fuck it: jim zorn needs his own thread

he's sort of ditka-crazy, but smart, too.

to wit (from dan steinberg's blog atwashingtonpost.com):

So, after all the football questions were done, I asked if he really knew how to skin a coyote.

"Heh," he said. "Yeah. Yup."

"We lived on Lake Washington," he began. "Ok, this absolutely was appalling to my bride of 29 years, but I actually found road kill. I didn't hunt the coyote, I found road-kill coyote, put it in a bag, shoved it in my trunk. I thought, 'A coyote pelt, this is awesome!'

"So I took it outside--I didn't bring it in the house obviously--I took it outside, I hung it on a tree right on the waterfront, you know. Beautiful waterfront house, I hung it right on the tree, and I skinned it. Um, and it looked like, I'll tell you what, it looked like a yard dog. So it was a little bit scary, because people were thinking I was skinning my own dog. But it was a coyote.

"So I skinned it out, I put it in a bag and I sent it to a tannery, right? And I got the hide tanned and brought back and I had this really nice coyote pelt, all right? And it was on a couch on our house for a long time, until our kids got to it and you know, they started pulling the tail and all that kind of stuff."

Look, it beats "the only thing we're focused on right now is the Cleveland Browns," no? This, though, was different than I imagined. I had pictured Zorn studiously learning technique in coyote skinning classes, not freestyling on random bagged road kill, so I asked how he knew what to do.

"I just did it," he said. "I didn't know necessarily how, I just did it. Worked out well."

He paused.

"I'll tell you how, ok, I'll tell you exactly how," he continued. "I took Human Anatomy in college. I went to Cal Poly Pomona, as you know, and that Human Anatomy course was a pre-med class, and so we learned how to work in the labs on cadavers. So if you can imagine, I was doing the same thing with a cadaver, learning the parts of the body. Fascinating."

Right. Redskins, what say you?

"I have not heard that one, no," Jon Jansen said.

"I don't put nothing past that man," Mike Sellers said. "He's different. Let me just put it like that, he's different."

"Did he do it with his bare hands?" Casey Rabach wanted to know. "Did he use his teeth?"

I had to admit that he did not.

"That's cool," Rabach said, "but the road kill part? He needs to kill it first, feel the blood, and then skin it. That'd be better. That's like skinning your pet dog. But no, that's cool. At least he got his hands dirty."

Then I told Rabach that Zorn had been guided by his Human Anatomy class.

"He's got issues," Rabach said

hahahaha everything in jim zorn's world is awesome

isn't it, though? in fact, an executive his age using the word "awesome" so liberally is also kind of amusing...i mean, since he's not working for microsoft or is some baldimg guy w/ a ponytail wearing jeans and a blazer.

him and portis need a reality show together

thread title should be "coyote pelt! awesome!"

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/dcsportsbog/2008/02/jim_zorn_makes_qbs_puke_skins.html

"Badminton is totally awesome," he says.

this guy is pretty cool

even his name

Did you guys know that he's a MacArthur Genius?

really? i did not.

ah...john zorn. i see.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/b/be/DouglasMacArthur.jpg/300px-DouglasMacArthur.jpghttp://www.exposay.com/celebrity-photos/jim-zorn-2008-nfl-pro-football-hall-of-fame-game-indianapolis-colts-vs-washington-redskins-16-30-august-3-2008-RCsjqw.jpg

http://www.macarthurmemorial.org/5starCampaign/images/Painting_MacArthur_weblg.jpghttp://bp2.blogger.com/_t9D_ovmGhQE/R69yYLJxuPI/AAAAAAAAMn8/qGaZYGaZ53U/s400/Jim+Zorn.jpg

http://www.american.edu/ted/ice/images4/Macarthur.jpghttp://media3.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/photo/2008/05/02/PH2008050203622.jpg

http://www.smh.com.au/ffximage/2007/10/01/Zorn_070928125442530_wideweb__300x375.jpghttp://farm1.static.flickr.com/229/460836857_57dfdff069.jpg

Zorn was a fantastic qb in his day too. Kickass hair too.

They Said It, from December, 1979

Jim Zorn, Seattle Seahawk quarterback, whose wife Joy is expecting their first child: "If it's a boy, my neighbors have some friends who want me to name him Bjorn, so the headlines could read, BJORN ZORN BORN.' "

i want to footage of him chasing after field crashers yesterday and randle-el actually tackling one.

I looked for that, no luck, wash post only had video from after the dude got tackled.

