Bright Zimmerman/IF-88.603
Rumor / Community LoreThis article contains lore created collaboratively by the Blaseball community. It is just one of many Rumors that we've found in the Interdimensional Rumor Mill. You can find more Rumors about Bright Zimmerman at their Rumor Registry.
Player History
Bright Zim (on official documents, Bright Zimmerman) is a merfolk pitcher for the Philly Pies. He gained renown pitching for the Underleagues' Atlantis Sharkbait. When he came ashore, he introduced himself formally as "Bright Zim, merman." His surname was incorrectly recorded as Zimmerman, which still follows him on his official records to this day.
It is rumored that Zim actually joined the team to escape a massive fish debt he had mysteriously accrued in Atlantis. This is supported by the fact that when he first joined the team he initially spent much of his time in disguise as a popular folk musician. After it was pointed out to him that his tail easily gave him away, he abandoned the disguise, feeling rather silly.
While the move to an Internet League Blaseball team is a step up in the world of blaseball, it is one rarely taken by merfolk due to their difficulties in living on land. Zim uses a personal mobility device for this reason. His wheeled aquarium is large enough to sit comfortably inside, and can be steered from within by just a flick of his tail, thanks to sophisticated motion sensing technology. Zim's pitching has been inconsistent since joining the Pies, something he attributes to the differences between pitching through air and water. He has a special Pitching Tank that he plays from, which gives him greater range of motion than the mobility aquarium he uses to get around. It takes roughly ten minutes to set up each time he takes the mound.
The Iron Contract
Due to his lackluster performance Pies GM Sam Hinkie has long sought to remove Zim from the team. However, Zim has taken a liking to the flavor of the water in the Delaware river and adamantly refuses to leave. After taking several community college classes in splorts law, Zim was able to create the Iron Contract, one of the most unbreakable contracts in all of Blaseball. Attempts to trade, fire, revoke, or otherwise get rid of Zim have all been thwarted by the Iron Contract's labyrinthine tangle of clauses and stipulations. "You shall never be rid of me!" declared a power-mad Zim, tempting fate. "A hard rain may fall, but it shall not strike me!"
During one of these impromptu rants, Zim accidentally let a bit of spittle fall onto the Iron Contract. In a freak coincidence, the spittle smudged the word "Philadelphia" so it looked like the word "Canada." The tendril-like clauses of the contract promptly seized Zim and dragged him flailing and screaming across the northern border.
There is a general consensus that none of this would have been an issue in the first place if Zim had put half as much effort into his pitching as he did thwarting attempts to get him off the roster.
Bright Zimmerman’s Big Wet Rivertrip
After Zim gained the “Roamin’' modification at the end of season 14, he embarked on a cross-country road trip through North America's many waterways. Having largely lived his Blaseball playing life in Philadelphia, eating battery cheesesteaks, or in Moist Talkers Canada eating battery poutine, Zim hoped to see as much of North America as he could, which, tragically, round up largely being Kansas, or wherever the Mints played.
In between his life's passion of playing the big game of Blaseball, and his other life's passion, pitching the Mints on new fish-flavoured battery mints, Zim travailed local waterways and hiking trails, despite the fact that he was neither a freshwater fish or really capable of breathing air at all, claiming that he was “just building up resistance” and that it “feels really good, actually. Plus, look at how tweaked my tail is, man”. Forgoing the usual hiking supplies, Zim subsisted on his natural diet of eating fish food granules, particularly slow frogs, frog eggs (“nature’s boba tea!”), and fish too slow to notice the apex predator in their midst.
Local animal control groups, scientists and Fish-Fanciers were soon on the hunt for the wayward fishman, intending to capture and study what they assumed to be a new invasive and highly locomotive species. Many other Blaseball players would be disconcerted by such an occurrence, but to Zim, it was a fantastic opportunity to share his art with the world. Under his fisheudonym “Wet Banksy”, Zim graffitied any vehicles sent after him with either poignant societal commentary, or entirely insufferable scribbles, depending on who was asked. Innumerable vans, boats and helicopters were transformed, throwing the art community into a frenzy as everyone sought to buy them, as well as providing a massive influx of business to garage and car hole conglomerates.
Zim’s escapades also attracted the attention of one Jaxon Buckley, who, hearing rumors about a mysterious new “Fishfoot”, spent his spare time trying to track down the nascent (and potentially sexy) cryptid. Not realizing their quarry was their own former teammate, Jaxon suffered many Wet-Banksying’s to loyal horse Fletcher, transforming the poor beast into the single most valuable work of art in the world, and also functionally into a stencil-art zebra. The two finally met when Jaxon, using their trademark quick-thinking, set a trap with a paint-it-yourself mug filled with fish sauce and Skate Juice (based on Jaxon’s thinking that a powerful cryptid must have a powerful thirst) which Zim eagerly fell for. Having never really talked to each other before now, and owing to their pent-up frustrations (and also a general love of cryptids in one side of the party), the pair entered into a whirlwind on-and-off again relationship (usually taking place when Zim stumbled into one of Jaxon’s hobby-grade cryptid traps, or vice versa).
Returning to Philadelphia to take their relationship full time and make it official, Zim channeled his newfound hiking hobby into exploring the city’s vast, haunted sewer system (which also provided a great deal of batteries for him to chew), where he repeatedly startled the life out of Lang Richardson, The Philly Pie Hamilton Phanatic. Richardson reportedly only refrained from harming Zim because he “thought [Zim] might be some sort of Killer Croc type guy, like from Spiderman Turn Off The Dark, yknow? Mister Hamilton is down here, so I can’t just blast anything that scares me!”. Sadly, Bright Zim’s metaphorical roadtrip of life would end in these same sewers when Jessica Telephone, local troublemaker, was attacked by a roving Rogue Umpire after venturing into the sewers to search for the Ninja Turtles (who were no longer returning her calls). Zim, thinking her hollered curses were Lang Richardson, burst out of the murk to scare her even further, and tragically caught the fireball intended for Jessica Telephone. There, he died content, in the arms of a confused but sad Jessica Telephone, finally a hero for the pies. Fin.
Fin is a fish joke.
