in. If you’re not all in, you’re not going to be enjoying all the different job opportunities that you’ve been able to enjoy during your relatively short time in your professional career.”

Next week, Pizza with the Pros welcomes Sean Kelly who is a Rowan University Alumni and Director of Broadcasting and Production at the University of Pennsylvania.

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