GOOD SPORTS : For 10 Angelenos, Athletics a Means to Champion a Cause

The sun rising over the perfect day in Los Angeles sports first strikes the middle-aged owner of a small office-supply store.

He is a casual jogger, climbing sorely out of his Agoura Hills bed, training for a marathon only because he thinks it will save a boy’s life.

Down in the inner city, a golf pro reports to work. He could hone his game and maybe make some money with it, if only he would stop giving free lessons to the kids who climb his fence and steal his range balls.

The sun rising over the perfect day in Los Angeles sports casts shadows over Dodger Stadium and illuminates a gym on the East side.

The sun rising over the perfect day in Los Angeles sports beams on a kindergarten teacher who won’t accept no, a TV anchor who can’t say no, and a middle-school counselor who sacrifices afternoons without question.

It is a day of triumph without victory, of stardom without statistics, of champions in races with no finish lines.

These are the stories of 10 of those champions, people who have used athletics not for bolstering their bank accounts or egos, but for bettering their world.

These are Los Angeles’ 10 good sports for 1996. For them, athletics involve five things: a game, a participant, a goal, an achievement, maybe a chill.

Their stories happen every day. And nothing is gift-wrapped.

“There are nights that I put my head down on the pillow and wish I could get away from it,” said jockey Chris McCarron, echoing the view of many here. “But I can’t. And I won’t. So I don’t.”

MARATHON MAN

Mickey Toyen, owner, Connelly Office Supply

He was jogging every other day and wondering if it was enough. He was serving on the board of directors of a local Rotary club and wondering if it was enough.

Then last summer, Toyen received a form letter sent to subscribers of a running magazine, asking for volunteers to run a marathon for leukemia research. Just as he was beginning to think about his impending 50th birthday.

“It all clicked,” he said. “I said, ‘This is what I should do, and when I should do it.’ ”

Today, he has memories of completing the Honolulu Marathon in 4 hours 25 minutes, “of the greatest feeling in my life after the birth of my children.”

And the Leukemia Society has $7,500 raised by a man whose friends thought he was crazy.

Under this Leukemia Society program, runners seek pledges for their marathon. In return, the society promises to train them and fly them to the race.

Toyen finally realized what he was doing when friends returned his donation request with, “I’ll only give if you put me on your life insurance policy.”

Or, “I always thought you were nuts. Now I’m sure of it.”

His two daughters urged him to be careful, to stop and walk if necessary. He told them, sure, but had no intention of doing that.

He was too focused on the 7-year-old leukemia patient whose photo he had stuck on his refrigerator. He even wrote the boy’s name, Benjamin, on his wristbands.

In training, he nearly tripled his weekly mileage.

“The race was not the hard part,” Toyen said.

But oddly enough, the longer he ran, the better he felt. Friends thought he would die. But he couldn’t remember feeling more alive.

“MR. WILLIAMS WAS ALWAYS THERE.”

Mike Williams, golf pro, Chester Washington Golf Course

A recent phone call to an inner-city golf course was answered by a young man attending Jackson State University on a golf scholarship.

He was asked the whereabouts of Williams, the course pro.

“He’s here somewhere,” said George Bowers III. “Mr. Williams was always here--when I needed him for a free lesson, when anybody needed him for anything.”

Williams, 49, heard that and laughed.

On this occasion, “somewhere” had been the parking lot, where he had been urging two neighborhood kids to put down their bikes and attitudes and come inside to hit golf balls.

“Just trying to catch kids before something happens,” he said.

According to his boss and co-workers, Williams has been catching them there for the last 10 years, giving away enough lessons to make another man rich, enough equipment to fill a garage.

“Gives away his time, gives away a lot of things,” said David Strider, course general manager.

Although he played on the pro tour from 1969-75, and even qualified for five U.S. Opens, Williams is only famous to those who need a $40 lesson they can’t afford.

“And those kids who climb the fences and try to steal my range balls, I get them too,” he said. “You can see that kids want help, they want to learn. I can’t turn them down.”

Especially not the dozens of kids now showing up because of Tiger Woods.

Woods, though, whose father once relied on inner-city pros to help his son, has long since disappeared.

“Since Tiger got famous, he never shows up anywhere around here anymore,” Williams said. “Somebody has to be here.”

HOLDING NO GRUDGE

Oscar De La Hoya, boxer

He is called traitor, booed as an outsider, reviled as a pretty boy. Is there any athlete in America who is as hated in his own neighborhood as our own boxing champion?

Yet when De La Hoya discovered the East Los Angeles gym of his childhood was about to be sold and probably torn down, he stepped up and bought it.

That was six months, and $2 million ago.

Today, the church that housed the Resurrection gym has been transformed to the Oscar De La Hoya Youth Center. And even though major renovations will not begin for another month, the place already sparkles with his gift.

