If they win today - particularly if quarterback Matt Hasselbeck leads the way - they also might be able to pinpoint Zorn's iNFLuence.

This will be the first time Zorn will coach against his former prot?g?. More than anyone, he knows what to expect from Hasselbeck. After all, he helped create him.

When asked about facing his former position coach, Hasselbeck said that his eventual biography will be bursting with examples of Zorn's iNFLuence.

"Everything that I have done as a player can be traced back to him," Hasselbeck said. "He has been my position coach since I have been starting in the NFL; we have spent a lot of time together, mostly good and some bad. He definitely pushed me even when I didn't want to be pushed, and he was a huge iNFLuence on me in a positive manner."

Although Seahawks coach Mike Holmgren is viewed around the league as a master shaper of young quarterbacks, it was actually the tandem of Holmgren and Zorn that exploited an effective good cop/bad cop routine on Hasselbeck.

"It was just a great mix with Coach Holmgren as the head coach and Coach Zorn as the position coach," Hasselbeck said. "Early on it was Mike being really hard on me and Jim being my older brother, uncle. There where times when Trent (Dilfer) was the starter and Jim was hard on me and I think it gave Mike the opportunity to take a little different role."

Zorn spent 17 seasons as a player and coach for the Seahawks. As a player, he was totally unscripted, unpredictable and entertainingly improvisational. As a coach, he was organized and thorough, but also creative in his design of off-beat drills to keep quarterbacks on their toes.

Hasselbeck said that Zorn was incapable of being anything less than totally honest, and that earned enormous respect from the players.

"They had a very close relationship, as happens with position coaches and players," Holmgren said of Zorn and Hasselbeck. Sometimes, that creates a situation where assistants can't separate the friendship from the job. This was not one of those cases.

"They were very close, as he was with Seneca (Wallace), yet at the same time, I think he held him accountable, which is what you have to do. He balanced that . . . and did a nice job of that."

Zorn's open and frank approach sometimes seems counter to the expectations of a head coach, a breed often gifted with the ability to dance around issues and be more political than forthright.

"I get criticized for being too honest here," Zorn said of coaching in Washington, D.C. "I think that's been written in the paper, if I'm correct about that."

In his years in Seattle, Zorn's reputation was as an inherently decent man who was unwaveringly considerate and thoughtful. You'd ask him a question and he'd present lengthy answers examining all facets, and when he finished, he'd double-check to be certain he supplied what you needed.

It seemed strange, then, to see him land on YouTube in a clip in which he raised his voice during a press conference. Typically, he first warned that he was getting "ticked off." And the whole thing had less venom to it than we might expect from Bill Parcells or Dennis Green ordering their morning coffee.

And when asked about it this week, he apologized and held himself accountable for not fully understanding the question. Also typically, he has analyzed the incident, studied its causes, and has plotted a means of personal improvement.

"I'm trying to make sure that I'm as honest as I can be, and try to not give them just fluff," he said of his press conference answers. "I try to give them something that really is true that, when you look at it deeper, I said something that was actually true."

And so it is particularly appropriate in Zorn's case to point out that few in this business manage to stay so true to themselves.

Zorn took the huge and unexpected leap from quarterbacks coach for the Seahawks to head coach of one of the NFL's flagship franchises. And apparently it's not changed him at all.

He's still getting away to do his mountain-biking; still doing his goofy drills. He's still polite and cordial and a little corny, and respectful of the players and of the game.

"Jim is still Jim," said Shaun Alexander, the former Seahawks running back now with Washington. "He is still humble and at the same time really focused. He doesn't mind standing up for what he wants to do and then apologizing if it doesn't work, but then pat everybody (else) on the butt if it does work."

He's one man who will have an enormous impact on today's game.

No matter which team wins.

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Dave Boling: 253-597-8440

dave.boling@thenewstribune.com