Zoltan is ahand gesture in which a person has their hands stacked on top of each other in order to form a letter "Z". Originally used in the 2000stoner filmDude, Where's My Car?, the Zoltan hand gesture also became popular in 2012 with members of thePittsburgh Pirates, as well as residents ofPittsburgh rallying around the team.
During the filmDude, Where's My Car?, the two main characters, Jesse Montgomery III (Ashton Kutcher) and Chester Greenburg (Seann William Scott), run into a group ofUFO cultists led by Zoltan (Hal Sparks). Whenever the name Zoltan was said while they explained their plan to Jesse and Chester they would do the hand gesture. It is during this otherwise minor scene in the film that the Zoltan hand gesture is first used.[1]
During the early part of the2012 Major League Baseball season, thePittsburgh Pirates were visiting theAtlanta Braves for a weekend series when the team was watchingDude, Where's My Car? in the visiting clubhouse atTurner Field. According to Pirates second basemanNeil Walker, the team thought that the Zoltan hand gesture was so bad that they decided to adopt it as a form of team bonding.[2] At the time, the Pirates had endured a major North American professional sports record 19 consecutive losing seasons which, fittingly, started after the Pirates lost to the Braves atFulton County Stadium inAtlanta in Game 7 of the1992 National League Championship Series whenFrancisco Cabrera cracked a bottom-of-the-9th-inning, two-out, two-run single that scoredDavid Justice andSid Bream.
Soon, the team started using the Zoltan as a way for players to congratulate their teammates after an accomplishment such as ahome run or adouble play. Over time, Pirates fans noticed the players (in particular,de facto team leaderAndrew McCutchen) making the hand gesture and started doing it as well.[3] This led to merchandise sales of t-shirts with the Zoltan on the shirts. After aTwitter campaign to encourage the "real" Zoltan to appear at a game,Hal Sparks flew toPittsburgh on July 25, 2012, to throw out theceremonial first pitch, and was on hand to see the Pirates win 3-2 over theChicago Cubs. Also there to support the team was Hal's girlfriend, Summer Soltis, whose family is from the area and are Pirates fans.[4] Despite picking up a cult following in Pittsburgh and helping the team contend in the playoff race well into September, the Pirates finished with a 79-83 record, extending their major North American professional sports record to 20 consecutive losing seasons.
The Pirates used the Zoltan again the following season, this time not only ending their losing seasons streak but clinching awild cardspot in the 2013 playoffs.[5] The Zoltan was still popular enough in Pittsburgh that when thePittsburgh Steelers signedRomanian-born punterZoltán Meskó in September 2013, Meskó declined to do the Zoltan himself for reporters, regarding it as the Pirates' hand signal and not wanting to take it from them (he was released in late October 2013).[6]