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/dcsportsbog/2008/10/s_moss_and_randle_el_discuss_t.html

Moss: Boy, I was gonna (Terry) Tate him. I was gonna hit him so hard. My whole focus was trying to win this game. We didn't need that.

Antwaan Randle El: I just kind of whacked him. I didn't really hit him, I just kind of grabbed him by the little hoodie that he had.

Jim Zorn: I was heading after the other guy behind our bench. I didn't see it.

i keep on grasping for signature zorn moments, but they seem to occur at brekneck pace!

such as...

wau randle el and moss are gonna fuck you up if you jump on their field. stay off their lawn!!

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/dcsportsbog/2008/10/jim_zorns_symphonic_masterpiec.html

haha, I just posted that on the other jim zorn thread (week 7)
I was like how did that message disappear?!

also, this.. seattle seahawks having fun
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/dcsportsbog/2008/02/jim_zorn_endorses_slip_n_slide.html
"afterwards, coach gave us juice boxes"
"i've clearly lost complete control of this franchise"

yeah, the viola thing is great (though, i also like the bit about portis and the sax).

zorn goes apeshit on a reporter...

a commenter on wapo blog said zorn is creating coors light ads before our very eyes. i believe him.

haha yeah, there's like hree or four questions back and forth trying to figure out, i don't know, what series they were talking about

i seem to be reading a fair number of redskins bloggers/comments asking what is up with clock management since they don't seem to be in a hurry with the 2-minute drill at the end of the half, and maybe the reporter was asking about the rationale for that..

are you okay?

i thought he was going to threaten to bury the guy! alas, no shoes were involved.

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/dcsportsbog/2008/10/today_in_zorn_im_a_roo.html

press conference today..

On whether he's a football guru: "I'm a Roo, but I don't know if I'm a Goo."

On his sideline run-in with Clinton Portis: "I think that I need to speak to myself about acting medium in those kind of situations."

On Clinton Portis's health: "We've been texting back and forth. He came in for treatment. I'm learning how to text now, which my daughter says this is the modern-day phone call, ok? So we have been texting. I've kind of screwed up the texts, so he doesn't really have an idea what I'm asking."

omg i love him

i am in love with goddamn jim zorn

xp lol

this is prob. the best season ive ever seen for football coach press conferences due in no small part to dr. zorn

seriously, i don't know how the people in his life restrain themselves from, like, grinning doofily at him and pinching his cheeks.

perhaps they don't!

dan steinberg @ wash post must love his job this season

can this thread act as a repository for all great moments in zorndom? i'm crestfallen to discover that no such resource already exists on the web, it shouldn't require a dragnet to keep up with all his KRAZY ZORN QUOTES

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/10/22/AR2008102203227.html

apparently he played viola with the seattle symphony orchestra

i am so glad god finally decided to take the hint and turn all those awesome "wacky sports team" movies into real life

my favorite thing about him is how gleefully ignorant he is of east coast football, esp when it pertains to the redskins - calling their colors maroon, black and yellow (which is hilarious not because of the gaffe, but because of the indignation of appalled fans pointing out that it's BURGUNDY AND GOLD i mean jesus christ i thought it was maroon too, HOW THE FUCK IS ANYONE SUPPOSED TO KNOW THAT/WHY DOES IT MATTER) or the fact that his only point of reference for the skins/cowboys rivalry was... the epic seahawks/raiders rivalries of the 70s and 80s???

oh, yes: please add your favorite zorn-isms.

yeah, i'm fond of the "maroon, yellow and black" b/c black isn't even a color on the unis!

http://kissingsuzykolber.uproxx.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/09/serious-face1.jpg

i think this is the bulk of 'ZORN U SO CRAZY' stuff so far:

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/dcsportsbog/2008/02/jim_zorn_makes_qbs_puke_skins.html
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/dcsportsbog/2008/10/jim_zorns_worthless_tricks.html
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/dcsportsbog/2008/09/vintage_zorn_quotes.html
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/dcsportsbog/2008/10/jim_zorn_used_to_own_gadget_st.html
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/dcsportsbog/2008/10/today_in_zorn_im_a_roo.html
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/dcsportsbog/2008/10/jim_zorns_symphonic_masterpiec.html
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/dcsportsbog/2008/09/jim_zorn_explains_his_punter_m.html
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/dcsportsbog/2008/02/jim_zorn_endorses_slip_n_slide.html

wow. nice work.

