Carolina Panthers’ former linebacker Dean Wells has died after a two-year battle with cancer. He was 54.
Wells, who played in the NFL for nearly a decade, died on Wednesday, April 3, reported the Carolina Panthers.
As well as the Panthers, the professional athlete also played for the Seattle Seahawks, which he was drafted into in 1993. Prior to his NFL career, he played for the University of Kentucky during his college football career. Wells retired from professional football in 2001.
Wells was diagnosed with Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia (ALL) in early 2023 and began chemotherapy. According to the Mayo Clinic, ALL is a type of cancer in the blood and bone marrow and is “a disease that progresses rapidly and creates immature blood cells, rather than mature ones.”
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Following months of chemo treatment, Wells’ cancer initially went into remission before he later received the news in the fall that it had returned.
Wells spoke about his cancer fight with sports outlet KSR in April 2024.
“Show me who to tackle and I can do that,” Wells told the outlet. “This is in the doctors’ hands and it’s in God’s hands.”
In the same interview, Wells shared details of the support he had been receiving from those around him and how he was trying to stay positive amid the difficult diagnosis.
“So many teammates have reached out. ‘You’re one of the toughest guys I’ve ever met. I know you’ll beat this,’” he said. “There’s mental toughness that comes into it. You have to have a positive attitude that you can beat it. I’ve done everything that I can with that. It’s like the chemo either works or it doesn’t. You just don’t have a lot of control over it. You wish you had more control.”
Wells added that he learned his positive outlook from his mother.
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“Generally speaking, my mother was a very positive person and I think she kind of rubbed off on me in that regard,” he added. “Not that I’m not scared and everything else you would expect with the possibility of dying, but you still gotta find a way to enjoy every day and stay positive.”
According the Carolina Panthers, Wells spent much of the last year of his life raising awareness about how to help in the fight against cancer, including encouraging people to donate blood, donate to cancer research initiatives and to join the bone marrow registry.
Wells is survived by his wife Lisa and two sons.
