A Perfect Body Attacked By Cancer

f all the athletes who’ve been treated at Hopkins over the years—legends such as Joe DiMaggio, Artie Donovan and Boog Powell, to name but a few—none has captured the public’s attention quite like former Oriole Eric Davis. Perhaps it was the timing and severity of his illness: At age 36, in the prime of his career, in the middle of the Orioles’ 1997 climb to the American League Championship Series, Davis’ Adonislike body was suddenly attacked by colon cancer. Fortunately the tumor was caught fairly early—stage B, with no metastases. But though the surgery and subsequent chemotherapy were routine, Davis’ case was far from ordinary. Dealing with a major league athlete presented several challenges for Hopkins surgeon Keith Lillemoe, M.D.

The first dealt with protecting Davis’ privacy. With the athlete out of action for two weeks prior to the secretive diagnosis, the sports press was in a frenzy trying to learn more about Davis’ “mystery” ailment. Davis checked in for surgery on June 12, under an unusual assumed name: Dave Stewart—the name of a former well-known major-league hurler. “I said something to him about it,” recalls Lillemoe. “People are going to think you’re the pitcher. He said, ‘That’s what I’m hoping.’” Still, Lillemoe admits, “you’d have to be a pretty big baseball fan” to pick up the reference.

“The procedures were done with the utmost care and positive bedside manner, and professionalism,” Davis wrote in his book Born to Play. “A half hour after the tests, Dr. Lillemoe came in [and said] ‘Eric, it’s not an abscess. It’s a tumor,’ He showed me the X-rays. ‘That’s the tumor—it’s the size of an orange. It’s confirmed. We’ve got to go get it.’ ”

But it was what happened after surgery that really concerned Lillemoe. With medical reporters now calling with pointed, probing queries, he realized Davis’ condition would soon be surmised. He thought of Davis’ family. “Particularly when he’s got young children. They turn on [ESPN’s] SportsCenter and hear their dad has cancer. .... I didn’t want that to happen. We wanted to make sure the family knew everything there was [to know], so nothing would be a shock.” Lillemoe and Davis agreed the best move would be to hold a press conference.

Just prior to the conference, patient and doctor conferred. “I sat down with Eric. I said, ‘Eric, I’m not going to get out there and say you’ve got a 50–50 chance, or a 75–25 percent chance [of recovery]. I’m not going to give statistics, but anybody who would ask the question and found out this was a Duke’s-B or Duke’s-C type tumor would be able to look [the statistics] up.”

Davis’ reply was true to the courage he would show throughout his public battle. “Just forget the stats,” said the outfielder. “Tell ’em the truth.”

Part of the apparent truth was that Davis wouldn’t be back that season. The papers, the Orioles and more than a few doctors figured the ’97 campaign was a write-off. But if athletes have proved anything, it’s their willingness to redefine the rehabilitation envelope. Despite his chemotherapy regimen, Davis nursed himself into playing shape. Starting with light dumbbells, he slowly extended his range of motion. He found the incision didn’t hinder his swing, and the chemotherapy—while a strength-sapper—wasn’t debilitating. All the while, Lillemoe and associates watched in awe. “It would have been very easy for him to blow the season off and feel sorry for himself, but he took the exact opposite tack,” says Lillemoe.

The payoff came September 15. With Lillemoe in attendance, the sell-out crowd at Camden Yards stood as one and roared as Eric Davis stepped into the batter’s box. “It was unbelievable,” recalled Orioles strength coach Tim Bishop. “I only had a couple of other feelings like that in my career here, like when Cal broke [Lou Gehrig’s consecutive-games played] record. The electricity in the crowd, the emotion that people felt, connected with him ... unbelievable.”

A few days later, Davis got his first hit. Thirty chemotherapy patients watching the game in a Hopkins ward burst into applause. “They knew who was at bat, what it meant. I thought of the chemotherapy patients ... and what Eric Davis means to them,” said oncologist Jonathan Simons, M.D.

Even Lillemoe got excited. With the O’s in a must-win situation in the ’97 American League Championship Series, Davis pinch-hit in the top of the ninth. At the Chicago Hilton, Lillemoe was relaxing with colleagues after an American College of Surgeons meeting. With one swing, Davis sent a rocket into the left-field bleachers—and Lillemoe began high-fiving every surgeon in the room. The home run was a symbol to the nation of how an athlete could turn the table on a horrible disease. “I was real proud of how hard he worked,” says Lillemoe. “I was proud of how he became an advocate for [fighting] cancer.”

Davis would go on to bat .304 for the year. Now with the St. Louis Cardinals, he continues to be a fearsome player. His Hopkins experience with colon cancer left him both grateful and humbled, a message he delivers to others as a spokesperson for the American Cancer Society.

“I know there is no limitation in life,” says Davis, “not even for a cancer survivor.”