Despite perfection, baton twirler heads home

9/13/2008

Jonathan Burkin never dropped a baton on America s Got Talent, but it wasn t enough to keep the Clyde native s hopes for winning the NBC reality show flying high. The baton twirler was eliminated from the program Thursday night when the number of contestants was cut from 20 to 10.

On Wednesday, Burkin, 18, twirled and juggled up to three firey batons to The Who s Pinball Wizard. At the time, judge Piers Morgan called his performance brilliant and David Hasselhoff congratulated him by saying, You ll be voted back, man. You are too good!

But it came down to a vote by the three judges and Burkin became the last person to be sent home when Morgan and Hasselhoff chose Elvis impersonator Joseph Hall over him. Hasselhoff explained that Hall was more likely to be able to sustain an act in Las Vegas, and Morgan said that while Burkin s act was faultless, the public might think it s already seen his best and that there s more to see with Hall.