Wilcox to Receive Woody Dietch Award

The four men and women who will be inducted into the Orange County Sports Hall of Fame during tonight’s banquet in the Emerald Hotel at Anaheim are all studies in perseverance and achievement.

But Jerry Wilcox, who will receive the 1987 Woody Dietch Award, is a true profile in courage.

Six-time All-Pro defensive end Jack Youngblood, Olympic gold-medalist diver Pat McCormick, basketball star Ann Meyers and Harry (Cap) Sheue, a teacher and coach at Huntington Beach High School for 39 years, certainly will be greeted with applause.

The ovation of the night, however, undoubtedly will go to Wilcox when he receives the award named for Dietch, the former Chapman College sports information director who never lost his enthusiasm during a long battle with leukemia.

Wilcox, 45, a graduate of Garden Grove High School, Santa Ana College and USC, is director of public relations at Hollywood Park. He held a similar position with the Los Angeles Rams for nearly 20 years until kidney problems forced him to retire.

Wilcox has been receiving dialysis treatment three times a week for the past five years. After one session last June, he fell and broke his leg. The fracture triggered a five-month ordeal of related problems that included a life-threatening infection, high fever, removal of his right hip, temporary blindness, a loss of hearing and days in a coma.

Wilcox rallied, though, and now drives his own car, walks with the aid of two special canes and maintains a normal work schedule.