Sports on Their Career Paths

For those who wonder if playing high school sports is worth the sacrifice in blood, sweat and tears, let me introduce you to some individuals who continue to call upon lessons learned as teenagers for inspiration and guidance.

Rocky Delgadillo was the student body president at Los Angeles Franklin High. He played football, basketball, baseball and ran track. He went to Harvard, earned his law degree from Columbia and came home to make a difference in his community.

Last year, at 41, he was elected city attorney of Los Angeles. People are already touting him as a future mayor or attorney general.

He still keeps in touch with his coaches at Franklin and has never forgotten how sports experiences helped put him on the path to success.

“Playing sports in high school was a significant character-builder for me,” he said. “[My coaches] taught me what it means to have big dreams and achieve them. Those dreams require hard work, team work and tenacity. I learned what it feels like to win and I learned what it feels like to lose. Character matters as much as talent. Those kind of lessons have served me well.”

As Los Angeles’ top prosecutor, Delgadillo is trying to find ways to keep teenagers out of trouble. He learned, firsthand, the value of sports and after-school activities growing up in Highland Park. Sports kept him busy and off the streets.

“One thing high school sports taught me is when bad things do happen, it’s important to get right back out there so failure won’t set in,” he said. “Failure is only temporary unless you allow it to be permanent.”

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Randy Redell played quarterback at Encino Crespi in 1985. He went to the Air Force Academy, became an F-16 pilot and has climbed the ranks to major.

Last spring, he was selected to join the Thunderbirds, one of the Air Force’s most prestigious honors. He’ll be one of eight pilots flying F-16s at air shows across the country.

“I am living a dream,” he said. “I found out June 6 and my feet haven’t touched the ground yet.”

From the time he graduated from high school, making the Thunderbirds had been his goal. High school sports prepared him for the long road he needed to travel.

“Football taught me discipline, perseverance, a service mentality that carried me through the academy and pilot training,” he said.

He called the football field “a leadership laboratory” to help him develop ideas and instincts for adulthood.

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Sean Sterle was a Southern Section player of the year as a quarterback for Panorama City St. Genevieve in 1982. In the 1990s, he decided he wanted to become an FBI agent.

In the weeks after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, he was working every day, 12 to 16 hours each day, trying to protect Americans. The stress level was high, as was the pressure to produce results.

It made him reflect on his days as a quarterback, when he had to maintain his composure no matter how difficult the challenge seemed.

“It helped me deal with an urgent task that’s very important, but keep a level head,” he said.

Sterle draws upon his playing experiences to help him in law enforcement.

“Working cases, you’re always trying to figure out ways to catch criminals,” he said. “As a quarterback, you’re always persevering, working hard, trying to improve and hoping it would pay off.

“There are going to be setbacks. You have to readjust, get back in there and fight. Even the disappointment of losing a championship taught me to work harder.”

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Rocky Balch played football and baseball at Huntington Beach Edison. He graduated in 1990, received an appointment to the U.S. Military Academy, became an Army helicopter pilot, then tried to enter medical school.

He was rejected the first time. He didn’t give up. That was something his coaches at Edison taught him. He’s graduating this year from the University of Texas medical school, then will begin a five-year residency program in general surgery.

“Sports has taught me if you work hard enough and put enough effort into it and ... don’t give up, you’ll get there,” he said.

“Sports has given me the confidence to do things people don’t think are easy. It’s given me the fortitude to stay the course.”

Balch has encountered difficult situations, such as a malfunctioning helicopter engine, which forced him to make a quick judgment without panicking. Again, high school sports provided a good training environment.

“You’re able to keep your composure and figure out what needs to be done,” he said. “Hopefully, for surgery, it will prove the same way. When you’re opening someone’s abdomen and something happens, you have to keep your cool. You don’t want a surgeon standing over you freaking out.”

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Ryan Bowne, 24, is in his second year of law school at Pepperdine. As quarterback, he led Sherman Oaks Notre Dame to the 1994 Southern Section Division III championship.

He’s grateful for his sports experience because he believes it helped him pass the Law School Admission Test.

“It’s an all-or-nothing test,” he said. “Doing well on the test is being able to sit down and deal with pressure, not worrying how much you’re going to get wrong. It’s similar to trying to calm yourself in the stretch of a football game, when you have to get a touchdown to win the game and ignore the outside influences and focus on the task at hand.”

After he passes the bar exam, he’ll practice estate planning and keep remembering those treasured moments on the football field.

“There’s a huge correlation between the lessons you learn playing on an organized team and later on in life,” he said.

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Usher Barnum was the standout running back on Chatsworth’s 1980 unbeaten City 3-A championship team.

He became a career naval officer. He’s a lieutenant commander based in Okinawa, Japan. His job is to fly in P-3 reconnaissance aircraft. He’s the one who pushes the button to release weapons when chasing submarines.

“The selfless dedication and teamwork in high school sports prepared me the most to be a career naval officer,” he said.

As a running back, he had to make decisions whether to charge through a hole or bounce outside and take a chance at trying to elude a defender. He trusted his instincts and football knowledge. It’s the same in the Navy.

“Sometimes looking for a submarine doesn’t go according to plan, but you have to do something,” he said. “You can’t just freeze up in the plane and come home with no explanations as to what went wrong.

“Oftentimes, there is a conflict or the information isn’t as clear as we had hoped. I still have to make a decision on what to do and be able to back up my decision when I land.”

Communication and decision-making are used every day in life, and the athletic field is the perfect training ground.

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Eric Sondheimer can be reached at eric.sondheimer@latimes.com.