NFL

Giants’ Mark Herzlich has ‘What It Takes’ to beat cancer

Giants linebacker Mark Herzlich details his battle with cancer in his soon-to-be-released book, “WHAT IT TAKES: Fighting for My Life and My Love of the Game

For much of my life I’ve been a football player. My position: linebacker. Physically devastating another man’s body is my job description. It is also something I truly love doing.

To be honest, I can’t say I’ve ever felt guilty about inflicting pain on a football field.

Believe me, I’ve been on the receiving end of plenty of brutal, bone-crunching hits — hits that temporarily flattened my lungs and scrambled my brain and sent tremors of pain radiating through my body. And after each one, I’ve risen up from the hard ground and walked off the pain. It’s a point of pride to get right back up after a big hit. That’s because a football player is not conditioned for self-preservation. He is not taught to protect his body. A football player is trained to surrender his body to the game, to hurl it at brick walls of bone and muscle again and again and again. In football, your body becomes your weapon. Your strength becomes your faith. Your toughness becomes your salvation.

Now let me tell you about the hit that took all that away from me.

The hit that left me fighting for my life.


A few days before my cancer diagnosis, I called my parents from my dorm room in the middle of a particularly painful night. My mother (Barbara) answered the phone. By then my pain had already been an issue for months, and my mother was deep into the process of finding out what was wrong with me. When we finally hang up, she sat up in bed and turned to my father (Sandy).

“What if Mark has cancer?” she said.

It was the first time she said that word aloud in relation to my pain.

“He doesn’t have cancer,” my father said. “No way. He’s playing football, how can he have cancer?”

Herzlich, then a linebacker for Boston College tries to pump up the crowd in the third quarter of a 2008 clash with the Maryland Terrapins. Below: An even younger Herzlich, still ready for the gridiron.Courtesy of Mark Herzlich and Penguin

Courtesy of Mark Herzlich and Penguin Group USA
But my mother didn’t let it go. She wouldn’t have dreamed of telling me about her suspicion, but she didn’t let it go.

After I played in the Spring Game at Boston College, my mother drove up in a big van to help me move all my stuff out of my dorm and into a storage room, since I had to clean out my room during break. As we loaded up the van I noticed she wasn’t talking much.

“What’s wrong, mom?” I asked.

“Nothing.”

“You’re acting weird.”

“Really, Mark, it’s nothing. I’m fine.”

When we got the van loaded up I expected we’d go straight to the storage place, but my mother had other plans.

“You know what?” she said. “Let’s just leave everything in the van and drive it back home, and then we can drive it back after break. I’m too tired to move it now.”

Ordinarily, my mother would have made sure we put all my things in storage before we drove home. She was too neat and organized and deliberate to just let my stuff sit in the van for days. But for whatever reason, she didn’t want me to store my stuff. So we drove home to Wayne (Pa.) and left it all in the van.

Not long after that my mother made the appointment for me to see Dr. Brad Smith. After that visit — the visit where he suggested I get an MRI of my leg — she stayed behind to talk to him while I waited in the hall.

“If Mark has cancer,” she asked, “will it show up in the MRI?”

“It is highly unlikely he has cancer,” Dr. Smith said, “but yes, it would.”

When she came out I asked her what she and the doctor had talked about.

“Oh, nothing,” my mother said.

The next day, I got my diagnosis. Once everyone at Boston College found out, someone from the front office called my mother and told her that since I wouldn’t be coming back to BC for a while, I had to empty out my dorm room.

“It’s already empty,” my mother told them. “All his things are here.”

Somehow, my mother knew I wouldn’t be going back to Boston College. Somehow, she knew I had cancer before anyone else did.

And because of that intuition, my

mother relentlessly pushed me to see new and different doctors, never letting me rest or get complacent, always driving me to every appointment, staying behind and asking questions, covering every base.

The only reason I went to see Dr. Smith for that crucial visit was because my mother made the appointment for me.

Had she not been so pushy and determined — had she not somehow have known — another month or two could have passed before I was diagnosed, and the cancer in my femur most likely would have spread.


