For ‘Papa Leams,’ love, support, proved the antidote for his cancer
2024 Berks football coverage presented by
Utilities Employees Credit Union
Keith Leamer didn’t need to keep coaching football. His resume is pretty much complete after more than 40 years in the game. He’s been a head coach. A defensive coordinator. Coached some of the best teams and greatest players in Berks football history.
Yet there he was out on the practice field nearly every day last season at Reading High. It didn’t matter that he often experienced a burning sensation in his feet, a crushing pressure on his chest, nausea or other discomforts related to chemotherapy.
Had he missed a summer workout, a practice, even a game, his Red Knights players and fellow coaches would’ve understood. They saw how worn he looked, how cancer was eating away at his once taught frame.
Keith Leamer couldn’t bring himself to skip anything. And so, when he wasn’t hooked up to a chemo drip, he was there with them, every grueling day of a difficult season that saw the Red Knights win just once.
He had to; it’s part of his DNA. He’s a competitor. An educator. A mentor. A leader.
“I wanted these kids to see the strength that I had,” says the 62-year-old Leamer, pushed by his tenacious spirit, his pride, and his need to teach.
And so while battling blood cancer — Non-Hodgkin’s Lymphoma, to be precise — “Papa Leams” continued to do what he has done nearly every day of his adult life.
“He could be sick as a dog, ready to pass out . . . and he still went,” said Trevor Leamer, who often drove his dad to practice because he was too weak to do it himself.
“Whatever we needed from Coach, he was able to make it,” said Reading head coach Troy Godinet. “He’s just that guy; he’s gonna push through whatever he has to do and make sure he does things for the best of everybody around. He set an example for the kids. Our kids need to see that, (someone) fighting through adversity.”
Godinet, a former Red Knights linebacker, took over the program in 2022. He knew he would face a mountain of adversity, and he has. His team has won just once this year.
No matter. He’s in it for the long haul, committed to seeing the football culture change.
Leamer, Berks Catholic’s defensive coordinator at the time Godinet was hired and with no plans of leaving the program, was struck by Godinet’s mission, his commitment and his approach. He joined him in the fight.
“The big thing we try to teach these kids is overcoming adversity,” said Leamer. “It’s not the adversity that defines who you are, it’s how you react to it. By them seeing me crawl out of bed and get my butt here every day. . . (I was hoping to show them they) can do the same thing: On the field, in the classroom, (at home). That’s the message.”
What Leamer got in return for his dedication was an outpouring of love that helped carry him through the most arduous 15 months of his life. Once the Red Knights learned of his plight they immediately had his back.
Gabriel Laws, the emotional linebacker who once got into a heated sideline confrontation with Leamer during a game at Berks Catholic, was first in line.
“I was distraught when I found out he was sick,” said Laws. “It made me very emotional. I cried for a good hour when I found out.”
A few years earlier, during a JV game against Berks Catholic, Laws was ready to throw down with Leamer. The freshman hit a Saints player out of bounds, drawing the ire of Leamer, who was coaching BC at the time.
“Shut up old man!” Laws barked at him.
That’s the moment Leamer became “Papa Leams” – his Saints players immediately tagged him with the nickname and it followed him to Reading High. It’s also a moment that started what has become a tight relationship between Laws and his coach. They’re kindred spirts, each with a sharp edge and a lovable side.
“We have this great connection,” Laws said. “I love the man to death. There were days he couldn’t show up to practice because he had to go to chemo. We understood that. Then he would show up on a Friday night like nothing happened.”
That was a facade, of course. There was a lot going happening within Leamer’s body, which was steadily eroding as his cancer worsened and treatments took their toll.
He was diagnosed with blood cancer in April 2023; he had his first round of treatments in October.
The rigorous ordeal took a painful twist when Leamer reacted negatively to Rituxan, an antibody medication injected into his body. He seized uncontrollably after being injected, so much so that Trevor – one of his linebackers at BC – had grab hold of him.
Leamer’s reaction to the drug made his treatments more difficult, and more drawn out, but there were no other viable options so his doctors continued to administer Rituxan.
“He was a warrior through all of that,” said Trevor, who was often by his father’s side during treatments.
He might not have shown it but Leamer was scared for his life upon being diagnosed. He was on the front lines when one of his Berks Catholic players, Anthony Myers, battled brain cancer. That tragic episode remains an open wound for many who lived through it.
He also saw what his oldest son, Jake, went through in his battle with thyroid cancer a decade earlier. Jake beat that one.
His wife, Cindy, has also faced health issues in recent years; the Red Knights had her back, too, presenting her with a game ball after a win over McCaskey in 2022.
Leamer, a three-sport athlete at Quakertown who played baseball at Penn State, admits he wasn’t confident he would win his one-on-one against cancer.
“In front of the kids, in front of my family, I tried to put on that tough exterior,” he said. “At times I had to fake it. I was in a bad place for several weeks (after being diagnosed).”
He’ll quickly tell you that the most effective treatment he encountered was the love he felt from his football family – at Reading, Berks Catholic, Kutztown, Upper Perkiomen, and his other coaching and teaching homes.
“Trying to coach . . . it was awful,” he admitted. “I was exhausted. Sometimes I would have to take a nap before going to practice. It was a very tough situation to overcome, but I had to do it because these kids opened their arms to me.
“The love and support of these kids and these coaches and my family and my friends and the teachers I’ve worked with . . . that’s how I got through it.”
In March Leamer learned he was in remission. He rang the bell at Lehigh Valley Hospital, a victory celebration for cancer survivors.
A few months later he received the David Hertzog Memorial Award as Reading High’s assistant Coach of the Year. Laws accepted for him.
“This man has cancer, and he did not let it define him,” an appreciative Godinet said at the awards assembly. “He did not let it defeat him. He found a way to get here every day.”
A few months earlier, at the conclusion of the football season, the inaugural Leamer Love Award was presented to lineman Michael Odeyemi. The award will go annually to the Reading player who shows “resiliency on and off the field while giving their best effort to themselves and everybody around them.”
Leamer is back to full strength now. He has resumed his early morning workouts, curling 60-pound barbells, and has continued to push his guys to be better players and better people.
He still gets choked up when recalling the dark days he faced and the way people rallied around him. He could not hold back tears the night of Reading’s final game last season at Hempfield when the Red Knights surprised him by running onto the field for pregame warmups wearing “Leamer Love” T-shirts.
The back of the shirt says it all: “We got your back.”
Keith Leamer will never forget what his football family has meant to him.
“When you’re going through (what I went through), something like that,” he said of seeing his guys wearing those shirts of support, “it means so much.”
