Jon Hamm to Star in Disney's MILLION DOLLAR ARM

Deadline.com reports that 'Mad Men' actor Jon Hamm is set to star in Disney's upcoming true-life sports flic MILLION DOLLAR ARM. The film, from Mayhem Pictures, will be produced by Mark Ciardi, Gordon Gray, Joe Roth and Palak Patel. The script was penned by Thomas McCarthy.

Hamm will portray real-life sports agent J.B. Bernstein, who was responsible for discovering professional baseball pitchers Rinku Singh and Dinesh Patel through an Indian reality show featuring cricket players. Bernstein was the first to realize the similarities between the throwing motion of cricket players and baseball pitchers and sent off to India to produce the reality show.

Called 'Million Dollar Arm', the show auditioned over 40,000 hopefuls, two of which he brought back to the U.S. Neither of the 19-year-old finalists had ever traveled beyond their rural villages of India and needed a quick lesson from Bernstein on American culture and the English language as well as the rules of American baseball. The teens became the first Indian players to sign pro baseball contracts with the Pittsburgh Pirates.

Hamm most recently starred in and produced the Jennifer Westfeldt-directed 'Friends With Kids'. He currently stars as Don Draper in AMC's 'Mad Men' fifth season.

Filming on MILLION DOLLAR ARM is set to begin this fall.