lost all gears last night in a833od?

last night while shifting from first to second ( mildly ) my son lost all gears, the trans is a a833od. the ride is a 80 1/2 swb truck, the trans has been in there about four years now and was smooth until last night, what we found was the bracket holding the "z" bar came loose which in turn made the shifter where it mounts to the trans loose, so after tightening the bolts he was able to grab first and get home but it would not go to second with or without use of the clutch, after it got home we removed the inspection pan, the clutch and release bearing look good and seem to operate just fine although the throw was a bit short then we found the rod from the release bearing fork to the " z " bar was a bit bent, we had a spare so swapped it out and adjusted the clutch, the throw was better but we can not get any gears, reverse grinds and 1-4 just wont go, however if we shift staticly with the engine off we can get 1-4, my next thought was a shift rod adjustment but I don't see how it would be out of whack as it was fine before?, any ideas?, this thing is pre-registerd in a car show in less than two weeks and we need to figure it out soon!