PSSST, hey, you: Some NSFW ahead. Be advised--Ted
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Warrior Poet Mike Zimmer tends to wear his emotions on his sleeve, if his sleeve was on the inside, and he was a ninja...which he totally is. In short, Mike Zimmer is a grown ass man of the old school vein, and although he has emotion, he pushes that shit down, deep inside, to the innermost part of his soul.
Because that's how Old School Man operates, yo. No skinny jeans, bro fedoras, or getting in touch with your swishy ass feelings, cupcake. Duct tape that shit and get on with life.
So in reading his weekly and midweek press conferences, you need to look deeper into what he says, to interpret, if you will, the true meaning of the sentences he constructs.* Because Mike Zimmer is not constructing sentences, he is building a highway.** A four lane interstate of how to live you life as an old school ninja.***
*The meaning is probably exactly what he said, to be honest
**He's just a football coach. Don't get me wrong, we love him and we love football, but yeah...football coach.
***It's just a press conference. Really, that's all it is.
So when The Old School Ninja speaks, we must listen carefully, and find the true meaning. And that's what Zim Tzu is.* We look at the words, interpret them, and give you the true meaning to what he actually said, we help you unlock the meaning of life,** and the answer for everything.***
* It's none of that
**You will not find the Meaning Of Life on a sports blog. Monty Python's the Meaning of Life might be for rent at Blockbuster on Netflix, though.
***The answer is 42. You're welcome. Also, because the barrister said I had to...my answers are all fake and made up, like Teddy's pre-draft rumors.
And Zim Tzu spoke yesterday. As always, what Zim Tzu said will be in highlighted quotes, and my very liberal interpretation of what he said will immediately follow.
What Zim Tzu said: This will be a great test for us this week. San Diego is an extremely talented offensive football team. They do a lot of thing defensively to create problems for you. We're going to need our fans this week especially with the no-huddle offense that they run, the muddle huddle and the communication, I think they can really help us being loud this Sunday. Questions?
What Zim Tzu meant: THIS ISN'T DETROIT, MAN. THIS IS THE SUPER BOWL SAN DIEGO. And bring the noise this week. Fuckers.
Q: What's the biggest challenge of facing the muddle huddle for a defense?
What Zim Tzu said: Communication, tempo because they change the tempo in it kind of like we do. We get on the ball and go fast sometimes. Sometimes they take the whole 25 seconds, so it's the rhythm of the game really.
What Zim Tzu meant: It's like being married. Your wife will ask you to do something, you do it, it's not good enough, everything spirals out of control, and the next thing you know she's bringing up shit that happened 15 or 16 years ago. And you want to respond with something just as bad, but damn man, you can't remember what shirt you wore to work yesterday, much less something she did that pissed you off a decade ago. So we call that 'muddle huddle' formation bullshit they do 'marriage formation'. And we need to stay ahead of it, man, or the next thing you know we'll be putting up the vacuum, get ambushed by being asked 'DID YOU PUT THE SETTING ON BLOW SHIT OUT OF THE VACUUM INSTEAD OF SUCK SHIT INTO IT BECAUSE THIS FLOOR LOOKS LIKE SHIT', and because of our efforts we'll be sleeping on the couch for two nights. Fuck, that sucks.
Q: Do you have to pick and choose when to substitute?
What Zim Tzu said: A little bit, yeah, when the ball goes out of bounds and different things. The more third downs you can stop, the better that is too.
What Zim Tzu meant: Yeah, man, it's like picking your battles in marriage. Do you build a trench and fight to the last man to avoid a dinner party with some of her friends you can't stand? Nah man, you go. Builds credit in the bank for the weekend when you want to watch football all weekend, because THAT'S what you take the bullet for. Do you really care what color paint the wall is? Really? No you don't you idiot, you're just happy there's no wallpaper she wants to put up, because you know and SHE knows in six months she'll hate it and want YOU to take all that shit down. So yeah putting up wallpaper is way out of bounds--you die on that fuckin' hill.
Q: Does it help that they played your former team, the Cincinnati Bengals last week?
What Zim Tzu said: The good part is that I know what Cincinnati is doing defensively. The bad part is they get to practice against it two weeks in a row. I guess there’s a little give and take on both sides there. It doesn’t hurt.
What Zim Tzu meant: LOL YEP
Q: Do you get irritated or does it concern you when people accuse your team of being chippy or dirty?
What Zim Tzu said: That doesn’t bother me. I know what kind of team we are, we’re not dirty. I probably owe
Anthony Barr an apology because I talked to the officials last night. These quarterbacks now, they’re starting to slow down as they go out of bounds and kind of egging these things on, and so that was one of the things we talked about. He said yeah, it probably should not have been called.
What Zim Tzu meant: You know, Golden Tate calling my team dirty is like the Honey Boo Boo family lecturing you on not being classy, AMIRITE RUSSELL WILSON?. Golden Tate can lick a python's balls for all I care. Sorry, Anthony. My bad. And what kind of stupid ass name is Golden Tate? It's more like Golden Taint, AMIRITE? Fucker.
Q: You talked to the league office about that?
What Zim Tzu said: I had to call them about something else and we just started talking about [it] because I saw in a couple other games where these guys are going out and they step out late. He was running parallel and kind of slowed down. What he told me was they do not get protection if they slow down. They need to try to get out of bounds.
What Zim Tzu meant: Matthew Stafford was whining like a toddler in shoulder pads, man. It's football. Be a man, embrace the suck.
Q: How have you stayed demanding this week? Is it more in the meeting room or on the field?
What Zim Tzu said: I think it’s all the same, making sure we’re on point, making sure that we understand it’s one game. We haven’t done anything. We cannot think that "Whoa, everything is great now that we’ve won one game." We have to have the same intensity and part of it is me talking to the team, talking about the things that I expect, the way we go about our business and the way we prepare for the ballgame, whether it’s on game day or on Saturday or Wednesday.
What Zim Tzu meant: I've introduced this new drill called 'Firewater' for when guys fuck up or get complacent. For example, Brandon Fusco jumped offsides in 11 on 11, so he was the first one to have to do the drill. We literally set him on fire 20 yards from a kiddie pool of water, and he had to walk...WALK WITH SOME GODDAMN DISCIPLINE...before he could douse the flames. Because by God we're going to have fucking discipline and intensity. Oh, also, our injury report for today. Guard Brandon Fusco is out with a concussion. Not sure when he'll be back. He might be bandaged.
Q: Did you learn anything in terms of their response last week?
What Zim Tzu said: Last week they seemed to have a little bit of an attitude. We’ve got to have that attitude every week if we’re going to do what we’re going to do. Hopefully they’ll continue to get the message. Some of it’s making sure we as coaches are precise at what we’re telling them, making sure they’re doing things right, making sure that they understand the game plan and we can’t allow mistakes.
What Zim Tzu meant: We play pretty good when we're pissed off. I'm going to keep them pissed off. And on fire. Literally, on fire. I'm out, fuckers. See you Monday.