Not The Casey Coleman Update We Were Hoping For

Very, very, very sad news in the local broadcasting community.

Akron Beacon Journal sportswriter Terry Pluto and Cleveland Plain Dealer "Tip-Off" columnist Michael K. McIntyre deliver that bad news today - WTAM/1100 sportscaster and morning co-host Casey Coleman's health has taken a drastic turn for the worse. And when you're already battling pancreatic cancer, those words are not what you want to hear.

Coleman's doctors have found four new inoperable tumors in his liver. And the local radio veteran, rather matter-of-factly, reveals that those doctors are now giving him about six months to live.

Coleman says he "already considers himself a survivor", noting he's already hung in there nine months after his cancer diagnosis.

And in the newspaper interviews, he's trying to be optimistic, and even humorous while staring death directly in the face. "So they tell me six months now -- hey, why not nine months or a year? Who's to say?", he tells Pluto. "The good news is that I don't have to have that hernia operation I scheduled," McIntyre says he's joking with friends.

Coleman had been planning a return to the WTAM airwaves a week from today, and was hoping the doctor visit would clear the way for that. Unfortunately, our attention now turns to praying for good health, and that Casey continues to break through the "expected" bad news as long as possible.

Though the news has him thinking of what seems to be inevitable, he tells Pluto he's not quite ready to go...yet. "I like living too much," he tells the Beacon Journal writer...and Casey, we like you living, too much, as well. Hang in there...and prove the experts wrong...