Delaware man makes difference through coaching, art

Part of Paul Worrilow's routine before every Atlanta Falcons game can be traced back to his middle school years in Delaware.

Worrilow typically sits at his locker on game days and scrolls through his music, searching for one specific, yet somewhat odd genre: Scottish bagpipes. It's certainly not what most NFL players use to get hyped for their games, but for the 25-year-old Worrilow, a graduate of Concord High School and the University of Delaware, the music has a deeper meaning.

Marty Barnes has been a youth football coach in Delaware the last 45 years and currently coaches middle schoolers at St. Mary Magdalen in Wilmington. Before every youth football championship game, Barnes has a drummer and bagpiper lead his team onto the field. He was inspired after watching the Roberto Duran-Ken Buchanan boxing match at Madison Square Garden in 1972, when Buchanan was escorted from the locker room by a bunch of bagpipes.

“It still sticks with me,” Worrilow said on the phone from his home in Georgia. “I’ll listen to bagpipes on game day just because it’ll bring me back to the St. Mary Magdalen days and with coach Barnes. People never really understand why.”

Barnes grew up in Wilmington and played football at Dickinson High School. His role as a coach goes beyond teaching kids how to play the sport. He wants to teach them life lessons too. One of the highlights of playing for Barnes, who was Worrilow’s football coach from fourth through sixth grade, has been his end of practice speeches.

Sometimes Barnes will have speakers come talk to the team. He once brought a knife and fork and used a kid’s head like it was a plate to show them how to twirl the fork to eat spaghetti. Last week Barnes told his team about how he went to a hoagie shop and joked about seeing two people inexplicably order vegetarian hoagies. Barnes has found a way to engage the approximately 50 kids who play each season, beyond what happens between the lines on a football field.

“Yeah, they’re legendary,” Barnes, laughing, said of his post-practice speeches. “Most of the time we don’t even talk about football. It can’t be football all the time, all that rah-rah nonsense.”

Without Barnes’ influence, Worrilow said he wouldn’t be where he is today. Worrilow, in his third season as a linebacker with the Falcons, always looked forward to his after school football practices. He still maintains a close relationship with Barnes, who attended his wedding a little over a year ago, and makes sure to go back to St. Mary Magdalen’s at least once a year to give back to the program that meant so much.

"He just made the game tremendously fun, and that’s when I fell in love with football,” Worrilow said. “A lot of my best memories with football involve coach Barnes. … He would always talk about doing your homework or telling kids to listen to their parents. Those are things that stuck with me.”

Barnes’ dedicates his time to more than just football, though. The Delaware native is also an avid painter and wood carver. He paints every day until lunch, and after daily chores, he heads outside to carve wood. Every year, Barnes paints a portrait for each of the sixth graders on his team in their game uniform with a football pose.

“I’ve always had a little bit of talent,” Barnes said. “I just kept pursuing it. I like to draw and paint with colors. I enjoy that. I always wanted to be a sculptor, but I never had the opportunity or the room so I bought a block of wood and started carving one day.”

Cindy Wilkinson convinced Barnes to display his artwork. On Tuesday, 40 pieces of Barnes’ work were displayed by Cheap Original Cool Art (COCA) at a gallery at Union Park Honda in Wilmington. At least 25 pieces were sold, with 30 percent of the profits donated to the St. Mary Magdalen football program. The showing has raised more than $1,500 that will help buy and maintain football equipment. Barnes’ work remains on display until Monday.

At the last practice of each youth football season Barnes typically puts boxes with his artwork on the field with the request that his players make sure to take whatever pieces they want. Even though he gives much of his work away for free, Barnes takes pride in knowing so many people enjoy taking his paintings home.

“People love him in the Catholic youth organization, and I think they love him some much because he’s such a good role model for these kids,” said Wilkinson, the founder of COCA. “You meet him and you’re kind of like, oh my gosh.”

Worrilow owns a couple of Barnes’ paintings as well as a wood carving of Jesus that Barnes made as a wedding gift to him and his wife. It’s on display in the dining room of his home. Among all of his possessions, Worrilow considers it to be priceless.

“It would be hard to find anybody like him, just what he does for all the kids and how much he cares for all of them,” Worrilow said. “It’s amazing.”

Contact Meghan Montemurro at mmontemurro@delawareonline.com. Follow her on Twitter at @M_Montemurro.