Olczyk Battles On With Optimism

Hockey/horse racing broadcaster Eddie Olczyk will not find out until early April following a scan if he is in remission from colon cancer, but he is glad to have finished 12 rounds of chemotherapy to shrink the tumor first diagnosed last August.

“Am I scared? Yeah, I'm still scared,” he said on his way from his home in Chicago to St. Louis to work as part of the broadcast crew for NBCSN's televised National Hockey League game between the Blues and Detroit Red Wings Wednesday night.

“I don't know what that scan is going to say, but all I can do is listen to my doctors and trust them that what they told me back in August is going to be the same thing they tell me in April,” he added. “They're going to let my body get back to some normalcy [before doing the scan], but just to be five days away from my last treatment I feel a sense of relief and achievement. I don't feel great, but I feel better because I know I don't have to go back in there next Monday and do it all over again.

“Once I got unhooked on the 21st at 9:47 in the morning, I pretty much said to myself, 'this is the first day of the rest of my life.' That's how I'm approaching it. As nice as everybody is down at Northwestern Hospital, I can do without seeing everybody there until at least April 2.”

He said while the doctors are fully confident they have shrunk the tumor, they aren't sure if something is festering somewhere inside.

“It's just way too early,” he said. “You've got to let the chemo and the medicine kick in. You just hope (the doctors) are right. But all I can go on is what they told me. Could I have walked away and not done the chemo and taken my chances? Yes. But once they said, 'we're here to cure you, not treat you,' that got my attention and that's where my focus was.”

He said the toughest part going through the treatments–and something he felt others who have endured chemo can relate to –is the mental, physical and emotional effects.

“The body is an amazing thing,” he said. “Early on in my treatment it was rough. It was brutal. I had some rough times when I got into treatments seven, eight and nine, but it wasn't as violent as it was early. You gain some confidence when you go through it for the first six weeks, but the psychological part is probably the greatest obstacle for anybody that is dealing with it or will go through it–or somebody that is living with somebody that is battling it. That to me is the greatest challenge for anybody that is dealing with it–not just what I battled or anything else similar to that. You go to places you've never been before. You just drift into oblivion sometimes. You question your strength and your mortality.

“When you hear cancer, the first thing I think about is death or dying. That's just the reality, regardless of what the doctors are telling you. There's just that human nature. I set goals for myself over the course of the six months, whether it was getting back to broadcasting hockey games or the Breeders' Cup or the Pegasus or my daughter graduating from Alabama or Christmas or the New Year. Instead of thinking ”it's 180 days, how am I going to do this,' you just start marking off landmarks.

“The one thing I found out talking to people who have battled this is you feel weak. You feel like you are a burden. Initially when you get the diagnosis, you feel like you've let people down being a husband and a father and somebody in the public eye, but once you get over that hurdle you prove to yourself that you're not weak. It's a horrible disease and it's sad, but you have to have that mindset.

“That's the greatest obstacle I felt as this thing went on–the psychological dealings of it, and not just your treatments but your off weeks, too. You feel good and you're able to work and then all of a sudden you get knocked down again. That's the greatest challenge I felt. I don't care how strong you are or how tough you are, initially it knocks you down. It levels you.

“The one thing I've learned and proved to myself is I'm way tougher than I ever thought I was. Anybody that goes through this needs to know they are tough and strong. You're not weak. You are way stronger than this and you will endure and you will conquer.”

He felt empowered by the support from family, friends, the horse racing community, the hockey community and NBC.

“I couldn't do it by myself,” he said. “I certainly felt like I had a lot of people behind me. I wasn't fighting only for myself. I was fighting for my family and people I care about and fighting for people I don't even know. At the start I just wanted to go under a rock–just go and deal with this and not burden anybody–and the more I thought about it, maybe I can help somebody stay away from this. I've gotten thousands of people reaching out and saying things such as, 'I went in and got a colonoscopy a little bit early because I wasn't feeling well and saw my doctor.' It just makes you feel so good.”

On Tuesday, Mike Quigley, the U.S. Representative for Illinois' Fifth Congressional District, stood up in the House of Representatives and praised Olczyk for being open about his fight and for raising the profile about colorectal cancer [video]. With Olcyzk's Chicago Blackhawks' jersey with the number 16 and his name on the back, Quigley called him a “native son of Chicago [who] exemplifies the heart, grit and character of the city we call home.”

“I like to think I've helped more than one person and I will continue to do that, but that was my kind of mission to start– my goal–and it just makes you feel really good that even in this trying time you've helped people you know and you don't know, and hopefully will keep more people away from going through it,” Olczyk said.

He gained almost 40 pounds because of prescribed steroids and lost a little bit of hair.

“I've never been 249 in my life, but it will come off eventually,” he said. “The weight more than the hair bothers me, but I just know that it's part of the process.”

In addition to going back to a regular slate of hockey games pending how he feels, he is also looking forward to broadcasting horse racing events. He may return for the [GI] Santa Anita Derby, but says he is “for sure a thousand percent” that he'll be at the Kentucky Derby. Because of his hockey and horse racing assignments, he has to juggle his schedule.

In the midst of his cancer battle, Olczyk received international attention when he won the Pegasus World Cup Betting Championship in January. He nailed the winner, Gun Runner, the exacta of Gun Runner and West Coast, and the trifecta with Gunnevera, collecting the first-place prize of $137,500. While he wasn't at the race, his NBC colleagues gave out his winner and exacta before the race. He gave out the cold exacta and trifecta on Xpressbet.com.

He was sitting about 96th overall out of 135 heading into the race and just decided to take his best shot with his exotic wagers. It was his trifecta bet that sealed the win.

“I just felt so strongly about Gun Runner and West Coast and I thought Gunnevera was going to run a huge race,” he said. “West Coast's last work prior to the race was breathtaking. I thought that horse was sitting on a big race. I didn't think he could beat Gun Runner, but I thought he could run huge. You've got have conviction and sometimes you've got to take what the track gives you. I never thought West Coast would be second favorite.

“Every squirrel finds a nut every once in a while,” he joked. “The stars were aligned that day. That week of chemo I didn't feel as bad winning that tournament on Saturday night. But handicapping has always been a passion of mine. I've been very lucky. I've had some really good days and some really bad days, but that's horse racing and that's handicapping. But it doesn't get much better than that when you win a tournament like that in the first year they have it.”

By winning the tournament, he gained automatic entry into the 2018 Breeders' Cup Betting Challenge and the 2019 National Handicapping Championship. He is eligible for a $1-million bonus put up by the Stronach Group if he wins one of the other tournaments.

“I knew I won the tournament, but I didn't realize there was that perk, too, to win a $1-million bonus,” he said. “I'm sitting in a pretty good spot. Can I do it? Yeah, I think I can, but I'm going to need some luck. I have to be sharp and have the stars aligned and go for it.”