Baseball Players Health

Dave Dravecky's left arm was amputated Tuesday to stop the possible spread of cancer, according to a former teammate. Atlee Hammaker, one of the Dravecky's best friends when the two pitched for the San Francisco Giants, said he spoke Tuesday with Dravecky's father, who confirmed the amputation. Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, where the surgery was performed, did not comment on the operation. The hospital said a statement would be made this morning.

The Dodgers learned Thursday that third baseman Adrian Beltre must undergo abdominal surgery for the second time in two months, sidelining him indefinitely with less than a month to go before opening day. Beltre is scheduled to return to Los Angeles today and have a wound on his large intestine closed Monday at Centinela Hospital Medical Center in Inglewood. Team medical personnel said that the opening formed as the result of an infection occurring after Beltre had an emergency appendectomy Jan.

Dodger center fielder Brett Butler has tonsil cancer, a disease that will cause him to sit out the remainder of the season and possibly end his baseball career. The cancer was discovered Friday during what was believed to be a routine tonsillectomy. Dr. Bob Gadlage found a tumor the size of a large plum in the right tonsil of Butler, 38. Two biopsies were taken, the second revealing a malignancy. A CT scan Tuesday morning confirmed the diagnosis.

What are the odds of getting struck by lightning and winning the lottery, all in the same day? Kent Mercker has no idea, but the Angel pitcher feels as if he experienced both on that scary evening of May 11, lightning striking in the form of a cerebral hemorrhage that knocked Mercker off the Edison Field mound, the lottery jackpot coming in the form of a most precious gift--life.

University of Texas outfielder Stephen Larkin, who has a heart condition, has been given medical clearance to play again. Larkin, the younger brother of Cincinnati Red shortstop Barry Larkin, missed seven games this season because he has a thickening of the heart that restricts blood flow and is believed to be the leading cause of sudden death among athletes.

Kirby Puckett, one of baseball's best and most charismatic players, announced his retirement Friday after the latest in a series of laser procedures on his right eye showed irreversible damage to the retina.

After all the cancer that was evident was removed in a three-hour operation Tuesday on Brett Butler's neck and throat, surgeon William Grist said that he is optimistic about the Dodger center fielder's chances for a full recovery. "Everything went as well as it possibly could have," Grist, Emory University Hospital's chief of head and neck surgery, told Butler's wife, Eveline, upon emerging from the operating room. "Nothing happened that we didn't plan."

Veteran first baseman Wally Joyner went to the Atlanta Braves last winter in a six-player trade with the San Diego Padres as an insurance policy if Andres Galarraga was unable to return because of the cancer in his spine. It is not as if the Braves have canceled the policy, but Joyner has been restricted to a premium seat as he watches Galarraga manufacture the comeback of this or any year.

Brett Butler, scratched from the starting lineup after complaining of pain in his neck, raced home with the winning run on Tom Prince's infield single with two out in the 15th to lift the Dodgers to a 3-2 victory over the New York Mets at Dodger Stadium on Monday night. The Dodgers spent much of the day fearing the unknown, praying Butler's visit to an ear, nose and throat specialist was just a routine examination that would discover nothing abnormal.

The transaction notice moved May 10: "Los Angeles Dodgers CF Brett Butler will miss the remainder of the season." A possibility, it seemed, for a man diagnosed with throat cancer and facing two surgeries and weeks of radiation treatments.

Until neurologists discover why blood spilled onto the surface of the brain of Angel pitcher Kent Mercker, they cannot narrow a list of treatment options that range from pain relievers to brain surgery. Mercker remains in stable condition in the intensive care unit of UCI Medical Center today, two days after dizziness and severe headaches forced him to leave the mound during a game at Edison Field.

Veteran first baseman Wally Joyner went to the Atlanta Braves last winter in a six-player trade with the San Diego Padres as an insurance policy if Andres Galarraga was unable to return because of the cancer in his spine. It is not as if the Braves have canceled the policy, but Joyner has been restricted to a premium seat as he watches Galarraga manufacture the comeback of this or any year.

Former Cal State Northridge All-American catcher Robert Fick of the Detroit Tigers underwent successful surgery to repair torn ligaments in his left shoulder Thursday and is recuperating at home in Thousand Oaks. Fick had experienced pain since spring training but tried to rehabilitate the injury at the Tigers' extended spring training site in Lakeland, Fla. Magnetic resonance images did not reveal the tear, which was discovered during surgery by Dr. Ronald Glousman.

Trying to return to the New York Yankee roster does not worry Darryl Strawberry. Nor is he consumed with the larger battle, his struggle with colon cancer. "My goal is to help others suffering with this disease," he said in the Yankee clubhouse. "By being on the field, I can send a message of hope and faith. Believe in yourself and don't give up. No matter what you have to deal with, you still have to move forward. I draw my own support from the comfort I give others."

Snippets of diseased tissue were taken to the pathology laboratory at Columbia-Presbyterian Medical Center late Saturday after Darryl Strawberry's three-hour surgery to remove a cancerous tumor in his colon. It will be days before doctors know how aggressive the tumor is, and whether Strawberry will require chemotherapy.

As his teammates prepared for Friday night's game against the Rangers, Yankee outfielder Darryl Strawberry checked into a New York hospital for what he called "the biggest challenge of my life." Strawberry, found to have colon cancer Thursday, will undergo surgery today for removal of a walnut-sized tumor. "I've convinced myself I'm ready," Strawberry said Friday in a lengthy interview on ESPN. "Knowing why I'm sick has actually helped my spirits and relieved a lot of pressure.

Brett Butler sat in his hotel room late Monday afternoon, sweating, anxiously looking at the clock. In a couple of hours, Dodger team buses would be pulling up. And for the first time in nearly four months, Butler would be seeing Dodger players, not as a visitor stopping by the clubhouse, but as a teammate. He wasn't quite sure how he would react, or what he would say, but he knew how badly he needed to see them.

It's been less than four months since the operations to remove the cancer from his neck, but there was Brett Butler, working out with the Los Angeles Dodgers on Tuesday. "I'm not 100% but I'm working on that," Butler said after his first workout with the Dodgers since he last played a game on May 1. "The question is: Can I play at the major league level and produce?" he said. "That's the level we're trying to reach."

Darryl Strawberry has overcome a past checkered with drug and alcohol abuse, spousal abuse and a tax-evasion conviction to become one of the most productive and respected members of the New York Yankees, but today he faces an obstacle more daunting than all of his past problems combined: colon cancer.