Yankees Hope Week honors a lifesaving friendship
NEW YORK -- It's Hope Week for the New York Yankees. They're honoring people who have found the greatest gift in helping others.
Never did Jon Becker and Mike Sole believe they would come back together for the first time in the Bronx and be making mozzarella.
"It's like seeing a brother I don't have," Sole said.
Their friendship first started when they were minor league athletic trainers in the Yankees organization, but their brotherly bond kicked in during COVID.
"We spent all of 2020 together in small confines working on intake and we didn't know spending 12 plus hours a day for eight months then we became roommates," explained Sole. "We decided to take separate career paths, but we still kept in touch."
Separate paths, but something kept them tied together. After Sole became ill in 2023, and several tests later, he needed a living liver donor transplant and the perfect match was the person he could always call on.
"Something so perfect had to fit together and it ended up being my best friend. It's just special," Sole said.
For the first time since the transplant in October, the Yankees brought the men together for Hope Week 2024, touring them around Arthur Avenue and filling them with Bronx-Italian delicacies.
"A year later to have the world flipped upside down in the most positive way, it's remarkable," Sole said.
More than 100,000 people are on the transplant wait list. Becker and Sole hope sharing their story could help others in need.
"I'm grateful to be able to share our story and use this platform and help tell the story of organ transplants and donate life," Becker said.
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