KC high school football star excels in another sport. It may not be what you think

To the untrained eye, North Kansas City’s Kobe Rhymes is the typical high school linebacker on track to next-level stardom.

He’s fast, aggressive, physical. And ask him about his favorite thing to do in sports, you’ll get the linebacker answer.

“I would say it’s to have a big hit … to steal the spirit of somebody, man you can’t beat that,” he said.

But the comparison game falls flat once Rhymes leaves the gridiron. Three-sport athletes, particularly for an athlete of Rhymes’ caliber, are fairly common.

Football linebacker, wrestler and volleyball player, that’s a different story.

“He’s fun to watch,” North Kansas City football coach Dan Joiner said of Rhymes, the volleyball player. “He’s explosive and above the net.

“He’s the first one that I’ve ever had,” Joiner added, “the first one I’ve been a part of.”

Linebacker/volleyball star isn’t an unheard of combination, but it remains rare. According to On3’s Charles Power, who tracks the NFL Draft, of the last 64 linebackers taken in the first three rounds of the draft, just two had high school volleyball backgrounds, and both were 2019 picks.

Both players also hailed from California, where high school volleyball enjoys tremendous popularity. But North Kansas City only added boys volleyball as an official Missouri State High School Activities Association (MSHSAA) sport in the 2023-24 school year, Rhymes’ freshman season.

And the sport has just one classification here in Missouri — with 89 teams across the state, boys volleyball still sits almost 40 teams short of gaining a second class.

Rhymes attributes his love for volleyball to his aunt, Jamie Tonasket, who he called “very important and special in my life.” Tonasket earned all-conference honors at Raytown South before playing at Ottawa College in 2017 and 2018.

Rhymes, who lived with Tonasket and his grandmother, remembers traveling to gyms to watch her play.

“She was cold,” Rhymes said. “To be honest, the looks (drew me to volleyball). The flashy jumps, being able to hit it so hard it makes a crack on the ground — I’ve always loved that about volleyball.

“So I’ve always just had a dream of jumping as high as I can and hitting the ball as hard as I can with no strings attached. So when I got my opportunity, I had to take it.”

That opportunity came in his freshman year, when North Kansas City added boys volleyball as a varsity sport. Hornets volleyball coach Tyler Gralheer said Rhymes showed his athleticism quickly.

“He’s just a freak athlete, so he’s very in tune with his body and how it moves,” Gralheer said. “Blocking was one thing that he picked up so quickly. I showed him the footwork once and he went up and did it and was roofing people right away.”

Gralheer said blocking is one of the most difficult skills to master, and credited Rhymes’ advanced feel and finesse — as much as his 35-inch vertical — for his stalwart swatting.

“You have to read the hitter and have such great timing and technique,” Gralheer said. “Even college coaches say that blocking is one of the things that freshmen coming into D1 colleges, that’s what they lack and have to be taught.

“He’s so natural at it. His timing is so good. When he’s on, you have no chance. For him to be so new to the sport and master that part to it is so impressive.”

Rhymes made the all-conference and all-district teams, but both he and Gralheer said volleyball allowed Rhymes an outlet to be himself and have fun.

“Things come naturally to him, and in volleyball, there’s no pressure,” Gralheer said. “Football, he’s a star, and in wrestling he’s super good, too.

“In volleyball he’s good, but you can also see he goes out and plays and just has fun and competes. There are lower stakes.”

Make no mistake, football is still Rhymes’ primary sport. A defensive menace, he is also a big-play threat on offense with 55 carries for 604 yards and eight touchdowns — that’s nearly 11 yards per carry — while adding 202 yards receiving and finding the end zone on five of his six catches.

And he’s a big part of Northtown’s surge. The Hornets won two games his freshman year before going 5-6 last season. This year, NKC is 6-1, with the lone loss coming by four points to undefeated Kearney. A big part of that growth revolves around a strong junior class, including Rhymes, that took their lumps playing as sophomores a year ago.

Rhymes credits Joiner for the turnaround and said he hopes that kind of success will help his teammates find their own recruiting exposure. And he quipped that he’s going to try and get a few of them out for the Hornets next volleyball season as well, fashioning himself as a bit of a Pied Piper for the program.

“He’s a competitor and he doesn’t like losing,” Gralheer said. “He’s the best selling point, a football player who took a risk and you know what, you wind up loving it.”

As a football player, Rhymes already holds scholarship offers from the likes of Mizzou, KU, K-State, Ohio State, Oklahoma, Michigan, Penn State, Alabama (which offered him Thursday) and a host of other Division I programs.

But those recruitment efforts won’t bear fruit until after the football season ends. And for now, Rhymes is a key part of a Hornets football team that has hopes for a deep playoff run.

“Obviously, everybody knows he’s a phenomenal player,” Joiner said. “But the intangibles he brings on the practice field and the locker room as far as leadership have helped immensely with the turnaround. He’s a great kid.”

This story was originally published October 16, 2025 at 2:56 PM.