Sean Warrington '17 Recruiting Profile

Hello, my name is Sean Warrington and I am a senior at Parkland High School in Allentown, Pennsylvania.  Football was never very prominent in my life growing up.  Of course there was watching an occasional Steelers game on a Sunday afternoon, but I never played Pop Warner or youth association football.  I had started learning martial arts and karate at age 4, before I moved to Parkland and when I got here, I stuck with it for another 6 years or so, earning a black belt in Kwon Ru Fu Chi Do, a style of karate.  At only 9 years old, I was actually the youngest at my karate academy to earn a black belt.  My Sensei’s held me in such high regard that they gave me the opportunity to earn my black belt in a 4-5 hour long test with kids years older than I was.  They gave me the opportunity and I seized it.  Karate taught me how to lead by example, never let someone fall too far behind, and how to rally those under me and get them excited about something any normal person would be dreading.  Karate could not have prepared me for what I experienced earning my Eagle Scout award.

I crossed over from Cub Scouting (keeping things out of 6 year olds mouths while kind of teaching them how to do a few "outdoorsy" things, to Boy Scouts (the ones that can do service projects that change entire communities) in April of 2010.  When I came into my troop, I knew absolutely no one.  No one had crossed over with me into Boy Scouts and I was there alone.  Thankfully I have a mother who from early on taught me soft skills, people skills, to be prepared for a situation that such as the one in which I found myself.  My troop took me in and I helped on many other scouts Eagle projects, the hardest part of the penultimate achievement in a young man's scouting career.  Due to this experience, I would be prepared when it came to my Eagle project right? Absolutely dead wrong.  My Eagle Scout project ripped an emotional hole in me and I think at some point I saw some grey hair from the stress of literally having to be a one-man business at 15 years old.  Most people's Eagle Scout projects benefit a church or a shelter or something, but I did not really like that idea because that is what everyone does.  Thanks to my grandfather (also an Eagle Scout), I grew up as a hunter.  I am a diamond life sponsor and active member of an organization called the National Wild Turkey Federation (NWTF) that over the past 40 years, has restocked the American wild turkey population and taken them from a critical number to numbers now that are absolutely thriving.  Because of my passion for hunting and conservation and the love for the outdoors, I decided, "hey, why not do a project that benefits all wildlife in a forest ecosystem?"  That is exactly what I did.  Over the course of 9 months or so, I planned, re-planned, got permission, re-planned again, acquired materials, acquired permits, drafted volunteers, and finally spent an entire day on Section 168 of the Pennsylvania State Game Lands planting 200 American Sweet Crabapple trees a few miles in where only 4x4's could access.  I was forced to take charge, round up donations, buy materials, and plan to the most miniscule detail (what type of soil is underneath where you want to plant).  I was in charge of people 10 years younger than I was and people who were 5 times older than me and old enough to be my grandfather!  After I achieved my Eagle Scout, it really did make me step back and realize what it is really like to be a leader in today's world. I still volunteer at least once a month and look up to the leaders at those projects and realize exactly what they go through.

I wish I could tell you that my experience with karate, teaching and earning my Eagle Scout made me become a leader and a captain when I joined football my freshman year of high school.  Then I would just be a liar.  I did not even purposely join football; my joining was actually an accident.  In 8th grade at my middle school, I was telling a story about my weekend to a friend of mine while walking out to the busses at the end of the day.  I was just about at the good part when he took a turn towards our field house and me, almost at the climax of my story, was not about to end it there.  I took a turn with my friend and continued with my story.  What I did not know was that I had just joined the freshman football team by walking into that locker room and finishing my story.  I went through with practice and when I came home and said to my mom, "I just joined the football team"! When I had never displayed any interest towards football before.  Saying she was surprised would be a bit of an understatement.  I couldn't blame her! I had never played football before. I was 5' 8", 130 pounds and I did not even know what position I should play.  Freshman year I barely played at all but I loved every minute of every practice.  Freshman year came and went and I was focusing on my grades for the road ahead.  In middle school I was on the Honor Roll and wanted to continue that.  Due to my need for good grades, I decided to not play football the following year.  Bad decision.  That fall there was a part of me that was missing, football practice.  I am also a member of both the marching band at my school and our indoor drumline. Our drumline competes on an international level.  This time was not going to be like freshman year, I bulked up, I ran, I did anything I could think of to help me out and become a better football player to play on those Friday nights instead of watching from the band way up in the stands.  I went from 130 pounds to 175 pounds, gained 4 inches, and became much faster and much more agile. I had my eye on one goal, which was playing linebacker on those Friday Nights.

