By Dylan Butler
It started with one simple slogan on one simple yellow rubber bracelet. “Livestrong.” It was the brainchild of cycling demigod Lance Armstrong to raise awareness – and money – for cancer research. Armstrong, himself a cancer survivor, has clearly hit a nerve because 50 million bracelets have been sold. It is a great idea, but it has also started an avalanche of fundraising rubber bracelets. There are bracelets for tsunami relief, for the Make a Wish Foundation, to Support our Troops, for AIDS, heart disease and diabetes. They are red and blue and pink and green, and it seems that everyone is wearing some sort of bracelet that is making some sort of statement.At Fenway Park, some Red Sox fans wore wrist bands that describe how they feel about the Yankees. It's fairly predictable.And the Yankees have gotten into the act now, too, selling bracelets with different players' numbers on them at local convenience stores. Please don't even try and tell me they're raising money for the club.Maybe I should get my own bracelet, “Writestrong,” and say that all proceeds go to the Buy Dylan Butler Breakfast Foundation.I was covering the St. John's/Seton Hall baseball game in South Orange Sunday and they were selling “Playstrong” bracelets, a fundraising effort for the Seton Hall women's soccer team.Enough already.Listen, before you label me as an insensitive buffoon, I am all for donating to charity. I purchased a “Livestrong” bracelet, not because it seemed to be the fashionable thing at the time, but because I believe in the cause. But can't we find some other way to make our statements? Can't anyone get an original idea? Or even go back to the old school ones, like the 50/50 drawings at a sporting event or have some Little League kid sell chocolate bars by the side of the road. By the way, TimesLedger photographer Ken Goldfield supported that cause on the side of the Whitestone Expressway en route to Seton Hall Sunday.But, please, enough with the rubber bracelets. There are so many people wearing so many different bracelets, it's impossible to even know what they're supporting. At least when it was just the yellow “Livestrong” bracelets, you knew it was for cancer research.Parting shotsSpeaking of benefits and giving to charity, a few weeks ago I wrote about the plight of Stephen Capano. Because his niece Megan Guerriero, a 2004 St. John's grad, was friendly with several Red Storm soccer players, Capano became a fan. He was born with Atrial Septic Defect and Tri-Cuspid Malformation of the heart; in other words, he was born with a hole in his heart. Doctors said he wouldn't live past age 10. He was also born with glaucoma and became legally blind in his early 20s. Capano's wife, Deidre Capano, is also blind.Now 42, Capano has had 12 pacemakers and four open-heart surgeries. Because the heavy trauma on his body has left a great deal of scar tissue, doctors at Columbia Presbyterian Hospital put him in the extremely high-risk category. His next open heart surgery will be a transplant. Or else he won't survive.Thanks to a huge donation from thousands of people who were touched by his story and who attended a benefit for Capano earlier this month – and a little luck – Capano got that heart transplant he so desperately needed.He went to Columbia Presbyterian last Thursday at 8 a.m. for the surgery and he is expected to be there for about another week. The soccer team, who all volunteered at the benefit last month, continued to support Capano. Matt Groenwald and Andre Schmid, who along with former Red Storm midfielder Chris Corcoran, were the most active players throughout the process and were at the hospital during the entire eight-hour surgery. “He's been waiting five years for this and he got the transplant three weeks after the benefit,” Guerriero said. “It's amazing.”Reach Sports Editor Dylan Butler by e-mail at TimesLedger@aol.com or call 718-229-0300, Ext. 143.
