Actress who played pitcher in ‘Bad News Bears’ killed in car crash, driver arrested

LOS ANGELES, Calif. – Sammi Kane Kraft, whose baseball skills earned her the role of a youth league pitcher in the 2005 remake of “The Bad News Bears,” has died in a Los Angeles car crash. She was 20.

The Los Angeles Times (http://lat.ms/RgLEIq ) says Kraft was a passenger in an Audi that rear-ended a big rig and was struck by another car at about 1:30 a.m. Tuesday on Interstate 10.

Her brother, Frankie Kane, tells the Times that Kane was pronounced dead at a hospital.

The California Highway Patrol says the Audi’s driver was treated for moderate injuries and arrested on suspicion of drunken driving.

Kraft was 13 when she was discovered on an LA baseball diamond and cast in her only film. She played the role originated by Tatum O’Neal in 1976.

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