Rodgers, 47, stunned the "Extra Innings" audience by announcing he has terminal stage 4 lung cancer.

"I said, 'Hey, I've got something more important to talk about. This may be my last show,' " said Rodgers, a former Reds minor league pitcher and front office executive in his third season hosting the weekend post-game shows.

But it wasn't his final show. Rodgers said Tuesday he plans to be back on the air Friday after the Reds-Indians game, after treatment for lung and brain tumors.

"I feel great," he said. "I've never felt better, actually."

In early May, Rodgers had told "Extra Innings" listeners he was suffering through an acute migraine headache, and asked for their remedies. His doctor told him he had a "tension headache," he said.

He did not seek a second opinion.

"I'm a man. I'm a knucklehead. I'll keep going till I drop," said Rodgers, a real estate agent for Wyoming's Coldwell Banker West Shell office. He lives in Springfield Township with his wife, Dorothy, and two children, ages 10 and 7.

After two weeks of severe headaches, he said, his left knee, foot and arm went numb when he came home from WLW-AM on May 23.

"I thought I was having a stroke," he said.

Emergency room doctors determined he had a brain tumor about the size of a quarter. In preparation for brain surgery on May 25, a full-body scan revealed that he had non-small-cell lung cancer that had spread to his brain.

"I don't smoke. I don't drink. I eat more salads than I do red meat. I don't go to bars. I thought that's the way you live," Rodgers said.

Radiation treatments at Precision Radiotherapy in West Chester Township in the last two weeks have eliminated the brain tumor, Rodgers said.

"It's gone. And if it comes back, they'll zap it some more," he said.

Rodgers was meeting Tuesday with his oncologist to determine which drugs will best treat the lung cancer.

A Texas native, Rodgers settled in the Reds front office here, where he met his future wife, a Procter & Gamble Co. employee.

He resigned from the Reds in 2002, then sued the team claiming he had been demoted in late 2001 because he is African-American.

Rodgers moved back here in 2004, after the Baltimore Orioles fired him as director of minor-league operations. He then earned his real estate license, and started working for Coldwell Bank West Shell five year ago. He also has been a basketball official.

On WLW-AM Sunday, Rodgers choked up when he told his Father's Day listeners that he had a gift for them - advising dads to buy adequate life insurance coverage. He was emotional again Tuesday repeating the advice.

"Go get life insurance. Before you pay the mortgage, make sure you leave enough to take care of your family," said Rodgers, who bought a $250,000 term policy for $58 a month three years ago.

"I should have done a lot more than that. I made more than 58 bucks every day I refereed. Dads should be a provider. That's what Dads must do, whether they're there or not there."