High School High Enough for Redell

Rare is the football coach who has been able to climb the ladder of success all the way from the very bottom to the top, from the high schools to the pros. A few names come to mind: Paul Brown, who coached the Cleveland Browns and Cincinnati Bengals, and Bum Phillips, former head coach of the Houston Oilers and New Orleans Saints.

Rarer still is the man who, having made that difficult journey to the top, took a good look at the insanity around him and jumped off, content to return to the bottom.

Lou Saban is one, eventually going from the Buffalo Bills and the Denver Broncos back to high school coaching.

Bill Redell is another who leaped back to the preps from the pros, although you might get an argument on that one. Redell left a head coaching job with Crespi High in Encino to become an assistant in the United States Football League, then gave it up to return to Crespi. Of course, a lot of people might question whether the USFL was really pro football.

Redell, however, has never questioned his move.

“I get just as much satisfaction out of coaching at the high-school level as I did coaching against the Philadelphia Stars in Veterans Stadium,” he says. “I would just as soon coach Crespi against Alemany. That is just as much of a thrill for me.”

Redell admits he wouldn’t have said such things four years ago when he abandoned his secure outpost in Encino to pursue the greater glory of the pros.

An NAIA All-American defensive back at Occidental College, Redell played six years in the Canadian Football League as a quarterback/safety.

He began his coaching career as an unpaid assistant to Dick Coury in spring ball at Cal State Fullerton in 1969. It was Fullerton’s first football squad, but Redell didn’t stick around to watch the program grow. Instead, he left coaching after one season to pursue his other profession, the one that paid the rent.

An insurance salesman, Redell went back to Philadelphia where he became a vice president of a large insurance company. It was nine years before the coaching itch got to him again. He turned his back on his prestigious executive position, came home, went back to selling insurance and took a $250 a year job as an assistant to Bob Shoup, head coach at Cal Lutheran College.

Redell’s first head coaching job was at Crespi in 1982. Coming off a 3-7 year, the Celts were 8-3 under Redell, making it to the Southern Section playoffs where they lost in the first round.

Then came the call. Coury again. This time he was coaching the Boston Breakers of the USFL and wanted Redell as an assistant coach and assistant general manager.

The temptation was too great. Redell went east.

It didn’t take long for the disillusionment to set in. After one year, the Breakers moved to New Orleans. Before they did, however, it got pretty crazy. At one point, Redell had leased out his home in Westlake, had put his belongings in storage and was spending nights with his family in sleeping bags in a Westlake condominium while awaiting word on where his wayward team would wind up.

When the Breakers decided to move again a year later and took their traveling show to Portland, Redell threw up his hands. Enough already.

He got his old job at Crespi and his old home, and he couldn’t be happier.

“I don’t have to move anymore,” says the 45-year-old Redell. “I feel like I packed 20 years of moving into the last two. I enjoy coaching high school football.”

Come on, Bill. Sure, things are great right now. Your team won the Big Five Conference championship game Friday night to cap a 13-1 season in your second year back. But what if USC was to call tomorrow and ask you to fill the vacancy created by the recent removal of Ted Tollner?

“It all depends on where you want to go with your life,” Redell says. “Ten years ago, I would have jumped at the chance. I would have told them, ‘I’ll pay you for the job.’ Now, at my age, I’d really have to think about whether I wanted to do it. Other things are important to me, like my family. I’ve known coaches who missed seeing their family grow up. You have to decide whether you want to make the sacrifice. You have to pay the price when you go to the top. For every Terry Donahue who has been around for a while, there are 50 guys who have to move around every few years.

“People exaggerate the importance of coaching at a higher level. There are great coaches in high school just like there are in the colleges and the pros. I know guys coaching at the major college level I wouldn’t hire as an assistant. It’s just like any other profession. If you love to coach, it doesn’t matter what level you do it at. You take Rick Scott at Hart High or Harry Welch at Canyon. They could coach at any level. If USC wants to get a good coach, they ought to hire Harry Welch. He’d be as good as anybody they are going to find.’

Or maybe they should try for Redell. If only they could convince him he wasn’t taking a step down .