Kathleen (my nurse) told me that most chemo patients start to lose their hair in the third week. But after three full weeks, my curly blonde hair was still in place. I wondered if maybe I wouldn’t lose my hair at all. Maybe I’d be the exception to the rule. I’d done some research about chemo-related hair loss, and it wasn’t very encouraging. One site even featured fake eyebrows. They looked like tiny furry boomerangs. Losing my eyebrows freaked me out more than anything. I was so afraid of how I’d look. Still, I couldn’t ever see myself wearing fake ones. So when my hair and eyebrows were all still in place after three weeks, I felt a surge of hope.

Herzlich — with now-fiance Danielle Conti — after the Giants’ Super Bowl XLVI win over New England. Below: Herzlich takes a selfie with Giants fans during the victory parade.Courtesy of Mark Herzlich and Penguin Group USA

Courtesy of Mark Herzlich and Penguin Group USA
A couple of days later I got in the shower and lathered up my hair with shampoo. When I finished I saw huge clumps of hair in my hands. I was shocked. It was happening. Losing my hair would change everything. Losing my hair would bring pity into the mix. Before, no one could really tell I was sick, but now everyone would know. They’d look at my bald head and feel pity for me. On the street I’d go from being normal to being an outcast. I’d feel shame and embarrassment. Seeing my hair in my hands was terrifying. I quickly washed out the shampoo, skipped the conditioner and jumped out of the shower. I went to bed and tried not to think about what just happened.

The next morning my pillow was covered with blonde hair.

One again I panicked, but only for a moment. In the light of day, I knew what I had to do next. I went into the bathroom and dug around the medicine cabinet for the electric clippers. Then I ran them through my hair. I dropped the thin strands to the floor, one after the other. Before long all that was left was a layer of stubble.

Then I took a can of shaving cream and lathered up my head. I passed a razor under hot water and mowed it through the shaving cream. When I was done I rinsed and toweled off, and looked at myself in the mirror. I was completely bald. It felt like I was looking at someone else. I ran my hands over my shiny head and marveled at how smooth it was. There wasn’t much consolation for me at that moment. About the only good news was that I still had my eyebrows.

A few days after that I woke up one morning and my eyebrows were gone.


A couple of days before the GameDay broadcast, I got a call on my cell from a Boston area code.

“Hi, this is Tedy Bruschi,” the man on the other end said. “Am I speaking with Mark?”

The former Patriots linebacker who’d fought back from a stroke, calling me? At first I thought it had to be a prank. Then I remembered I’d given my number to my friend who was on the Patriots.

“Tedy Bruschi?” I said. “Yeah, it’s me, Mark! How are you?”

I could hear my voice cracking as I talked.

“I’m good, I just wanted to call you and let you know that I am very inspired by your story, and that you are in my thoughts,” he said.

“It’s actually you who inspired me,” I said. “And that’s why I want you to know that I just got the results of an MRI from my doctor and he said he’s 99% sure I’m cancer free.”

“Well, congratulations!” Tedy said, clearly surprised and excited. “I’m so happy to hear that.”

We talked for a bit about cancer, and about football, and finally we talked about what came next.

“Mark, don’t forget — you’re a survivor now,” Tedy told me. “So be proud of being a survivor. Always be proud of that.”

We hung up and I sat on my bed for a long time thinking about what he said.

The notion of feeling pride in relation to my cancer had never occurred to me. Yet here was Tedy telling me I should feel proud. He wasn’t saying I should be happy that I got cancer. But the accomplishment of fighting it off was something to feel proud about. And with that pride, I realized, came responsibility. As a survivor it fell to me to be an inspiration to others. That was my responsibility now. After talking to Tedy I realized exactly what I had to do.

I had to go public with my MRI result on College GameDay.


