Prior to Owens: Leal was a three-sport athlete at Clyde in baseball, football and basketball. In baseball, he was named Second Team All-Sandusky Bay Conference as an outfielder for coach Bill Selvey, and he was named Honorable Mention All-SBC and Honorable Mention All-District in basketball.

Personal: Jose is the son of Jose and Bethany Leal. He is a social work concentration major at Owens.