Michigan QB Beat Cancer. Now He Supports Kids Fighting Same Disease.
By Movieguide® Contributor
At the age of 17, Michigan quarterback Davis Warren was diagnosed with Leukemia.
“In March of 2019, I started feeling a little under the weather,” Warren wrote in an article for 247 Sports. “I thought I was just getting sick. I was a kid who never got sick growing up, so it was really weird for me. And then my dad one day was like, ‘Man, you just really don’t look right.'”
“He took me in, got some tests done and then didn’t really figure out the results of those tests right away,” he continued. “Then they’re just like, ‘You gotta go to the Children’s Hospital.’ And that’s when I knew it was probably worse than I thought, and knew that something probably was up.”
“And I actually told my dad, ‘Dad, we don’t have to go.’ I literally had a 7-on-7 tournament the next day,” he added. “And I was like, ‘Oh, I’ll be fine. I’ll play the tournament, and then we’ll go.’ And he’s like, ‘No, we’re going.’ And six hours later, a doctor comes in and tells me, ‘You have cancer.’”
Now that Warren is cancer-free and the quarterback for a big Power Five school, he uses his platform to help other kids with leukemia, something he didn’t initially want to do.
“When I first got out of the hospital, like, I wanted nothing to do with cancer, but then I came to Michigan and realized how important my story was to some of these kids that are going through their battles,” he told the Big 10 Network.
“For me to be able to go in there and show my scar and talk about being in the hospital and being in the same beds that they were in and giving them real hope, like hope that they can be bigger than this. Cancer can be a part of your story without defining who you are or who you want to be,” he emphasized.
He wants to use his platform to encourage other cancer patients that “they can get back to doing the things that they love to do,” adding that this mission “made me feel like my battle was worth it.”
The athlete formed a special bond with 5-year-old Hudson Gazsi who also battled leukemia.
Per ESPN, “Warren would visit him at home and even attend his baseball games to offer support.”
Gazsi’s family hosted a “No More Chemo” party to celebrate the end of his cancer journey. To Gazsi’s surprise, Warren attended the party.
“I was so excited. I ran and gave him a big hug!” Hudson said.
“For me to look at them in the eye and say, ‘Hey, I have been in your position. I went through this.’ I could see how much of a difference that made,” Warren added.
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