When I joined football again my Junior year, everyone my age had a one-up, they had been playing for a year already, getting noticed and working on their skills.  I had never played linebacker before and the coaches did not even know my name.  I worked and worked and worked harder than everyone around me, first one in, last one out.  My perseverance finally paid off when I was told by the assistant linebackers coach that I would get my first start on JV.  It sure wasn't that Friday night lights payoff, but nonetheless I was ecstatic.  That Monday, all day during school I was just thinking about what to do and how to act and reviewing my blitzes and my coverages.  That Monday game was a game for the ages for me, I could feel that even though we were in a park near the highway, it felt as if there was hundreds of people in the stands and two bands battling back and forth with music, incredible feeling that I wanted more of.  Too bad that was my only start that entire season.  Regular season, Playoffs, and a State Championship came and went, all viewed from the sidelines.  Horrible feelings watching from the sidelines that I knew I never wanted to experience again.  I want to help my team on Friday nights win the football game and go back to the State Championship.  Back to work in the "off-season".

Here it is, Senior year, my final hurrah, my last chance.  If there was any year to put everything on the line, it was now.  I wanted to feel the exhilaration of being on the field on Friday nights, and that is exactly what I thought of in the weight room in the spring.  You are tired? Rather be tired now than tired on a Friday night.  You can't bang out one more rep?  Do it now so you do not feel this way when fall comes.  That was my motivation, my driving force, to feel what it was like on a Friday night.  When my linebacker-now-head-coach called me up to play middle backer on second string in the summer, I thought he was just joking and playing some cruel, twisted joke on me.  But when he said "get your ass out here", I knew it was for real and I was electric.  Unfortunately, I was so electric I made stupid mistakes and messed up more than a few times, but he believed in me and kept me there.  When time for the first game rolled around and I was starting on kick-return.  I was so afraid and so nervous that I was going to mess up, get yelled at, and never put in again and it would be a repeat of Junior year.  But when we were standing at the 40 yard line in a concrete stadium built in the 1940's and hearing their band blasting the "Imperial March", I knew that where I was, right then and there, was where I was meant to be.  That game was when I settled down and knew exactly what must be done and what I am continuing to do throughout the season.  Big game or small, rivalry or blowout, I continue to bust my ass and go 1000 percent on every single play. It doesn’t matter whether it is kick-off, offense or defense.  Those Friday nights have been my motivation since January, and it has finally paid off.

Ever since I was 12 years old and being molded into the leader I am now, I always wanted to join the military.  My dad is Army, my uncle was Army, I've always been around military members and just knew that I wanted to be just like them someday.  The only question was "what branch?"  Since then my heart and my desire have been to search for what exactly I want to do.  After searching and searching for a few years I had finally decided, the Marines.  The one and only United States Marine Corps.  The few, the proud.  When I broke the news to my family they were stunned and taken aback needless to say.  But when I told them what it is exactly that I wanted to do when joining the Marine Corps, Force Recon, their shock quickly molded into disbelief.  Force Recon is the Marine's version of SEALs or Rangers or Delta, the special operations of the first to fight.  The elite of the elite.  Their disbelief stemmed from the fact that my uncle was killed in Iraq fighting as an infantryman, the less dangerous version of what I want to do.  They don't want to see me go, but I know that the Marine Corps is where I can thrive and push myself as a leader, and as an individual.  All of those lessons I learned, through karate, Eagle Scout, and Football will be put to the test in a cornucopia called boot camp.  That motivation to play on Friday nights got me through one more bench press. That motivation will push me to run out that one more mile at 2 AM in full gear.  That motivation is being with my brothers in arms on the battlefield as I am with my brothers on the football field.  I want to be a Marine to lead other Marines. Those marines are like my brothers in football, there is no one under me because we are all equal when judgment day comes.