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Kings fan who inspired marrow donor registration drive dies

By Helene Elliott
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Tanner Raboin of Chino Hills, the Kings fan whose need for a bone marrow transplant inspired a donor registration drive at the Kings’ regular-season finale on Saturday, died Monday, a team spokesman said.

Raboin, 19, had suffered from a chronic illness resulting from a genetic disorder called Chronic Granulomatous Disease. He had been treated at the National Institutes of Health.

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The drive drew 307 people who registered to be screened as part of the Kings’ partnership with “Be a Match,” an organization that helps patients find matching donors, funds transplants and advances medical research.

Condolences go to Raboin’s family and friends, along with hope that a life-saving match might be found among those 307 people who registered to be screened.

-- Helene Elliott

Sports Now
Helene Elliott

Helene Elliott was with the Los Angeles Times’ Sports department from 1989 to 2024, first as a staff writer and then, starting in 2006, as a columnist. She became the first female journalist to be honored with a plaque in the Hall of Fame of a major professional sport as the 2005 winner of the Hockey Hall of Fame’s Elmer Ferguson Award, awarded to writers “who have brought honor to journalism and to hockey.” A native of Brooklyn, N.Y., and graduate of Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism, she has covered 18 Olympics.

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