Jim Zorn was my first childhood sports hero.
My first favorite sports team was the Seahawks, and my dad thought it was cool that I had chosen my own team (I was 7), so my parents supported me being a Seahawks fan from the beginning, even though neither of them was a Seahawks fan and we didn't know any other Seahawks fans.
Despite being small for my age and playing with kids older than I was, I was pretty much always the quarterback on offense in neighborhood games because my dad had taught me how to throw good spirals and how to throw to where the receiver is going to be (how to "lead" the receiver). I didn't have a fixed position on defense, so I did a little of everything like pretty much everyone else. Anyway, I was a quarterback, my team was (is) the Seahawks, and Zorn was the Seahawks' QB, so I identified with him. It did not bother me in the least that Zorn is left-handed and I am right-handed.
The greatest moment of the sports-fan part of my life was getting to tell Zorn to his face in September of 1984 that I had had his autographed picture framed on my wall in Kennebunk, Maine for years.
The thing is that when I got to tell Zorn that after a Seahawks game in Foxborough, Zorn hadn't played in that game, because by that time he was Krieg's backup. And I never resented Krieg in the least when he replaced Zorn as the starter. I liked him from the beginning, and rooted for him to succeed, even though I knew Zorn could get another chance if Krieg had been benched. I knew that Krieg was clearly better than Zorn by some time in 1983, and the transition never bothered me. I can separate the concepts of "my favorite" and "the best." Zorn is one of my all-time favorite players, but I know he's fourth-best among Seahawks QBs, and I've got Krieg in second place (two places ahead of Zorn), but I won't fight with anyone who wants to put Hasselbeck second and Krieg third. Zorn's place in my heart is a little more special than Krieg's, but I recognize that Krieg was better.
