Johanes Maliza is an American soccer midfielder

Midfielder

A midfielder is an association football position. Some midfielders play a more defensive role, while others blur the boundaries between midfielders and forwards. The number of midfielders a team uses during a match may vary, depending on the team's formation and each individual player's role...

 who, in 2004 and 2005, played for the Puerto Rico Islanders

Puerto Rico Islanders

Puerto Rico Islanders is a Puerto Rican professional football team based in Bayamón, Puerto Rico. Founded in 2003, the team plays in the North American Soccer League , the second tier of the American Soccer Pyramid....

 of the USL First Division

USL First Division

The United Soccer Leagues First Division was a professional men's soccer league in the United States, Canada, and Puerto Rico....

. He has since entered politics and law.

Soccer

Maliza attended Latin School of Chicago where he was a Parade Magazine High School All American. He then played his college soccer

College soccer

College soccer is a term used to describe association football played by teams who are operated by colleges and universities as opposed to a professional league operated for exclusively financial purposes...

 at Stanford from 1999 to 2002 along with Roger Levesque

Roger Levesque

Roger Levesque is an American soccer player who currently plays for Seattle Sounders FC in Major League Soccer....

 and Todd Dunivant

Todd Dunivant

Todd Dunivant is an American soccer player who currently plays for Los Angeles Galaxy in Major League Soccer.-College and Amateur:...

. He graduated in 2003 with a bachelors degree in history. On January 17, 2003, the San Jose Earthquakes

San Jose Earthquakes

The San Jose Earthquakes professional soccer team is located in the San Jose, California, United States suburb of Santa Clara, and participates in Major League Soccer , the top level soccer league in the United States and Canada....

 selected Maliza 46th overall in the 2003 MLS SuperDraft

2003 MLS SuperDraft

The 2003 Major League Soccer SuperDraft was held January 17, 2003 in Kansas City, Missouri.-Round 1:-Round 2:-Round 3:-Round 4:-Round 5:-Round 6:References=* USA Today MLS Draft List...

. He suffered a severe right hamstring injury in the early pre-season which prevented him from playing for several months. On May 31, 2003, he finally signed a developmental contract with the Quakes. He failed to see any playing time and was waived in September. He signed with the Islanders in 2004 and retired from playing professionally following the 2005 season.

Law

Following his retirement from soccer, Maliza entered politics and law. In 2006, he worked for the Harold Ford campaign in Knox County, Tennessee

Knox County, Tennessee

Knox County is a county in the U.S. state of Tennessee. Its 2007 population was estimated at 423,874 by the United States Census Bureau. Its county seat is Knoxville, as it has been since the creation of the county. The county is at the geographical center of the Great Valley of East Tennessee...

. He travelled to Kenya

Kenya

Kenya , officially known as the Republic of Kenya, is a country in East Africa that lies on the equator, with the Indian Ocean to its south-east...

 where he worked in the Legal Advice Center. He then entered Harvard Law School

Harvard Law School

Harvard Law School is one of the professional graduate schools of Harvard University. Located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, it is the oldest continually-operating law school in the United States and is home to the largest academic law library in the world. The school is routinely ranked by the U.S...

 where he was selected for a 2008 Chayes Fellowship and wrote for the Harvard Law Record

Harvard Law Record

The Harvard Law Record is an independent, biweekly student-edited newspaper based at Harvard Law School. Founded in 1946, it is the oldest law school newspaper in the United States.-Characteristics:...

.