3A Football | Massive lineman making big push
Ed Pelzer couldn’t feel his leg.
In the Metro League championship game last year, the O’Dea defensive tackle’s knee took a hit from the blind side.
Pelzer crumpled to the ground, his anterior cruciate ligament shredded.
His season was over.
“It was tough not being able to play with my team anymore,” said Pelzer, a 6-foot-3, 335-pound senior. “Mentally tough, more than anything.”
For months, Pelzer nursed his knee back to health while college recruiters backed away. Doubt and frustration consumed him.
“He wasn’t himself,” said his father, Ed.
The O’Dea player sought help from his older brother, Lee Jones, an O’Dea alumnus who a year earlier had torn his ACL while playing defensive back for Idaho.
Jones brought first-hand guidance and the hope of recovery.
Pelzer got advice on what to do and what not to do from his brother. “Don’t let it get you down,” he remembers Jones telling him.
Long hours of rehab have paid off. Pelzer, his knee fully healed, has returned to his dominant form.
Voted the Metro Mountain Division co-Defensive Player of the Year, Pelzer leads the undefeated Irish (12-0) into the Class 3A semifinals against Bellevue (11-1) at 9 a.m. today at the Tacoma Dome.
Scary thing is, Pelzer might be better than ever.
“Sometimes you see that with guys with injuries,” said Eastside Catholic coach Bill Marsh. “They end up working harder and improving. He is every bit as good as he was before [the injury], if not better.”
Marsh likened Pelzer to a young Sam Adams, a run-stuffing lineman for the Denver Broncos and former Seahawk, who doesn’t get a lot of credit but makes his teammates better.
Off the field, Pelzer is quiet and polite, but when it’s game time, the massive lineman craves contact. And he doesn’t mind blocking on offense because “you still get to hit people.”
Defense, however, is where Pelzer excels.
“He’s an immovable force,” Marsh said. “We couldn’t run it in his direction. He eliminates three different running lanes all by himself.”
It’s no surprise he’s known to many as “Big Ed.”
Now the recruiting letters are filling the family mailbox again. California and Washington are atop his list, but Pelzer’s immense frame might be too big for him to pull in the offer he wants.
College coaches hope he loses a few pounds.
“Even in the third grade you could tell the difference in his size between everyone else,” said Pelzer’s father. “I don’t even think he understood why he was so big.”
Almost as big as O’Dea’s goals for this season.
“It’ll be a real big failure if we don’t win state,” Pelzer said. “I don’t have a letterman’s jacket that displays individual awards. I want a team award.
“I want a state ring. I want to hold the trophy.”