Sunday, August 17

 Photo: Kelsey Grant/D-backs

Welcome to the D-backs Beat newsletter! I’m Steve Gilbert and I’ve been writing about the D-backs since 1998. Let’s get right to it …

Charitable causes will get a lot of attention as part of MLB Players’ Weekend, but for Diamondbacks manager Torey Lovullo, it’s a year-round mission to raise awareness and show support for those fighting the toughest of battles.

Every Sunday home game, he wears special cleats to raise awareness for Williams syndrome. Lovullo also wears a “Rare But Real” T-shirt most days during his pregame media sessions to do the same.

Some days to his media sessions he wears an “End ALS” shirt in honor of his good friend and MLB.com researcher/reporter Sarah Langs.

Two wristbands, though, are always with him. One orange, one yellow, each with the words “No one fights alone” on them.

 Photo: Kelsey Grant/D-backs

The yellow one represents leiomyosarcoma, a rare and aggressive form of cancer that develops in smooth muscle tissue.

Lovullo’s best friend since second grade, Dean Singer, has been battling Stage Four leiomyosarcoma for a few years, and Lovullo is determined to let him know that he is fighting right along with him. During the 2023 World Series, Lovullo held up a Stand Up To Cancer sign with Singer’s name on it.

“I’ve had like a blood brother my whole life,” Lovullo said. “You talk about deep-rooted friendships, Dean and I have known each other as long as I can remember. I've just been walking through life with a best friend, somebody that I value as much as I value anything in my life, and his friendship means the world to me. He called me and he said, ‘Look, I just want to let you know that I am probably gonna have my kidney removed because I have cancer.’ It has metastasized, and it's all throughout his body. It's in his lungs, it's in his liver now. So he fights it every day with the most unbelievable sense of humor, and he's just got one of the best attitudes you could ever imagine. So I'm fighting along with him. I fight along with him every single day.”

Lovullo discovered that leiomyosarcoma is not a well-known cancer and more funding is needed for research. If he can help raise awareness, he hopes that will translate to more support for research.

The orange wristband represents leukemia, and Lovullo had those made when his good friend and former Major League player and executive Billy Bean was diagnosed with the disease.

Bean, who was a former teammate of Lovullo’s, passed away just over a year ago, and Lovullo gave the eulogy at a pair of memorials for him, missing a Diamondbacks game for one of them.

“That was brutal,” Lovullo said of Bean’s passing. “You meet people in your life and you think they're gonna live forever, they give you the feeling that they're a part of your life and you're never gonna have to say goodbye. You get to a certain age, I'm 60 years old now, and I've had to say goodbye to some very dear friends for different reasons. Billy and I were as close as two friends could be, and to say goodbye to Billy was heartbreaking.”

The orange bracelet also represents another person near and dear to Lovullo’s heart -- the 4-year-old niece of D-backs assistant general manager Mike Fitzgerald. Carson Doherty was diagnosed with leukemia and is currently going through treatment.

“That was like getting hit over the head when I heard about Fitz’s niece,” Lovullo said. “So I wear this [orange] bracelet to carry on Billy’s legacy and also to show that Carson isn’t fighting alone either.”

Lovullo says he gets asked about the bracelets all the time and is happy to stop and share what they mean and how people can help.

“I love being a walking billboard for these types of messages,” Lovullo said. “And I'm not going to stop. I want to do my part while I can to create awareness and hopefully raise funds to help save lives. I probably get asked four to five times a day on these, and it's easy for me to talk about it. I love talking about it. Sometimes it's hard and it brings back some tough memories, but I love talking about it to create that awareness.”

To subscribe to D-backs Beat, visit this page and mark "D-backs Beat" from our newsletter list. Make sure you're following the D-backs or that they're checked as your favorite team.

View Online

© 2025 MLB Advanced Media, L.P. MLB trademarks and copyrights are used with permission of Major League Baseball. Visit MLB.com. Any other marks used herein are trademarks of their respective owners.

Please review our Privacy Policy.

You (mlb-newsletters@mlb.com) received this message because you registered to receive commercial email messages or purchased a ticket from MLB. 

Please add info@marketing.mlbemail.com to your address book to ensure our messages reach your inbox. If you no longer wish to receive commercial email messages from MLB.com, please unsubscribe or log in and manage your email subscriptions.

Postal Address: MLB.com, c/o MLB Advanced Media, L.P., 1271 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020.