Abbott Earns Prestigious Jimmy V Award at ESPYs
7/15/2026 9:13:00 PM | Baseball
NEW YORK, N.Y. -- University of Michigan baseball alum Jim Abbott was bestowed the prestigious Jimmy V Award for Perseverance at the ESPY Awards on Wednesday night (July 15) at the David H. Koch Theater at Lincoln Center. Abbott is the first Wolverine to be chosen for the award and just the second baseball player in the award's history.
The award goes annually to a deserving member of the sporting world who has overcome great obstacles through perseverance and determination. Abbott joins such sporting legends as Stuart Scott, Dick Vitale, Liam Hendricks and Jim Kelly, among others. The former Wolverine becomes the award's 20th honoree.
Abbott was born without a right hand but managed to have a successful 10-year Major League Baseball pitching career, earning many collegiate honors in his three seasons at Michigan. In the maize and blue, he compiled a 26-8 record with 186 strikeouts and a 3.03 earned-run average in 234.1 innings pitched. Abbott's wins total ranks fifth in program history, while listing 10th in strikeouts, 19th in innings pitched and 27th in ERA.
The pitcher racked up the awards after his second season, earning two third-team All-America honors from Baseball America and the American Baseball Coaches Association. He remains the only baseball player to win the prestigious James E. Sullivan Award, and in 1987, he also won the Golden Spikes Award, one of the highest honors in collegiate baseball. He was inducted into the U-M Hall of Honor in 2004, the College Baseball Hall of Fame in 2007 and had his jersey number retired in 2009.
Outside his time at Michigan, Abbott represented Team USA three times, including at the 1988 Olympic Games in Seoul, South Korea, where he earned a gold medal and was a flag bearer for the 1987 Pan American Games. In his professional career, Abbott threw 1,674 innings across 263 games with 888 strikeouts. His MLB career was highlighted by a no-hitter with the New York Yankees on Sept. 4, 1993.
