Barry Zito - Personal Life

Personal Life

Zito is known for his idiosyncrasies and his offbeat personality. He has earned the nicknames "Planet Zito" and "Captain Quirk".

At his introductory press conference with the Giants, Zito said he liked the way his uniform number 75 looked, because the 7 and the 5 are like a "shelf" to hold the name "Zito" up. He carries pink satin pillows on the road, collects stuffed animals (such as a good luck teddy bear, with which he used to travel), and burns incense to relax. Early in his career, Zito dyed his hair blue. He plays guitar, surfs, practices yoga, and follows Zen. He has done yoga poses in the outfield, and meditates before games. In 2001, Zito espoused a universal life force that he credited with his midseason turnaround. His mother Roberta named him after her brother Barry, a beatnik "freethinker" and acolyte of Zen who mysteriously vanished in 1964 at the age of 22 near Big Sur, California.

Zito created the charity Strikeouts for Troops, to which he donates $400 for every strikeout he throws. The charity benefits hospitals for soldiers wounded in military operations. In 2010, Zito announced that he would donate $1,500 for every strikeout in the Giants-Padres game on September 11. There were a total of 14 strikeouts in the game.

Zito's father Joe Zito composed and arranged music for Nat King Cole in the early 1960s (ca.1961–64), and arranged for the Buffalo Symphony. Zito's late mother Roberta was a classically trained musician who also sang with Nat King Cole's band, in a choral group known as The Merry Young Souls.

Zito's uncle is television actor Patrick Duffy. In 2003, Zito portrayed a United States Navy petty officer in an episode of JAG on CBS. Zito's character, a pitcher, faced assault charges after hitting a Marine with a ball during the annual Navy-Marine all-star baseball game.

Zito became engaged to former Miss Missouri Amber Seyer in April 2011, and they were married on December 3, 2011.

In August 2011, after being raised in a "spiritual, metaphysical type church" where his mother was the pastor, he became a Christian, saying he "committed to Jesus Christ as his Lord and Savior." At the 2012 San Francisco Giants Christian Fellowship Day, Zito explained that God got his attention through being left off the 2010 Giants postseason roster and a car accident and strange foot injury in early 2011. He got a tattoo of a golden calf on the inside of his right bicep as a reminder for him to "not worship false idols" and to remember that God comes first.