Rough call keeps teen off diamond

Monty Stratton was a successful major league pitcher before a hunting accident in 1938 forced doctors to amputate his right leg. Stratton staged a comeback in the 1940s, pitching in the minors and semi-pro games.

Actor Jimmy Stewart played him in the 1949 movie "The Stratton Story," in which the most inspirational scene portrays Stratton successfully fielding a bunt.

Anthony Burruto, a 16-year-old sophomore from Orlando, Fla., is the 21st-century version of Stratton. But Burruto's story does not have a happy ending.

Burruto's legs were amputated when he was an infant. He grew up wearing high-tech prosthetics and has played baseball since age 8.

Burruto, who was featured on the cover of ESPN the Magazine when he was 13, can throw an 80 mph fastball and a nasty curve and, his friends and family say, adequately field his position.

But Burruto was cut by Dr. Phillips High School baseball coach Mike Bradley last week after two workouts. Bradley was concerned Burruto would have trouble fielding bunts from the mound, according to the Orlando Sentinel.

The Sentinel's George Diaz wrote, "Would a coach be so obsessed with winning that he would order every player to bunt?

"Bradley botched a call that was so simple to make. You don't cut Anthony. He's a keeper."

The same can't be said for his coach.

■ BIEBER FEVER -- Oklahoma State football coach Mike Gundy's latest recruit is teen pop star Justin Bieber.

During an interview on Radio Disney, Bieber received a call and his cell phone blared, "Come after me! I'm a man! I'm 40!" -- Gundy's infamous eruption from a 2007 news conference in which the coach verbally attacked a reporter who had written unfavorably about one of his players.

Gundy responded by making his ringtone Bieber's hit song "Baby."

"I figured that if he was going to use my ringtone, then I should start using his ringtone," Gundy said Monday.

■ FULL OF SPIT -- Ohio State freshman center Jared Sullinger claimed to have been used as a human spittoon before and after the Buckeyes basketball team's upset loss to Wisconsin on Saturday in Madison.

Sullinger posted on Twitter that Badgers fans spat on him.

Badgers coach Bo Ryan defended his rabid fans, claiming video cameras in Kohl Center did not capture any saliva heading Sullinger's way.

Halfway across the globe on the next day, however, Tiger Woods was clearly seen spitting on a green during the final round of the Dubai Desert Classic. The European PGA Tour fined Woods, who apologized for the loogie.

Ewen Murray, a TV commentator for Britain's Sky Sports, said on-air after seeing Woods spit on the second tee during Friday's second round that it was "one of the ugliest things you will ever see on a golf course."

Apparently he has not seen John Daly's pants.

After Woods' spit-iful display Sunday, Murray added, "Somebody now has to come behind him and maybe putt over his spit. It does not get much lower than that."

Spitting in sports has not received this much coverage since Joe Garagiola began campaigning against the use of smokeless tobacco in baseball.

COMPILED BY JEFF WOLF
LAS VEGAS REVIEW-JOURNAL