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Zusatztext “Powerful.”— Library Journal “Funny! heartbreaking! and triumphant . . . Still! to label this fine book ‘an inspiration’ almost misses the point. Imperfect isn’t about learning to cope with a disability. It’s about becoming a man in America.”—Mark Kriegel! author of Pistol: The Life of Pete Maravich and Namath: A Biography “Terrific . . . Imperfect can teach all of us valuable lessons.”—Cal Ripken! Jr. “A story of how to fight! overcome and! ultimately! thrive.”— Newsday Informationen zum Autor Jim Abbott and Tim Brown Klappentext "Honest! touching! and beautifully rendered . . . Far more than a book about baseball! it is a deeply felt story of triumph and failure! dreams and disappointments. Jim Abbott has hurled another gem."-Jonathan Eig! New York Times bestselling author of Luckiest Man NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER Born without a right hand! Jim Abbott dreamed of someday being a great athlete. Raised in Flint! Michigan! by parents who encouraged him to compete! Jim would become an ace pitcher for the University of Michigan. But his journey was only beginning: By twenty-one! he'd won the gold medal game at the 1988 Olympics and-without spending a day in the minor leagues-cracked the starting rotation of the California Angels. In 1991! he would finish third in the voting for the Cy Young Award. Two years later! he would don Yankee pinstripes and pitch one of the most dramatic no-hitters in major-league history. In this honest and insightful book! Jim Abbott reveals the challenges he faced in becoming an elite pitcher! the insecurities he dealt with in a life spent as the different one! and the intense emotion generated by his encounters with disabled children from around the country. With a riveting pitch-by-pitch account of his no-hitter providing the ideal frame for his story! this unique athlete offers readers an extraordinary and unforgettable memoir. "Compelling . . . [a] big-hearted memoir."-Los Angeles Times "Inspirational."-The Philadelphia Inquirer Includes an exclusive conversation between Jim Abbott and Tim Brown in the back of the book. CHAPTER 1 I spent two baseball seasons in New York and enjoyed them most on Saturday mornings, when the city composed itself with a long, slow breath. Maybe it was a sigh. Either way, on this particular Saturday the sidewalks twenty-seven floors below the apartment window were less cluttered, the taxi hailers appeared in a hurry but not altogether panic-stricken, the dog walkers smiled and nodded at passersby as their little city pooches, pleased not to be rushed, did their morning business. Across 90th Street, a broad patch of emerald green—conspicuously so against the old brick and brownstone and grit—hosted a game of soccer, filling the neighborhood with cries of encouragement, whoops, and applause. The sky was gray, a leaden touch to a yawn-and-stretch morning on Manhattan’s Upper East Side. The idle observations from the uniformed lobby doorman and the waitress four blocks away at Gracie’s Corner, where the wait was manageable and the pancakes were reliably fluffy, were about afternoon rain, the prospect of which further softened the jostle of the expired workweek. I liked it there. Dana and I had carved something like a routine from our first year east. What began as an exercise in survival became almost comfortable. We’d rented a one-bedroom apartment with a sofa, a coffee table, and a couple chairs, bought a few things for the kitchen, and mostly ate out. We were in our mid-twenties, a good time for exploration and discovery and a semi-furnished life. At first we walked the neighborhood within a few blocks of 90th and York Avenue, browsing the shops and studying the menus taped to the windows before widening the radius to include Central Park...
