Jared Lansford is not the only California teenager on the rise in professional sports.
In 2003, at 17 years old, Guillermo “Memo” Gonzalez was selected in the first round of the Major League Soccer draft to play for the Los Angeles Galaxy.
Gonzales, a native of Southern California, began playing soccer early in his childhood and with plenty of family support.
He describes his life emphatically as “soccer, soccer, soccer.” At the age of 15, Gonzalez moved to Florida to participate on U.S. Soccer’s under-17 team.
The midfielder is now among the youngest members of the Galaxy.
“It seems easy, sure enough, but I practice three to four hours each day,” he said. “It’s a responsibility.”
Life on the field is one thing, but life on the road with a team of adult men is a different ordeal. What happens when the guys go out for a night at the bar?
Gonzales nodded his head slightly at the question, glanced at his feet, and said, “It’s a little hard.”
He added that, at first, “I was getting picked on a lot, but I got used to it.”