My latest piece for Awful Announcing on Peter Kostis and the impact he is making after going public with his battle with colon cancer.

From the story:

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The number that sticks with Peter Kostis now is 18, and it has nothing to do with golf.

As of last week, Kostis has been contacted by 18 people who found out they have colon cancer after getting tested because of the CBS golf analyst spreading the word about his battle with the disease.

“They all have a good prognosis,” Kostis said. “I feel good about that. It shows what kind of impact you can have.”

Kostis, 66, is walking the fairways again for CBS. He says he still isn’t completely back to 100 percent, but he is getting there.

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Kostis downplays the notion of his celebrity status. However, as one of golf’s top instructors and a high-profile analyst for CBS, he was struck at the people he was able to reach in going public about his condition and message.

“I met a guy at Augusta, and I honestly unfortunately don’t even remember his name,” Kostis said. “He just grabbed me by the arm as I was walking out in front of the clubhouse. He goes, ‘I want to thank you for what you did for going public. I have stage 4 colon cancer.  It’s back and it’s spreading.  I don’t know what the prognosis is going to be, but the fact that you’ve beaten it is helping me hang in there and go through my treatments and stuff like that.’

“Yeah, there’s a lot of negative to being in the public eye, but they pale in comparison to the positives when you can do something like that.”