For Gallinari, His Job Is About A Lot More Than Just Basketball

Despite being out for the season with a torn ACL he suffered while competing in a FIBA World Cup qualifier game, Boston Celtics forward Danilo Gallinari has continued to put in work during the 2022-23 campaign. But this time, in a way that supersedes even the global-reaching impact of basketball.

This season, Gallinari has teamed up with the St. Baldrick’s Foundation (the largest charity funder of childhood cancer research grants) in order to further the quest toward, once and for all, solving the disease that each year takes more children’s lives than any other.

Along with making a generous donation to the foundation, Gallinari has dedicated time to meeting St. Baldrick’s Honored Kids (children who are fighting or have fought cancer) and fundraising for the cause by shaving his own head and cooking pizzas for a local restaurant in his spare time (more on this in a bit).

“We (my team and I) have been researching charities to work with that enable us to be impactful on somebody’s life. We had a lot of meetings with St. Baldrick’s, and [in the end], we decided to help them out and work with them,” Danilo Gallinari shared during a phone interview with Forbes.

“We did this mostly because I think cancer is one of the biggest fights, maybe the biggest fight, that we as humans are still not 100 percent sure if we are going to win or not when we get it. This is especially the case for kids. And St. Baldrick’s is one of the biggest and best charities in kids’ cancer research, so it was a no-brainer to start working with them and help them out in something that is very important for us.”

Unbeknownst to most, children’s cancer is a lot different than adult cancer in the way it behaves and mutates. As a result, it requires entirely different treatment protocols. That’s why we need charities (like St. Baldrick’s) that specialize in this specific area of research.

As Kathleen Ruddy, St. Baldrick’s Chief Executive Officer (CEO), explains in her conversation with Forbes: “[c]ancer is the [number one] disease killer of children, and most pediatric cancers are different than those seen in adults. Since kids aren’t just ‘little adults’ we cannot cut a dose of medicine in half and give it to kids. Each [child] needs a treatment designed to protect [their] developing bodies and minds.”

Ruddy continued, “[s]ince most of the funds invested in cancer research by governments, charities, and the pharmaceutical industry are invested in adult cancers, the St. Baldrick’s Foundation focuses exclusively on children to ensure that every child can not only survive cancer, but live healthily, free of the life-long health issues that are caused by most of today’s treatments.”

The action that may be the most telling of Gallinari’s commitment toward the foundation and the fight to defeat cancer came recently when the veteran forward live streamed his head being shaved as an act of solidarity with all the children who have lost their hair as a result of chemotherapy (a common treatment for combating cancer).

“The most important thing for me was to raise awareness for St. Baldrick’s and about the situation involving children’s cancer. [I want] to make sure that people educate themselves and understand the full situation and the numbers/statistics behind it all. Because a lot of people know about cancer, but they don’t really know what’s going on in the world’s of the kids and adults [who have been diagnosed with cancer],” Gallinari told Forbes.com.

“And unfortunately, one of the first things that happens to children and adults that get cancer is they start losing their hair due to treatment. And the head shaving is something that St. Baldrick’s has been doing has been doing as an event [for some time]. So, when they mentioned it to me during our meetings, I jumped right in.”

Outside of being one of the most versatile scorers of his generation, the one thing people have come to associate him with over the years is all the different hairstyles (who could forget the mohawk phase) he has donned on the court throughout his 15-year (and counting) NBA career.

However, his affinity for dabbling in various styles did not matter to him at all when he decided to shave his head for St. Baldrick’s. Whatever enjoyment his hair brought him was outweighed by the fulfillment he felt in furthering this cause.

Gallinari went on to explain the importance of St. Baldrick’s work, even commenting on how far behind our knowledge of cancer is to other fields like that of sports medicine.

“It is important because we have the answers to a lot of diseases and medical problems. [For instance,] I, unfortunately, have had a lot of injuries throughout my career, [and I’ve seen firsthand how many answers we have to those problems]. But we still need to find a lot of answers as it pertains to cancer.”

“And in order for us to find the answers and to find the cures, we need to research. And we need to have investments in the research so that the research can find the answers for us. It is not easy. It is a long process. But we can do it. We’ve been getting better. If you think about us in the medical system 20, 30, 50, 100 years ago, we’ve been getting better. We are way better now. But still, the cancer sector is something that needs a lot of work.”

Ruddy echoes Gallinari’s sentiments when it comes to the rapid improvement made in the field over the last handful of years. “I know it is. When I took up this work 22 years ago, the cancer field was saying ‘we’ve gotten about as far as we can with the three-legged stool of treatment: chemotherapy, surgery and radiation. We need another tool or another leg on that stool.’ Enter immunotherapy – the ability to harness the power of the body’s immune system to fight disease. It’s a game changer in blood cancers and has proven less toxic and damaging than the earlier three legs of the stool.”

“In addition to the advent of immunotherapy, we’ve seen survival increase in many cancers – sometimes by staggering percentages – in addition to lowering the length of treatment, reducing the amount of toxic drugs used, and many other factors that add up to more kids surviving and enjoying a better quality of life during and after treatment.”

Gallinari isn’t done yet, though. His next initiative actually involves him participating in an act that is quite sacred to his Italian heritage: cooking pizzas.

“We have a big [event] coming up where I am going to be cooking. We are going to do it by partnering with Eataly, which is a grocery store located in Boston. But it is also located all over the world.”

“[For the event,] I am going to be cooking as many pizzas as I can, trying to raise as much money as I can. So hopefully, people enjoy the pizza,” Gallinari remarked jokingly.

For some further context, on April 11th, Gallinari will be at Eataly Boston for the evening from 6:00 – 9:00 PM at their staple restaurant, La Pizza & La Pasta. There, Gallinari will create a specialty pizza alongside their team from Rossopomodoro (their pizza partners) twice throughout the evening. That pizza will be on the menu that evening and through May 11th. $1 from each of that specialty pizza sold during that time period will be donated back to St. Baldrick’s.

(Sidenote: if you were curious what the Italian forward’s favorite toppings on a pizza were, he later shared with us that he prefers a simple combination of ham and gorgonzola cheese. Maybe that’s a precursor to what one of his signature dishes might look like at his event. Who knows!)

Whether it be through his financial contributions, his head shaving, or his pizza cooking, the work Gallinari is doing off the court has gone a long way toward furthering the goals of St. Baldrick’s.

“[Gallinari] is one of the top professional basketball players in the world, and he is proving we don’t all have to be scientists to be part of the solution because we all have something to give,” Ruddy remarked.

“For [Gallinari], it’s many things…like shaving his head in solidarity with childhood cancer patients, inspiring young basketball players who are raising funds for lifesaving research, or asking his fans to take up the cause, and inviting others to join him! Kids really need more champions – we can all be that champion.”

Regardless of whether or not his Boston Celtics win the NBA title this season, Gallinari has shown he is a true champion where it matters most: in the fight to help others and make the world a better place.

If you live in Boston or will be in the area on April 11th, be sure to come down to Eataly Boston La Pizza & La Pasta for Pizza del Gallo: An Evening with Danilo Gallinari.

And if you are interested in donating to the St. Baldrick’s Foundation, please be sure to visit StBaldricks.org and help #ConquerKidsCancer.