10 November 2009 2:00 AM, PST | PEOPLE.com | See recent PEOPLE.com news »
Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, one of basketball's all-time greatest players, announced Tuesday morning that he has cancer. The sports legend made the public disclosure nearly a year after being diagnosed with chronic myeloid leukemia. "Having lost one of my closest friends to a different, highly aggressive form of leukemia, I knew how serious my diagnosis was," said Abdul-Jabbar, 62. "My own life expectancy became a question mark." Abdul-Jabbar, the NBA's all-time leading scorer, won five championships with the Los Angeles Lakers before retiring in 1989. He was diagnosed with Cml in December 2008 and is being treated with a medicine that targets the abnormal protein that causes his leukemia. »
- Bob Meadows
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