Former Springfield College wrestling standout Jeff Blatnick died Wednesday at 55 from heart failure.
Jeff Blatnick, right, wrestles Sweden's Thomas Johansson during the Super Heavyweight Greco-Roman wrestling event at the 1984 Olympics in Los Angeles. The former Springfield College star died Wednesday at 55.
Former Springfield College star Jeff Blatnick, who overcame cancer to win a gold medal in Greco-Roman wrestling at the 1984 Summer Olympics and went on to a career as a sports commentator and motivational speaker, died Wednesday in New York state at age 55.
Officials at Ellis Hospital in Schenectady, N.Y., said he died there of heart failure.
“This is such a tragedy,” said Blatnick’s Springfield College coach, Doug Parker, now retired and living in Longmeadow. “Jeff had such an amazing intellect and he was so far ahead of everyone that it wasn’t even a contest.”
Blatnick received a degree in physical education from Springfield College in 1979. He was inducted into the Springfield College Athletic of Hall of Fame in 1987, and received an honorary doctor of Humanities degree that same year.
“On behalf of the entire Springfield College community, I wish to offer our heartfelt sympathy and support to Jeff’s family,” said Richard B. Flynn, president of Springfield College. “We are deeply saddened to hear of his untimely passing. An Olympic wrestling gold medal winner, motivational speaker, cancer survivor, and devoted son, husband, and father, Jeff was a role model and an inspiration to so many people. Jeff is an important part of the history and legacy of Springfield College.”
Blatnick was a high school state champion in suburban Albany in the mid-1970s and was a two-time Division II National champion and three-time Division II All-American at Springfield College in Massachusetts.
“I remember driving to Jeff’s hometown with coach Parker when they had a parade for him,” said Howard Davis, who was Springfield College’s Sports Information Director during Blatnick’s undergraduate years. “He was one of the finest persons I knew.”
Davis recalled being at the airport in Pittsburgh with the University of Massachusetts after he left Springfield College to work in Amherst when somebody came up to him from behind and gave him a big bear hug.
It was Blatnick, who never forgot where he came from or the people who helped him along the way. The bear hug did stun the Minutemen players.
“The players all ran,” Davis said. “But that was Jeff.”
He qualified for the U.S. Olympic team and was a member of the 1980 squad that didn’t compete because the U.S. boycotted that year’s games in Moscow.
In 1982, he was diagnosed with Hodgkin lymphoma. He was treated and the disease went into remission before he won the gold as a super heavyweight in Los Angeles in 1984.
“Jeff had such unbelievable determination,” Parker said. “He wouldn’t let anything bother him.”
Blatnick, who in 1979 became the first and only Springfield College athlete to grace the cover of an NCAA preseason guide, was also a three-time Greco-Roman national champion and won eight Greco-Roman All-American awards, two World Cup medals and two Freestyle All-American honors.
USA Wrestling National Greco-Roman Coach Steve Fraser also won a gold medal at the 1984 games as a teammate of Blatnick. Fraser and Blatnick were the first two U.S. Greco-Roman wrestlers to ever win gold medals.
“I am devastated that Jeff Blatnick, who was a great Greco-Roman champion, has passed away,” Fraser said. “I am stunned by it.”
Fraser talked to Blatnick a few weeks ago about working to promote Greco-Roman wrestling.
“I am heartbroken,” he said. “He has done so much for the sport as an athlete, an announcer, a leader and a spokesman. My prayers go out to his family.”
Bob McGuire, the athletic director at Burnt Hills-Ballston Lake High School, recalled Blatnick asking if he could be a volunteer varsity wrestling coach at the school. Blatnick had gone to high school and competed in nearby Niskayuna.
“What do you say when you hear that from an Olympic champion,” he said Wednesday. “You open the door and say ‘Come on in’.”
Blatnick spent six years volunteering at the school.
“When you’re talking about high school sports, you’re always looking for that special individual who will be a role model for a lot of different children,” he said. “And Jeff Blatnick was that person.”
Blatnick also was successful as a motivational speaker and television commentator. He was an NBC Olympic wrestling analyst in Seoul in 1988, Barcelona in 1992, and Atlanta in 1996 among other assignments, according to his website.
“Jeff,” said Davis, “was a fantastic young man.”
Blatnick was an advocate for people of all ages to maximize their potential to be contributing members of society by developing their spirits, minds, and bodies and maintaining balance in their lives, which reflects the Springfield College mission. As the college’s commencement speaker in 2000, he said: “You can educate the mind. You can train the body. But, without spirit you have nothing, because spirit makes possible what is seemingly impossible.”
Flynn added: “The passing of Jeff Blatnick is a great loss to the Springfield College family and to all those whose lives he touched and inspired.”
(Material from the Associated Press was used in this article.)