This year, our Glendale football team is hoping for a change in culture. With previous coaches and players not willing to buy into the program, this year seems to be a turning point, with new coaches and other modifications. This season, our GHS football team has players motivated to alter history, including senior, Absalom Leiva.
Absalom was born in Los Angeles, California and enjoys playing football, drawing, and lifting weights. He has been playing football since seventh grade, and it all started because he was invited to play on a team.
Absalom’s favorite things about football are the competitiveness and the challenges that come with it. But, with the good comes the bad. He doesn’t enjoy losing and wants to make others around him better. He hates “the players that don’t give any effort, which ruins it for everyone.”
Absalom’s greatest accomplishment in football was being awarded with second-team All-League Defense by the CIF. This year, he has his hopes set on winning. “I hope to have a team that won’t give up and will give it their all to win every single game,” he said.
With the arrival of Glendale’s new football coach, Jacob Ochoa, many players had mixed feelings. Fortunately, Absalom enjoys the new coach, because “he does things differently from the old coach.” He believes that the biggest challenge Ochoa may face will be lazy players. With regards to the new conditioning protocol, Absalom stated that he doesn’t know how he feels about it. He just knows that everyone wants to get into action for football.
As this is the last year for Absalom, he has some feelings and motivation to bring into his senior year. He stated, “I gotta give it my all to be better and make it to the next level. I know it’s gonna be hard but with God, anything is possible.” Along with the majority of people, Absalom believes that playing with COVID-19 is frustrating, because the team lost out on chances to become bigger, better, faster, and stronger.
In the future, Absalom wants to be in the NFL and be inducted into the Hall of Fame. He believes this year is the year that will end Glendale’s drought of success. Absalom knows that this year is going to be different, but he says that he has “a real good feeling about it.”
Glendale’s first scheduled football game is on January 8th, against Mendez at Lincoln High School. Jacob Ochoa, Brandon Weisman, and Patrick Cartmill have been drilling a winning mentality into the players. Glendale hopes to start out with a 1-0 record for the second year in a row, but they have the intention of keeping things going ‘til the wheels fall off.
