Longtime Mile High Sports Host Eric Goodman shares this story with our MHS readers and family.
Mark McIntosh is more than a good man. He’s a great man! He’s a doer, not a dreamer. He’s a man of action, not a man who speaks empty promises. I know this because he was my radio partner on Mile High Sports Radio in afternoon drive for nearly three years. And before that, he was a sports anchor/reporter at CBS4 for nearly two decades.
Mac is not well. Although, he told me, “When you find out there’s something inside of you that’s trying to kill you? You get real serious about LIVING!”
He was recently diagnosed with a rare blood disease called Amyloidosis–a deadly bone-marrow disease. It’s killed his kidneys and he needs a donor or faces forever being on dialysis. This insidious disease, where rogue plasma attacks the heart, liver, lungs, nervous system, or in his case, the kidneys, is tough to detect. And once most folks learn they have this disease, It’s too late. For Mac, it’s not too late, but it’s getting close without help.
All of us bring value to this world. I am not sure I have met many, if any, who give back more than Mac to our community. The world needs more Mac’s, and lieu of this happening, we need to keep the one we’ve got.
When we hosted our sports talk show, he would drive me nuts wanting to bring non-profits on our show to talk about the good they were doing in Colorado—not Broncos players, but executive directors at non-profits. I used to tell him, “Mac, this is a sports show! Our listeners aren’t tuning in to hear about how people are saving the world!”
Many years later, I am asking for your help him and to spread the word. A new kidney will save his life because Amyloidosis has killed kidney’s rotting in his body.
We need Mac alive. We need him to continue the good work he has done for our community. We need him because I know there’s something next for him and all of us should be eager to see it.
His current crusade “Share your Spare” is working with the American Transplant Foundation to raise awareness of how a kidney, liver and bone marrow donation can saves lives.
Mac told me, “I’m praying for a kidney but it’s more than that. This has become a mission to raise awareness that giving something of thyself that is expandable. It can be a real game changer for someone else.”
Besides being the champion for Share Your Spare, he founded “A Stronger Cord.” It’s an organization created through volunteering a decade ago at the Denver Rescue Mission. ASC walks beside displaced men and encourages them to build a stronger cord to their families and communities.
Mac also serves as an advisor to MSU Denver’s “Roadrunner Pathway” and its mission to encourage low-income kids to realize a college education is possible and a career on the business side of sports can be part of their future. If that wasn’t enough, he is chairman of the Irv Brown Endowment Fund, which provides scholarships, mentorships, internships and career opportunities for MSU Denver students enrolled in the Roadrunner Pathway.
Everyone could use some help. Everyone has a story. Everyone isn’t Mark McIntosh.
He has lived, survived, and thrived a life that needs to go beyond 65 years, not just for him, but for all of us. And while most are thinking about retiring, playing golf, playing with grandkids, or something else at that age, he’s thinking, “What can I do next?” Right now, it’s “Share Your Spare.” If there is a next year, I am sure it will be something else.
Mark McIntosh excels in life, and I hope someone will consider giving him a gift that will allow it to continue.