New punching bags have arrived, holes have been patched, strict rules have been enforced.

“It was a little wild in here earlier, not as organized, but now it is all changed,” said Rodrigo Mosquera, a father of two young boxers. “Oscar has done good.”

The monthly fee is $4 a child, one-fifth the normal rate. Uniforms are provided. Report cards are checked.

And the cheapest part of De La Hoya’s contribution was the building. He also pays trainer Roberto Alcazar to run a program that sends De La Hoya Center boxers to tournaments throughout the state.

“Even though a lot of people were giving me a hard time, I felt I had to do this,” De La Hoya said. “Not because I want to impress anybody. Not because I wanted to show people. It’s just that the kids appreciate it.”

A LONG MEMORY

Ed Arnold, KTLA sports anchor

He used to dig graves and fold newspapers, and used his meager paychecks to buy his only pair of good pants.

Growing up in Texarkana, Ark., with a waitress mom and an absent father, Arnold appreciated anyone who would extend a hand to help.

Now, those helping hands are his.

When quizzing local observers for this story, a common refrain was, “Whatever list you are making, it has to start with Ed Arnold.”

It would be easier here to list the things that Arnold, 57, does not do.

Just the other day, he was ringing bells in downtown Los Angeles for the Salvation Army . . . hours after hosting a luncheon for the Boy Scouts . . . or was that the March of Dimes . . . maybe Goodwill.

“I have particular interest in Goodwill, because I used to shop there,” Arnold said.

And, oh, yes, years ago he joined Rafer Johnson in helping start the California Special Olympics.

“I always said if I was in a position to give back, I would,” Arnold said. “I’m not a celebrity. I just work hard.”

NO MORE FUNERALS

Ed Cabil, counselor at John Muir Middle School

In the lives of many of these good sports, there was one incident that inspired them to service.

For Cabil, it was the shooting death of one of his students 11 years ago.

“I got [the surviving students] together and said, ‘I am not going to any more funerals,’ ” he said. “ ‘What can I give you that will keep you out of trouble?’ ”

Organized sports, they said.

Sounds simple, huh? But there are no organized sports in Los Angeles middle schools.

So Cabil threw in nearly $4,000 of his own money, solicited donations from his doctor and dentist, and started some.

He encountered gang resistance, administrative apathy, and difficulty finding volunteers.

But he was also embraced by kids who suddenly stayed on the playground instead of running the streets. Dozens of kids, given direction, reveled in their new teams and told their friends.

And a program that started out with two basketball teams and two drill teams has grown to more than 80 teams, and 5,000 children, and a $200,000 budget for the venture known as New ADAGE (Alternatives for Drug and Gang Elimination).

“And in 11 years,” Cabil said, “I have not gone to another funeral.”

FREEDOM FOR A FRIEND

Ron Orr, associate athletic director, USC

It was 1981, and one of the strongest people that Ron Orr knew had just been forced into a chair.

Mike Nyeholt, a former top USC swimmer and teammate of Orr’s, was paralyzed from the chest down in a motorcycle accident.

“I went to see him right away, and he’s wearing this halo [brace], and he can’t move, and it’s really frustrating,” Orr said. “So I’m driving home, thinking, ‘I have to do something. I have to get him a van, get him out of there.’ ”

How could he raise the money for that?

How else? He would swim for it. And get others to swim for it.

“I didn’t know what I was doing, I just got on the phone and called around and . . .”

Two months later, 300 people showed up to swim laps and raise $58,000 for Nyeholt.

Today, the annual “Swim with Mike” event attracts as many as 500 people from around the country, and has raised about $1.5 million.

That’s been enough to endow 30 full USC scholarships for disabled former athletes. Six are currently enrolled, providing a constant reminder of what one man can do for one friend.

“This is about giving people a new start,” Orr said. “When a tragic accident happens, education goes down on the priority list. But it is education that can get somebody’s life going again.”

But none of the swim-a-thons will match that first one, which featured a surprise guest.

It was Nyeholt, only hours after having been released from the hospital--ahead of schedule.

A week later, he moved his big toe. Today he is a successful businessman who can walk with crutches.

Said Orr, “Every year we do this, I turn to Mike and say, ‘You know, we just can’t stop.’ ”

THE ULTIMATE RELAY

Jon Ross, coordinator of the Los Angeles chapter of Achilles Track Club

He is a competitive runner, a shorts-and-beach guy, one of those producers who knows “Personal Best” is more than the title of a movie.

So why is Ross bragging about the time he ran an 8 1/2-hour marathon?

Or the time he finished a race just ahead of a truck picking up the orange cones?

Because Ross no longer runs for himself, but with others who need him.

