BIOGRAPHY

For more than a decade, Hamm's older brother Garrett suffered from aplastic anemia, a rare blood disorder. After he died in 1997, Hamm established the Mia Hamm Foundation. The nonprofit agency raises money and awareness for bone marrow transplant patients. It also provides opportunities for women in sports.

Since its inception, the foundation has distributed almost $500,000 in grants and run events such as The Garrett Game, a benefit exhibition soccer game that serves as a tribute to her brother. The event also brings together bone marrow donors and their unrelated recipients for the first time.

Mia is considered to be one of the best to have played the game of soccer - she was twice named FIFA World Player of the Year (2001 and 2002), and is listed as one of FIFA's 100 best living players. As a forward, Mia played for seventeen years as a member of the United States women's national soccer team and has garnered numerous awards and recognitions throughout her career. Among those, she was elected as the Soccer USA's female athlete of the year five years in a row (1994-1998), MVP of the women's cup in 1995, and number 14 among soccer's most influential people by Soccer Business International magazine. In the 1996 Summer Olympics and 2004 Summer Olympics, Hamm helped lead the U.S. women's national team to gold medals, and she was also chosen by her fellow U.S. Olympians to carry the American flag at the Athens Closing Ceremonies. Hamm retired with 158 international goals, at the time more than fifty ahead of any other player (male or female), and 276 caps, second only to Kristine Lilly.

Mia was inducted into the Soccer Hall of Fame in August 2007.


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