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/dcsportsbog/zornslinkey.jpg

"I really liked my Volkswagen. I thought it was really fast. Because I like to feel like I'm racing around. Well, you can't really race around in a Volkswagen, but it sounds like you are."

he has a radio show on the redskins radio station this afternoon (Tuesdays) at 4 or 4:15. awaiting more excellent quotes

HOW THE FUCK IS ANYONE SUPPOSED TO KNOW THAT/WHY DOES IT MATTER

i dunno, as a redskins fan.. it is just a thing that's been going on for a long time, there's a whole bunch of fan stuff that is all about showing loyalty to the BURGUNDY AND GOLD

Zorn has worked something of a miracle in that I realize I am now actually rooting for the Redskins to win, solely because of him.

isn't there a line in the fight song that mentions the colors? not that anybody outside of season ticket holders and their neglected children know the fight song.

not true! when i was in elementary school, we were taught the fight song and they also encouraged us to wear burgundy and gold the friday before every dallas game. granted we're talking the early 80s, here but this was public school in maryland!

yeah I was in catholic school and we had redskins pennants up in the classroom

I know the fight song, no reference to the colors in there though

jesus that stuff (learning the fight song in grade school) is completely unfathomable to me, i guess atlanta just has super low self esteem or something

many people refer to atlanta as the worst town for professional sports. i understand that folks are pretty much bananas for tech, though.

do the giants even have a song?

yes.

http://blog.wfmu.org/freeform/2008/09/are-you-ready-f.html

those songs are not as good as the san diego super chargers song, are they?

They really aren't, but maybe the Teletubbies could improve them.

i think this is the bulk of 'ZORN U SO CRAZY' stuff so far:

ade, you're the best!

the skins/cowboys seahawks/raiders equivalence was so amazing. i would like to live on jim zorn's planet.

wow, more zorn-y gold via dan steinberg:

Today in Zornisms: "I Said It Very Vigorously"
Ok, maybe it's not a newsflash that Jim Zorn sometimes says things in a manner that some other NFL coaches do not. But today on ESPN 980's Jim Zorn Show, Zorn said things in a manner that some other NFL coaches do not. Also, he busted out his prized new adjective--"sudden"--for the Pittsburgh Steelers, like so: "They're very sudden."

Does it mean quick? Spontaneous? Unforeseen? Abrupt? Can you train suddenness, or does it just suddenly happen? And who is Washington's suddenliest player? None of those questions were answered.

On London Fletcher's final tackle: "One of the most exciting plays of the game was London Fletcher on fourth down just knocking the crud out of their best receiver in an open-field situation where all's he had to do was run a couple yards to keep their drive alive. And he put a stop to it. It was a great football play."

On that 3rd and 19 conversion at the end of the first half: "I was a bit emotional on that drive, because I was so mad that we hadn't been moving the ball very well. I was upset that here we are on the minus-5 yard line because we had a snap and another penalty that drove us back, so I kind of I didn't scream in it, but I said it very vigorously over the headset, 'We are going to will a score out of this drive.' "

[If you didn't know, in Zornspeak the minus-5 yard line is your own 5-yard line.]

On breaking the NFL template by going for it there: "We had to get a score. We wanted some momentum going into halftime. What it took was a very disciplined group of players to not sort of get caught up in the down and distance and the time on the clock, but to execute the play. That's what a great two-minute drill is....You don't have any preconceived ideas like, 'Oh no, they may sack me; Oh no...this evil thing may happen. You just execute the play."

On Jason Campbell botching the first-and-goal play on the first drive: "That can't happen. That just flat can't happen, and those are the things that we have to answer for when disaster happens, and it did, and it ruined--it didn't kill the drive, it just ruined that opportunity. And you never get em back, you know?"

On the difference between winning and losing: "The difference between winning and losing is when you lose games like that, there's much more examination. I think the answers are the same, you just hash 'em over more when you lose, and when you win you realize what happened and you're sort of positive about it. You feel ok, because you won. We don't stick our head in the sand either and say that it was all bliss out there."

