ESPN basketball analyst and Hall of Fame personality Dick Vitale is cancer-free after being diagnosed with vocal cord cancer, but he is still recovering from vocal cord surgery he had earlier in the year. Vitale received six weeks of radiation treatment and was hoping to return to basketball broadcasts last November, but the plans changed when Dr. Steven Zeitels determined that he needed more vocal rest. This eventually led to a four-hour vocal cord surgery, after which he remained on vocal rest to determine its effectiveness. Vitale was in Boston to meet with Dr. Zeitels, who analyzed his progress and gave his subsequent evaluation, in turn delivering news that basketball fans had hoped they would be able to hear.
“The surgery that you had recently to reconstruct your vocal cords went beautifully,” Dr. Zeitels said, speaking to Vitale. “I’m very optimistic in the fall – it’s encouraging that you can get back to work here. I see absolutely no evidence of the cancer whatsoever, so I think this is a terrific visit, and I’m really optimistic that the future is really bright for what you want to do [with a] return to the court.”
Over the last several years, Vitale had fought against melanoma and lymphoma amid a global pandemic and always remained hopeful that he would return to calling basketball games for ESPN. Vitale made a return to the broadcasting booth during the 2022 college basketball season and is now looking to make it back again. In a previous interview with Barrett Sports Media, Vitale said that he hopes to call college basketball games at 100 years old and is motivated by the winning formula of passion, pride and perseverance.
Vitale understands that Dr. Zeitels wants him to minimize what he does up until the fall, utilizing a gradual assimilation into speaking more. By the time the fall comes around, it seems to be entirely plausible that he could be back calling college basketball games again.
“You can work with this, but you don’t want to take on too much,” Zeitels said. “When you take on too much, vocal problems can get worse quickly, so as long as you’re graded in your approach and you’re thoughtful about things, I think the future looks really bright.”
Vitale, a former college basketball coach, accepted the Jimmy V Award for Perseverance at the 2022 ESPYS and discussed the importance of raising money to fulfill Valvano’s dream to beat cancer in his acceptance speech. Outside of his broadcasting work, he hosts the annual Dick Vitale Gala to benefit the V Foundation, which raised $24.8 million for pediatric cancer research in the past year.
