ROUND ROCK, Texas -- When Cade Webber was growing up and playing baseball, his dad was always there with him. Chris Webber coached Cade Webber for many years leading up to high school.

What You Need To Know


  • Cade Webber grew up playing baseball with his father, Chris Webber

  • Chris Webber diagnosed with leukemia in 2019 

  • Cade preparing to donate stem cells to his father 

“That’s all we used to go. We used to come up here to the cages and hit every day,” says Cade Webber. “That’s something we did with him every day.”

All the practice helped Cade Webber become a really good player in high school for the Round Rock Dragons. In January of 2019, he was about to begin his senior baseball season when the Webber family received news that shook their world. Chris Webber had been diagnosed with leukemia. 

“It was pretty rough for him not to be there doing that period of time because he was in the hospital for like a month,” Cade Webber says.

The Webber family appears in a holiday photo. (Courtesy: Cade Webber)

After his initial treatment, Chris Webber went into remission and was able to attend many of his son's games that season. But the cancer did not go away. Despite lots of chemotherapy, it has returned at different times over the past year.

“There’s highs and lows all the time,” says Cade Webber. “Now the past couple of months has been a little more rough.”

Chris Webber is currently in Houston and receiving care at the University of Texas MD Anderson Care Center. The hope is that he can go into remission soon and be well enough to receive a bone marrow transplant. To help with that transplant, Cade Webber recently spent about a week in Houston preparing his body so that he could donate stem cells. Those stem cells can be stored and when Chris Webber is feeling better, they can be used in the transplant.

“For me to pretty much almost save his life, that’s a pretty big deal,” Cade Webber says. “They call it his rebirth, and for me to be able to do that is an honor.”

Because of the current health crisis in the country, the Webber family can’t see Chris Webber as much as they normally would because of the risk. But Cade Webber is doing what he can back in Round Rock to help. He’s been designing T-shirts and bracelets to help raise money for medical expenses.

A bracelet Cade Webber designed in support of his father, Chris Webber, as he battles leukemia. (Courtesy: Cade Webber)

“There’s been a lot of positive feedback from all of the community,” he says.

The phrase on the shirts and wrist bands says “Stay the Course.” Cade Webber says that this the first thing his father told him and his younger brother Cooper when he got diagnosed. Cade Webber also has a tattoo of that on his right arm. A GoFundMe page has also been set up to help the family and so far has raised more than $50,000.