Enterprise Journalism Release – February 24, 2011
The Sporting Life with Jeremy Schaap (March 4, 10 p.m., ESPN Radio)
On May 9, 2010, 25-year-old LPGA golfer Erica Blasberg was found dead in her Las Vegas home. After a four-month police investigation, it was determined she had committed suicide. Reporter Colleen Dominguez explores Blasberg’s life and what led a promising young athlete to kill herself. Through phone records and interviews with close friends and family, Outside the Lines reveals new details about the final months and hours of her life and what those closest to her knew about her emotional decline.
“When Erica was born, I was probably hoping for a boy. I put the club in her hand and she was able to do it. Genetically she wasn’t pre‑disposed, so I had to do a little pushing there.” — Mel Blasberg, Erica’s father
“I could tell that she had some parts of her that were not totally there, and maybe a little bit sad. So I just thought it was a bad phase for her and it would get better.” — Cassandra Kirkland, Erica’s college teammate who stayed with her for several weeks just four months before her death
Mel Blasberg — “She was in a tournament and called me, ‘I’m gonna kill myself.’ And next tournament, we went out, I talked to her, she seemed fine and we left there. So it wasn’t a suicide attempt, she was just telling me, ‘I can’t take this life anymore.’”
Colleen Dominguez — “So you had an inkling this was a real possibility.”
Mel Blasberg — “I knew my daughter was not healthy.”
“I have always been incapable of handling the life I lead. I know to some this would be a dream, but to me it is torture.” – – Quote from Erica Blasberg’s suicide note
SportsCenter (Sunday, 10 a.m., 6 p.m. ESPN; 11 p.m. ESPNEWS)
Once upon a time — before football, basketball, or even baseball — there was jousting. During the Middle Ages, jousting was used by kings to keep their knights in peak fighting condition. Today, jousting brings to mind a local renaissance fair or a movie scene. But jousting does exist today, in its original form. SportsCenter traveled to the World Jousting Championships in Colorado to speak with modern day knights who are desperately trying to bring what they consider the original extreme sport back to the masses.
ESPN Deportes SportsCenter (Sunday, 11 p.m.)
Reportajes Especiales piece (ESPNDeportes.com)
In the early hours of February 27, 2010, a tsunami triggered by an 8.8 magnitude earthquake hit the Chilean central coast. Waves up to 36 feet tall, the equivalent of a three-story building, swept away entire towns. Among the most destroyed was Constitución where highly skilled 9-year-old soccer player Felipe Sáez was killed. What followed was the struggle of a community to rise from its devastation, and the hope brought forth by a new soccer school built in the memory of Felipe and made possible by the commitment of Chilean International’s Mark González, whom Sáez had idolized.
College GameDay (Saturday, 10 a.m., ESPNU; 11 a.m., ESPN)
Bobby Hurley won two national championships as Duke’s point guard in the early 1990s, but his assists now come as assistant coach for his younger brother, Dan, at tiny Wagner College in Staten Island, N.Y. They have run the emotional gamut together, from basketball success to battling tremendous physical and emotional challenges. Greg Garber reports on two brothers whose devotion runs deep.
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