On MNF: " I really do believe that a football team enjoys the season once its over more than during it, because it's just hard. You know, there's little moments of enjoyment, but the season moves so quickly and you've got to be so ready and pay attention to everything. I don't believe we need to get caught up in the grandeur of the situation. We really do have responsibilities."

i'm sorry but calling other teams "sudden" and saying "minus-5 line" makes him sound like paris hilton

I was into him in his QB days; look at those pornstar DSLs:

http://cache.deadspin.com/assets/resources/2008/02/jimzorntopps.jpg

wow that is one eighties-ass football card

or is that late seventies? the pink football with the QB in it is totally DAIRY QUEEN

I suspect late '70s. card image colors may vary.

i don't even know what to say about the delightful turn this is taking!

http://www.gasolinealleyantiques.com/sports/football/images/seahawks/jimzorn.JPG

http://www.thefunnypets.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/02/cat-dog-love.jpg

http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/sportsnation/ratings

http://www.nndb.com/people/731/000024659/Richard_Hatch.jpg

John 2:17
And his disciples remembered that it was written The zeal of thine house hath eaten me up

http://kissingsuzykolber.uproxx.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/10/lol-zorn.jpg

just the good old boys...

http://i222.photobucket.com/albums/dd230/bobert_051/largentandzorn.jpg

haha i also was taught "hail to the redskins" in elementary school. this is in suburban VA, in time for the '91 super bowl

dudes there are several more awesome stories on the wash post

Once, the coach was a DJ himself. It was in his playing days when he was the quarterback of the Seattle Seahawks, leading the franchise to the brink of the playoffs in only its third season and every play seemed to be an improvisation with Zorn scrambling in desperation, a step from disaster, suddenly flinging a pass to a magically open Steve Largent. They were the faces of the Pacific Northwest then, with Zorn driving Largent to the games from the Holiday Inn in nearby Issaquah, Wash., over the floating bridge in the VW bug he bought in high school as Bob Dylan's "Highway 61 Revisited" spilled from the cassette deck and the quarterback howled along to the words.

A jazz station of low wattage and even smaller ratings called KJZZ ("Kayyyy Jaaazzzzzzzzzz" Zorn intones) hired him to host a show in which he talked sports and played songs. The problem was Zorn wasn't much interested in talking sports or playing the music he was assigned, choosing instead to bring in records from his voluminous home collection that seem to cover just about every genre possible.
[..]
Zorn laughs. Then, looking around, he suddenly appears struck by how this must look -- the unknown, untested new coach of the Redskins standing on a mountain with poles in his hands discussing the intricacies of DJ Riz's musical selections, deciding he likes the amplified electronics and not so much the dance grooves -- when his face begins to cloud. "This could come out cheesy," he says.

wow...he had already won my heart, but his love of highway 61 has won my soul.

worthless tricks

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/dcsportsbog/zorndistracted.jpg
Sleepless Zorn: "You get caught just staring at the woodwork, thinking about what went on. That's what I was doing in bed last night, just looking up and staring, focusing up on some of those things that happened. It's hard. It's not, not fun."

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/dcsportsbog/zorntreadingwater.jpg
Medium Zorn: If we could change a handful of things that are going wrong--and I'm not talking about two big fistfuls, I'm just talking about a handful, ok?--we could flip that game that we just had. That's how close it is. So I don't think it's a snowball going downhill, I think we're kind of treading water, I really do, I think we're kind of treading water. We haven't just put the hurt on anybody, no question. Is it frustrating? Yeah. We haven't dominated, so we're kind of this Even-Steven team right now, but I do not believe we're waning at all....Tou can't tread water in this league for very long, you've got to be swimming. And we're not swimming yet."

seattle media this week with more you so crazy stories..

>>RENTON -- Jim Zorn, museum curator?

Don't laugh, it was one of the career avenues the Seahawks' original quarterback was exploring during the one-year break between the end of his playing career and what has become a coaching career that now has him in his first season as head coach of the Washington Redskins.

It all started when Zorn got hooked up with IDAK -- a career-match company in Portland.

"The company helped me just kind of look at where some of my natural bends were, where some of my interests were," Zorn said Wednesday during a conference-call interview from Redskins Park in Ashburn, Va., where he is preparing his new team to face his old team at Qwest Field on Sunday.

"I had several avenues to go.">>>

i think i have that first card, or used to. he was my favorite when i was 4 or 5 or whatever.

http://misterirrelevant.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/11/zorn-portis-bff.jpg

zorn-portis-bff.jpg

zortis

more from steinberg - following college coaching job @ minnesota after the whole staff gets fired:

"I could not get another job," he told me. "Nobody wanted to hire a guy without a college degree. It was a little bit embarrassing. So Steve Largent made a comment, he got together with my wife Joy and he said while Jim has idle time he should get his college degree."

So Zorn sent his college credits to what was then known as Regents College, a New York school that was a pioneer in distance education and has since changed its name to Excelsior. He needed to take 22 credits in one semester, including four upper-level courses in the same subject area. Since he loved art, he chose that for his subject area, and one of the courses turned out to be cast-metal sculpting, which he loved.

