East Bay teen diagnosed with cancer now Clayton Valley High placekicker

CLAYTON, Calif. - Brady Emry was diagnosed with cancer when he was in junior high. He has been beating the disease back for years, and is now a placekicker for Clayton Valley High and headed to college in the fall. 

"I feel good," he said. "I feel like right now I’m the strongest I have ever been.  I feel good physically.  It doesn’t feel like I had leukemia." 

The 18-year-old Concord native was diagnosed in January 2021, when he was in the 7th grde. 

Brady underwent 900-plus consecutive days of oral or IV chemotherapy and labored through weeks isolated in the hospital. 

"I just always stayed positive, and I knew nothing could really stop me from doing what I wanted to," he said. "And when I didn't feel good, my mom would walk around the hospital floor.  We would see how many laps I could do going around.  And I just trusted my doctors.  I trust they knew what they were doing."  

Remission came in May 2023, and months later, he approached Clayton Valley’s head football coach, Nick Tisa.

"He came to me," Tisa said.  "It was his sophomore year.  He wanted to play football, and his mom gave me some background to the story.  And they wanted him to play QB.  That's going to be a hard position to play with something of the caliber that Brady's gone through.  Maybe he could be a manager or a ball boy.  Something like that.  And so he just got into kicking." 

Three years later Brady is now a 4-star punter and kicker for the Eagles, and his journey had made quite the impression his fellow teammates.

"There's no words that can describe what he had to go through and there no excuse for us to push through like a two hour practice while he had to fight for years battling something so terrible," said senior lineman Alex Mackechnie.   

Fellow lineman Cruz Caballero added this: ""When he told us things he had to go through it was hard to hear, but knowing that it obviously makes me want to push harder just for our team and him.  It's a huge inspiration."  

Brady tackled cancer much like his kicking duties.  Simply by visualizing a positive outcome.

"You just have to be focused," he said.  "You can't be focused on anything else.   During our games we stand in here alone by the kicking net picturing every single play that's going on,  and I'm going to need to go out on to the field and perform.  Before it happens I already know what I was going to do.   I’m going to make the kick." 

All of Brady’s hard work has paid off.  

He's accepted a scholarship to punt and kick at Minot State a Division 2 school in South Dakota in the fall.

"Yeah, honestly I never thought I'd get a scholarship or anything," he said. "It was kind of a big dream.  I didn't know any coaches would believe in me, but I put in the work and I'm going to keep putting in the work and make sure I get better."

Brady's cancer battle has galvanized his Clayton Valley High team.  

They are all locked in with life lessons that will lead them far beyond the football field.

"I realized that you only get one shot at it, and you can't take it for granted.  You just have to appreciate ever moment that you’re in and just enjoy that you're here."