PEORIA, Ariz. — When you remind Connor Joe that it has been five years to the month since hearing the words that altered his personal and professional orbits, he paused.
You have cancer.
“I guess you’re right,” said Joe, a Poway native who ed the Padres this season. “I knew July (of 2025) would be a big marker for me. They deem five years (cancer-free) as remission.”
This month, however, was the first milepost in a journey that continues. The outfielder and first baseman has come full circle.
While a member of the Dodgers organization, a spring training physical revealed Joe had stage 3 testicular cancer that had metastasized to his lung.
Though the American Cancer Society calls his form of the disease highly treatable, he was 27 and in the earliest stages of his career.
The former Poway High School and University of San Diego star was jolted by the discovery and weight of it all.
“To hear the news was devastating,” Joe said this week. “I didn’t feel sick. I had a great offseason. I went from ‘How am I going to make this team">
The first thing Joe did was to side-step the darkest corners of his mind, where doubts and crippling fears can take root.
No matter the encouraging numbers, it can be human nature to wallow in the worst possible outcomes. The five-year survival rate of his form of cancer is 95%, but try telling that to the other 5% of those diagnosed.
“I it vividly,” said Joe, 32, who signed a $1 million, one-year deal in San Diego. “I was in Scottsdale at the Mayo Clinic. During the exam, the doctor felt something abnormal. On the ultrasound, the tech really wasn’t supposed to, but he said ‘This looks like an abnormal mass.’ The blood tests came back with elevated tumor markers.
“I sitting in the office, very anxious, waiting for the doctor to come in. I kind of knew what the news was going to be. I him coming in. I feel like he’s broken this news to hundreds if not thousands of patients. I could tell he had a hard time telling me.”
The ground balls and at-bats were benched, replaced by chemotherapy and a year away from the game.
“My whole perspective on that month, that week, that season, that year, was changed,” Joe said.
The lightning bolt stopped Joe’s career in its tracks. And the COVID-19 pandemic cast a new and uneasy spotlight on his health and the world.
Joe felt handcuffed before he truly had a chance to start, playing just eight career big-league games for the Giants the season before. Now cancer was going to claim a full season at an uncertain time.
“My oncologist felt we did a good job of catching it early,” Joe said. “So I pretty much took it as, ‘OK, tell me the game plan. What do we have to do? Tell me the steps. Let’s knock this thing out. Let’s get to work.’”
Joe had a compromised immune system during a public health crisis, ramping up the stress and concern.
Joe handled the chemotherapy at first, but that changed over time. It all becomes a mental and physical test.
“The chemo made me sick towards the end,” Joe said. “The first couple rounds were no problem. I was working out, walking, going out on the water (and) kayaking. After treatment, I would come home and ride the bike. If it was five minutes, it was five minutes. If it was 20 minutes, that was great. But my oncologist wanted me to get outside.
“Then I started feeling nauseous and fatigued. There are a lot of lessons I’ve learned from being an athlete. You’ve got to grind it out.”
Joe rested, sleeping a lot, while balancing the need to stay active.
In reality, Joe had two jobs: his health and, hopefully soon, baseball again.
“Clearly a challenging experience, regardless of age,” Padres manager Mike Shildt said. “Likely more challenging as a younger, athletic guy who’s got a high profile and ended up a good (big) league player. To overcome that on your journey, it’s already hard enough to get to the highest level, is pretty impressive.
“He’s a very mature young man.”
The worlds and thinking overlapped.
“I reflect back to how I fought it,” Joe said. “A lot of it is lessons I’ve learned from being an athlete. You’ve got to grind it out. You have to have a roap. There are checklists. As baseball players, we have a process. We have routines. How do I get healthy? That’s how I looked at it.”
It was more difficult for Joe to watch those around him.
“The hardest part was the game being taken away from me and to watch my family do their best to me when they felt helpless,” Joe said. “As an athlete, I knew I could get through it. I knew how much I could handle.
“I always tell people I think it’s harder on the ers than the actual patient. That’s how I felt.”
Joe is married with a daughter. Another point on the health timeline nears as the prospect of a future with a new team materializes.
“I kept a pretty narrow focus on what the next step was,” Joe said. “My last day of chemo was exciting, but I was also a little bit anxious because I had a scan coming to see if it worked or if I needed more.
“Then the doctor called and said the chemo worked. Your body is cancer-free. My parents had a drive-by with signs for me. People would cheer. That was really the best we could do at the time with balloons and everything.
“That was a great day.”
In July, an even greater day awaits.