"Tremendous," he called it.

aw. aw! he is so adorable it freaks me out.

re: Jason Campbell in the New Orleans game: "We left some things on the field that I was hot about - and he knows it because I was jumping up and down," Zorn said. "I was telling him the reason I was jumping up and down; I was trying to get to his eye level so I could actually look him in the eye."

hahahaha what?!

is jim zorn 4ft tall?

in one of the articles running up to the seahawks game, they were talking about how sir mix-a-lot is a skins convert b/c of zorn. the steinbog has more funny clips from washington state papers about zorn. funny seneca wallace bit about always passing zorn on the way to and fro prac (wallace in car, zorn on bike).

heh, that article (sir mix-a-lot: i'll root for anyone, sports here suck so bad) was in the ny times basically the whole thing about how sports are 100% terrible in seattle right now. apparently game day yesterday most of the seattle media was on about a big local college football game.. between an 0-10 team and a 1-10 team. good lord. i was seriously going to move to seattle myself a couple years ago b/c i really like it there (too broke for cross-country move at the time), but if the football team stays as bad as they are.. uh.. well i guess it might not be hard to get season tickets right?

hasselbeck was funny in postgame interview yesterday talking about how zorn kept apologizing to him when he decided to leave seattle.

at least thier basketball record is a lot better this year

ok, here we go again:

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/dcsportsbog/2008/11/zorn_on_being_medium_and_hip_h.html
The popular media question recently has been whether opposing defensive coaches have figured out Jim Zorn. Today, we asked some Redskins whether they've figured out their coach.

"I know what he's gonna do, when he's gonna do it, how he's gonna do it at times," Santana Moss said. "I know when you ain't do it right he's gonna get mad and turn into a little fireball. So I pretty much know him. I mean, I probably got a lot more to learn about him, but thus far in this season he's shown me all his (tricks)."

Like, say, Hip Hip Hooray? As I mentioned yesterday, it's been a month since that cheer was unleashed. And, thankfully, the homecoming brought a return to Hipness.

"Oh, I was egged on," Zorn explained, pointing his giant foam finger at Antwaan Randle El. "I was egged on by a couple of the players that we had to do that. Yeah, we got after it. Were you there? Did you hear it through the (wall)? Oh gosh, it was pretty good."

not totally related but figured this was as good a thread as any for what i saw in the mall today:

http://i181.photobucket.com/albums/x18/gr8080/IMG_0313.jpg http://i181.photobucket.com/albums/x18/gr8080/IMG_0314-1.jpg

howtf did I miss the excelsior college thing? yay me and jim zorn, gettin the jobs in DC with the mail-order bachelor's from lol u

steinberg has nothing else on his plate apparently, so..

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/dcsportsbog/zornportistears.jpg

"He's so banged up," began the reporter, "he was saying (Sunday) he had blood running down his elbows, both legs, and now he has the hip to go along with the knee." Zorn's lip began quivering. His face puckered. And, in his emotional sympathy for Portis's tenuous plight, Crying Zorn had to wipe his nose, as seen here. Joe Gibbs would have sooner introduced Joe Biden at the DNC Convention than pretend to cry over one of his player's pain.

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/dcsportsbog/zorntaylorthrow.jpg

"Each week as he's into different positions, would we like it to be a smooth seam?" Zorn asked rhetorically. "Absolutely. We'd love him to just be ripping, throwing people down (demonstration, demonstration, demonstration). That's not the kind of player he is. We've just got to get him in a comfort zone, that's all."

classic zornery head coach:

Zorn said he spoke briefly with Snyder about the incident Tuesday night, that he lost no sleep over it and that he wasn't worried about losing his team. Zorn said Snyder "acted very medium" about the dust-up and said, "This is Clinton."

heh. remember when everyone in Washington was having fun?

http://misterirrelevant.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/12/t-shop-pockets-2.jpg

I gotta side with CP on this one..

When your case is that the best blocking RB in the game wasn't doing the job in pass protection it doesn't look good, no.

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/dcsportsbog/zornpromag.jpg

omg the seahawks had a 12 year old playing quarterback?!

pro!

zorn OUT as ravens qb coach

RavensInsider
Jim Zorn was often described privately as quirky or odd. Just wasn't a good fit with the rest of the staff. Communication wasn't good.

Gotta repost this bc it still makes me lol

http://kissingsuzykolber.uproxx.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/09/serious-face1.jpg