Chiefs fan donated kidney to Eagles fan. Now they’re off to Super Bowl together
When Billy Welsh went on social media more than two years ago and said he urgently needed a new kidney, his former US marines comrade John Gladwell stepped up and donated one of his.
Little did the two men know that Gladwell’s act of friendship – which preceded a monumental health crisis of his own – would give both men the chance to share a once-in-a-lifetime trip: attending Sunday’s Super Bowl to see their favorite football teams face each other in the big game.
“He’s my hero,” Welsh said of Gladwell in a local television news story about the pair’s connection. Meanwhile, of Welsh, Gladwell said: “He’s family.”
According to the KMBC station in Kansas City, whose Chiefs play the Philadelphia Eagles in the NFL’s championship game Sunday, Gladwell and Welsh first met each other while serving with the US Marine Corps at the branch’s base in Camp Lejeune, North Carolina.
Gladwell, a Chiefs fan, said he initially did not like the younger Welsh at all.
“He was too enthusiastic,” Gladwell told the station, which aired its piece on Saturday. “I just wanted to go home – I wanted out.”
That didn’t bother Welsh, an Eagles diehard, because he didn’t think much of Gladwell either. “He was a jerk,” Welsh said.
But their hearts softened when Welsh used social media to reconnect with Gladwell more recently, revealing that he was struggling with his health and was desperately looking for a new kidney.
Welsh admits that he was shocked when Gladwell replied that he was a donor match and would be in town soon.
“I cried,” Welsh told KMBC. “Never in a million years would I have ever thought that dude would’ve given me a kidney.”
Yet Gladwell said it wasn’t at all a difficult decision. He didn’t just have Welsh in mind, he said. He knew Welsh had a two-year-old son, who was close to the same age as one of Gladwell’s grandchildren.
“I don’t think I could’ve lived with myself if I could do something but didn’t,” Gladwell said to KMBC. Gladwell wanted Welsh’s child to be able to go with him to see all of Philadelphia’s sports teams play: baseball’s Phillies, hockey’s Flyers and basketball’s 76ers.
“I wanted him to be able to experience all of that with his dad,” Gladwell said.
Gladwell donated his kidney to Welsh in October 2020. The full weight of the sacrifice became clear early last year, when a Covid-19 infection sent Gladwell to a hospital intensive care unit with advanced kidney failure.
“I was in a pretty pickle,” Gladwell remarked.
It took him nearly a month to recover – but he did. And Welsh said he was grateful for that, and that both men’s kidneys were functioning well.
Neither Welsh nor Gladwell had been to the Super Bowl. So, after Gladwell’s Chiefs and Welsh’s Eagles clinched berths to Sunday’s Super Bowl, the teams worked together to arrange for both men to be in the stadium in Phoenix which is hosting the NFL’s title game.
Welsh is hoping the Eagles win their first Super Bowl since 2018. Gladwell on the other hand hopes the Chiefs can retake pro football’s crown for the first time since 2020.
However, no matter the outcome, the trip itself symbolizes a monumental victory over hardship not only for both men – but also for Gladwell’s wife, Randi.
She was in Phoenix for several months nine years earlier undergoing treatment for ovarian cancer which spread to her kidney.
She was reportedly given a 7% chance to survive. But, as she headed to Phoenix again with Gladwell and Welsh, the cancer was in remission.