who would not respect these wishes?

http://sports.espn.go.com/nhl/news/story?id=2695193

Phil Kessel, the Boston Bruin rookie, has surgery for some type of cancer. The team is deferring all further release of information to the family. Does the public need to know more or is this story done until he is ready (if ever) to play again.

 

Public doesn't need to know more, but if the team is throwing it back into the family's lap and this is a player or team my paper covered, I would make at least one attempt to talk to the family to see if they will say anything.

Most likely the agent will be the only one talking, though.

 

I forgot where I read it but some media outlet went ahead and said that he was being treated for testicular cancer. Not sure if that information came from the family or not.

 

It was Channel 4 in Boston that reported it specifically as testicular cancer.

http://www.boston.com/sports/hockey/bruins/articles/2006/12/13/cancer_surgery_for_bruin/

 

The public never *needs* to know. They want to.

But medical records are personal, especially when it comes to things not related to on-field, court or ice injuries. In Michigan when we went through Jiri Fischer's heart-related injury, the Red Wings said they could not legally disclose his medical condition. That makes sense.

It's pro sports, but it's still an employer-employee scenario. Not many of us would want our employers announcing at the holiday party or even the news meeting that Carl Copywriter had entered rehab or Peggy Paginator had found a lump.

At my office, we got a nasty e-mail that we're not even allowed to ask a co-worker why they're absent, and the bosses aren't allowed to tell us.

Kessel's probably still in shock and not ready to talk. When he conquers it, he might be ready to. I've actually dealt with a high school kid who'd gone through it. At 17, he explained how, at 14 or 15, he had to decide whether or not to store sperm for future planning. That's too much to deal with when you're young, and I certainly wouldn't want to go in front of a bunch of cameras so soon after and explain it. How can you explain something when you don't even know what hit you?

 

The biggest example of this was Arthur Ashe... Many of the members of the media knew he had AIDS for years... Bryant Gumbel was one of them, I think Bill Rhoden was another, Bud Collins etc...

If memory serves, somebody at USA Today found out and wrote it even though Ashe begged him not to... I don't blame the guy for writing it any more than I blame Gumbel, Rhoden and Collins for keeping their mouths shut...

 

Sometime after he contracted HIV, Arthur Ashe was treated for a brain-related malady that was a marker for AIDS. That was the beginning of the end for his secret. At the time I was told that Doug Smith of the AP also knew.

Ashe's press conference following the USA Today story, when his wife had to finish his statement for him, was one of the saddest things I have ever seen.

 

Agree. As someone who always admired Ashe, that was a very sad and painful thing to witness.