Wayne Drehs has been at ESPN for 20 years, telling stories about everything from a basketball court in the middle of a tenement in Taguig City, Philippines to how a young man from North Carolina gave the gift of life to several others through organ donation. This time, he got to tell his own story, which includes waiting to have open heart surgery — in Cleveland, of all places — until after the 2016 World Series.
Sitting at home recovering left Drehs with little else to do but indulge his love of shoes, which eventually brought him into contact with a fellow open-heart surgery patient who’d designed an amazing pair of Nikes.