Cincinnati Bengals

Sam Wyche is Thankful to be Alive

Published Jun. 30, 2017 6:28 p.m. ET

foxsports

PICKENS, S.C.-- For a special Thanksgiving week episode of my podcast, I went to South Carolina to catch up with former Bengals coach Sam Wyche, nine weeks removed from a heart transplant. Wyche came pretty close to not making it before the Sept. 13 transplant at the Carolinas Medical Center in Charlotte. “But for the grace of God,” Wyche told me, “I should be dead.”

Wyche is my lone guest this week. (Usually I have two. But this week, he was so good when we talked that I decided to run his entire conversation—about half on his life in football, and half on his heart transplant experience and recovery—as one Thanksgiving podcast.) I hope you’ll spend a few Thanksgiving minutes listening to this conversation with a man who will be more thankful this holiday than during any other one in his 71 years on earth. I'm also writing a story on Wyche's life-saving transplant, that will be published here on Thanksgiving day.

I hope you enjoy this conversation.