Herzlich in 2009 on the set of ESPN’s College Gameday with hosts Chris Fowler, Lee Corso and Kirk HerbstreitJohn Quackenboss/ESPN

My mother was against the idea. She didn’t want to do or say anything to jinx my recovery. Like my father, my mother is highly superstitious. When Brad and I were little my father coached my football team, and he wore the same shorts to every game. He believed that wearing them would bring us good luck. Then my father had back surgery and couldn’t coach one of the games. But he still believed the shorts had to be there, to keep bringing us good luck. So my mother had tiny little Brad put on my father’s huge shorts and wear them to the game. And wouldn’t you know it, we won.

The idea of announcing to the world I was cancer-free spooked my mom. Plus, my low white cell count and my trouble breathing were a real concern to her. She didn’t want to have thousands of BC students cheering me on because they thought I was home free. “They have no idea how sick this kid still is,” she thought. “We got good news, but the fight isn’t over. The cancer might not be gone.”

Saturday, October 3 — the day of our game against Florida State — was raw and rainy and cold. The clouds hung gray and low. But the excitement of having GameDay at Boston College was palpable. The campus was electric and buzzing. My parents and Brad drove up and were given seats near the GameDay set. Hundreds and hundreds of students in number 94 jerseys and “Beat Cancer” T-shirts squeezed onto the lawn. The show’s hosts, Chris Fowler, Lee Corso and Kirk Herbstreit, took their seats to huge wails from the crowd. The unique, surreal emotion-overload of a college football game, coupled with news of my appearance on GameDay, simply electrified the place.


I spent the morning with the BC team at a local Sheraton Hotel, eating a meal and planning the game. Then Barry Gallup drove me to campus. I walked to the GameDay set and got my first look at the sea of students in the lawn, waving signs and banners and flags. More students were hanging out their dorm room windows, shouting my name. I looked left and saw my family. My mother was in a yellow rain slicker with a big button with my photo on it. Brad wore a number 94 football jersey. I was in a yellow Beat Cancer T-shirt. I was bald and had no eyebrows.

Earlier that day I couldn’t walk up a set of stairs without feeling totally winded, but now the energy of the students gave me strength. I walked towards the stage and high-fived every fan I could. I was smiling and nervous and happy. They played a pre-recorded video of athletes and celebrities wishing me luck. I sat next to Chris Fowler and a set director waved at us, letting us know we were live.

I began to tell the story of my phone call with my dad. How he asked me about the Apple rebate instead of telling me my MRI results. The crowd, screaming just moments ago, was silent. They sensed something was coming. I got to the heart of the story, which was me asking my dad what Dr. Staddon said.

“He said he looked at the MRIs,” I announced, “and he said he’s 99% sure that the cancer is completely gone.”

Then it happened. The roar. The sweet, beautiful roar.

It’s on YouTube, if you want to hear it for yourself. Sometimes I dig up the video just to listen to it again. It went on for nearly 30 seconds, a strong, sustained, exuberant, unifying roar. The sound of relief and happiness. I turned and saw students jumping up and down, out of their minds with excitement. I looked over at the GameDay hosts — all gruff football guys — and I saw tears in their eyes. I looked at my parents, who were smiling and cheering and crying. I sat there and tried to soak it all up. I’d said the words now, aloud and in public, and that made everything more real. I was beating this thing. I was really beating this thing.

When the roar subsided I explained I still had three chemo sessions to go, and after that the titanium rod surgery, and after that I’d “get the leg strength back, start running again and get back on the field.” The crowd roared again. I didn’t ever want to leave the embrace of the students that day, because their love and support and genuine concern was incredibly empowering. It was beautiful. Sitting on the GameDay set I felt a lot of things, but chief among them was blessed. Blessed to have my parents, blessed to have Brad, blessed to have these fans. I was bald and I was sick and I was still a cancer patient, but most of all, I was blessed.

Boston College was the underdog that day. But we won anyway.

From WHAT IT TAKES: Fighting for My Life and My Love of the Game by Mark Herzlich. Reprinted by arrangement with New American Library, a division of Penguin Group (USA) LLC. Copyright © Sandon Mark Herzlich Jr., 2014