‘Imperfect’: Jim Abbott faces tough question about his birth defect in book excerpt

Yahoo Sports ^ | By Jim Abbott and Tim Brown

[Hojczyk]

Ella is my youngest.

She has my hair and eyes and her mother’s smile. The timing is distinctly hers. She was five when she asked, quite publicly, “Dad, do you like your little hand?”

My what? Do I like it?

I had come to her preschool’s Career Day bearing baseball cards for her classmates. In the morning rush getting the girls through the front door and into the car, I’d packed into a gym bag a couple familiar baseball caps, an Olympic gold medal and a baseball glove.

I had come first as a dad, and then as a former baseball player. I’d pitched for the local team, the California Angels, and for the team everybody had heard of, the New York Yankees. I had come because I wasn’t pitching anymore, and because Ella’s mother, my wife, Dana, wryly pointed out that preschool Career Day wasn’t really for fathers who no longer had careers.

At any age, I was the kid with the deformity. At Ella’s age, I was the kid with the shiny and clunky metal hook where his right hand should have been.

Thirty-five years later, classrooms remained among the few places where I was conscious of my stunted right hand. I would enter and later find I had slipped it into my front pants pocket, tethered against unconscious gesturing, signaling to the room that the details of its story would come at my choosing, if at all.

[Hojczyk]

http://www.wabcradio.com/sectional.asp?id=33447

He was on John Batchelor last night...9pm

[JPII Be Not Afraid]

I went to school with Jim Abbott and was always proud of the way he handled himself. Later in life when I seen that he was a professional ball player I thought what a great roll model he is for all.

Good luck, Jim, today and forever.

[muawiyah]

Great life’s story.

[Gay State Conservative]

I worked with a guy who was born in Canada during the 50’s/60’s who was born with badly deformed arms/hands.IOW,”little hands”.His mother had taken a drug for nausea called “thalydimide” (? spelling) while she was pregnant with him.It was available in Canada (and elsewhere) for a while but was never approved by our FDA.It was a bad drug that caused many very sad birth defects.

[The Working Man]

I knew a girl in High School was was a thalidomide Baby. She was born missing her feet and had to wear prosthetic legs from the knees on down.

Great personality, we lost track of each other after school.

[Buckeye McFrog]

I know people from Flint who played high school ball with Abbott. Universally they say he is a solid, stand-up guy. Not the egoist one might expect of a high school kid with Major League talent.

[JAWs]

He had a bad tendency to clobber the Red Sox whenever he was on the mound. Otherwise a great person.

[null and void]

REAL handicaps start one inch behind the forehead.

[dfwgator]

REAL handicaps start one inch behind the forehead.

"Hey, I resemble that remark."

[null and void]

A perfect example of overcoming handicaps...

[Tallguy]

He had a bad tendency to clobber the Red Sox whenever he was on the mound. Otherwise a great person.

That's the great thing about baseball -- it's a game of statistics where the most interesting things can revolve around a player or team that seemingly defies quantifying through statistics.

The Phillies had a journeyman 1st baseman back in the 70's. Hit Tom Seaver at like a .320 clip when Seaver was in his prime. This guy was a .248 hitter, too. Go figure?

Tommy Hutton

[wbill]

Yeah, I went to school with a guy who was a Thalydimide baby. No arms.

Mike was a real role model. And an incredible soccer player.

What impressed me the most about him was watching him drive with his feet. The only "aid" was a suicide knob on the wheel for him to grasp.