Before the season began, El Vaquero interviewed Ethan Pena and Kodie Ecks Hanawahine, two confident Glendale Community College baseball players with great potential for the future. Pena is a 19-year-old second-year GCC Baseball player from California. He is a third baseman and was selected two weeks ago to play in Division 1, “the top division in college baseball in the Fall 2025.” Hanawahine is a 20-year-old third-year GCC pitcher from Hawaii.
Both Pena and Hanawahine started playing baseball between the ages of 3 and 4 because of their respective fathers. They said baseball is a team sport, and also said that their teammates are what keep them playing baseball. Pena said the moments when they come together as one are happier than when he plays well himself. Hanawahine, on the other hand, is happiest when he is on the mound pitching.
Pena and Hanawahine both said that baseball has taught them a lot about teamwork and relationship-building. Pena said, “Baseball is kind of teaching me life lessons”. Just like in life, we repeat failures and successes many times. If the failures are significant, I must move on, prepare for the next one, and take chances.” Then Hanawahine said, “without his teammates, he would not have been able to do so well, and that they are his rivals in a good way”. There are some routines that Pena values for this purpose. He checks the condition of the area around third base before every game or practice, and touches the corner of the box and the spike shoes with his bat before going up to bat. He said these are very important things for athletes to do.
They also talked about the current situation of the GCC baseball team and the team’s future. The GCC baseball team has a good record every year, and said they always practice to be better. And also said, when they are doing hitting practice, or even in a game, they use wood bats. Which means, once season’s begin, they start using metal bats and metal bats. Metal bats produce more distance than wooden ones. They incorporate many of these innovations into our practice games. The whole team believes they can make it to the playoffs this season and they work a tough schedule every day.
Story continues below advertisement
Finally, the players discussed their goals. Pena said in his first year, he hit a 3.70 average and aims to improve his batting skill and also his school career too. Then, the following year, he will be drafting and going to the professional world. Hanawahine said he would like to continue playing baseball, transfer to a four-year college, and eventually play baseball in his home state of Hawaii.
El Vaquero will continue to keep an eye on these two and the GCC baseball team.
Yoichi Terada can be reached at [email protected].
This post was originally published on this site be sure to check out more of their content.