He directs a group of volunteers who assist members of the nation’s only track club for physically challenged runners.

In the last eight years, the only races Ross has run have been with blind runners, wheelchair participants who are not in the competitive group, and any others who need help. He also acts as one of the club’s trainers during weekly workouts.

You can see him at the next Los Angeles Marathon. He’ll be the one running next to a blind racer, attached by a tether.

“People are always asking if we are escapees or something,” he said.

He still doesn’t know why he got started. The founder of the New York-based club, a friend, persuaded Ross to start another chapter when Ross moved to Los Angeles in 1986.

Ross agreed, and although he has since won no medals he also has no regrets.

“All I can say is, I get some deep-seated satisfaction that I can’t verbalize,” Ross said. “You have to finish a marathon with a blind runner to feel that runner’s jubilation mixed with your own, to understand.”

KINDERGARTEN CLOUT

Brenda Johnson, teacher, 95th Street Preparatory School

The tennis court doesn’t have a name, doesn’t have a surrounding fence, doesn’t even have a net when its founder is not around.

But to most people at the inner-city 95th Street School, it might as well be Wimbledon.

In five years, a part-time player has helped turn an empty piece of blacktop into a regular court, leading to lessons, clinics, and new attitudes.

One of the most rewarding parts for Brenda Johnson?

“I love seeing all the kids running around here in tennis outfits,” she said. “That’s never happened before at this school. They all look so cute.”

It started when Johnson took up tennis, in 1988, and realized it was something her students could do for life.

“So I just asked the principal if we could have a court,” she said.

No big deal, except no other Los Angeles inner-city school had ever dreamed of such a luxury. Johnson convinced school officials that it was a necessity.

Last winter, at minimal cost because it mostly involved painting lines and drilling some holes, Johnson’s court was finished.

Children now play there in the morning, and after school, and whenever Johnson pulls out the net from a supply room.

She and husband Marion--they recently became the first African Americans voted tennis family of the year by a local association--also give lessons throughout the community.

“And after one year, our court still has no graffiti on it,” she said. “Other places around it have been marked, but they’ve left the court alone.”

A NET TO CATCH THEM

Chris McCarron, jockey

For once, entertainer Tim Conway was not joking.

He had received $5,000 for a promotional appearance at a Minneapolis-area racetrack in 1986, and he wanted to give the money to needy jockeys.

“As a horse owner, I knew that many of them didn’t have insurance,” Conway said. “When they fall and go boom, I wanted to have a net to catch them.”

So he asked his buddy, McCarron, how to get the money to the fund.

“There is no fund,” McCarron said.

The men thought a bit, then started one.

Today, the Don MacBeth Memorial Jockey Fund--named after another jockey volunteer who died of cancer when the effort was beginning--has granted more than $1.75 million to jockeys for everything from health care to rent.

“We even bought one guy a set of teeth that he lost in the backstretch,” Conway said.

For 10 years, McCarron has been at the forefront, meeting struggling jockeys at race tracks around the country, listening to their woes, struggling with decisions on who should get what.

When he’s not riding, McCarron is licking envelopes and mailing T-shirts and encouraging jockeys to donate during “Jockeys Across America Day.”

He is also receiving letters like the one from the wife of an Arkansas jockey who had been paralyzed. The fund bought him a special car. His wife wrote to say it had changed his life.

“This has also changed mine,” McCarron said.

NOT JUST A NAME ON A LETTERHEAD

Eric Karros, first baseman, Dodgers

What kind of guy would endow a $100,000 baseball scholarship at a school that would not give him one as a freshman?

“Sometimes I wonder that myself,” former UCLA star Karros said, laughing.

What kind of Los Angeles sports star would actually spend his off-season in Los Angeles, appearing in corny neighborhood parades and giving tours of a hospital that serves low-income families?

“Man, anybody would do what I do,” Karros said, giving credit where it is certainly not due.

Karros is involved in foundations for cystic fibrosis, Catholic Big Brothers, and even a local drunk-driving prevention program.

But what separates him from others is his position on the Board of Trustees for St. Francis Medical Center in Lynwood, one of the few remaining hospitals that turns nobody away.

“Eric is not just a name on our letterhead,” said Carol Lee Thorpe, chief operations officer for the center’s foundation. “He’s not just some honorary trustee. I mean, he’s here.”

Walking the halls with potential donors. Watching groundbreaking on additions. Checking on crack babies through a window. Attending board meetings when he’s in town.

Karros gives money to the hospital for every home run he hits. But doesn’t everybody do something like that these days?

He is different in that he watches that money being spent, and hosts events there to persuade others to give.

“It’s just a matter of going over there, seeing the work they are doing, and realizing how little you need to do to make them happy,” Karros said. “I just saw it, and reacted. Like anybody.”