Throughout the majority of this offseason, the head coach of the Colorado Buffaloes and NFL Hall of Famer, Deion Sanders, had been quietly battling bladder cancer. His absence from the program had been the source of speculations and health concerns for months, but the Buffaloes reassured him by offering a five-year, $54-million contract extension.
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He’s now been declared cancer-free, and he’s crediting the help of the program’s trainer, Lauren Askevold, for his ability to navigate his health issues. Askevold recently made an appearance on the Raw Room podcast to discuss the details of Sanders’ adversity, where she noted that she’s aided him through more than 10 procedures throughout the years.
“If you watch all of the documentaries, you know he went through it with all of his health issues,” she explained. “The blood clot thing, that was 10 surgeries. Then he had nine or 10 before that just from the league… Then when he got here, he had two more. So he’s had 12 surgeries now total.”
The former Atlanta Falcon lost two of his toes in the process of combating the blood clots as well. Suffice to say, he’s been through a lot of adversity, leading to sincere effort from Askevold. Since Sanders first arrived in Colorado back in 2022, she’s been with him every step of the way.
Unfortunately, that’s meant that she’s had to hear a fair share of bad news in recent times.
“As much as I’m invested in the football team, I’m just as invested in his health… It’s like, ‘Hey, you might have to lose that leg. Now it’s the knee down. Now it’s just, you might have to lose a foot, and then, it was okay, this a little more serious. You could lose your life.’ When you’re sitting in a room with someone and you hear that, it hits you.”
Thankfully, Askevold’s been able to take things in stride, all while providing quality care for both Coach Prime and the rest of the Buffaloes. When jokingly asked about ‘rubbing nubs,’ or having to massage Sanders’ feet at times, she explained that the process is necessary, given his condition.
“He’s on his feet at practic,e and he doesn’t have a lot of feeling in there,” she noted before citing that the aim of the massage is to “desensitize” the bad nerves. “He says it just feels like he just has a boot on it the whole time.”
Turf toe from his playing days, in addition to the fact that Sanders was walking on a dislocated metatarsal for 15 years, were the cited causes for that issue in particular. Nevertheless, thanks to the help of Askevold along with the rest of Sanders’ doctors, Coach Prime is now fully prepared to saddle up for his third season with the rest of his herd in Boulder, Colorado.
