Zaws are BIS for most of the 1H types. That said, melee is all about extreme range, and 1H weapons aren't good for much other than exalted weapon stat sticks and Covert Lethality daggers. No Zaw will remotely compete with Atterax, Galatine Prime, Lesion, etc. for raw damage. Also keep in mind you have to do a lot of normal PoE grinding in order to actually complete a weapon and then gild it (which is even more rep).
If you want to get the bare minimum for future use, buy Plague Keewar and Plague Kripath. Those are the two strikes, which is the part that gains mastery. The grips are not important at all besides being easier to grind for than normal Zaw parts. I'm probably going to get three of them for that reason--use one make a dagger out of Balla/Plague Akwin/one of the cheap links and the other two to make mastery fodder weapons with plague strike/plague grip/cheapass link.