Dan Marino Considered Leaving Dolphins to Chase Super Bowl Title
Last year, Matthew Stafford won a Super Bowl in his first season with the Rams, which seemed to boost the trend of quarterbacks changing teams to get better chances at winning it all. Matt Ryan and Russell Wilson were traded this past offseason and hope to replicate Stafford’s success.
If this was a thing 25 years ago, then arguably the best quarterback to never win a Super Bowl might have had a different end to his career. Hall of Famer Dan Marino, who played his entire career with the Dolphins, admitted to USA Today’s Mackenzie Salmon that he considered changing teams late in his career.
“Yes, I definitely thought about it to be honest with you,” Marino said. “I played 17 years for the Dolphins, and they were kind of going in a new direction and a new coach, and I had offers to go play other places and really thought about it, and maybe had a chance to win a championship like Matthew [Stafford] has done.”
However, Marino mentioned that ultimately he just couldn’t reconcile leaving Miami after nearly two decades with the same team, and he decided to retire instead.
“It just didn’t feel right,” Marino said. “I just decided I’ll just be a Dolphin for life, and it’s worked out great.”
After Marino’s final season in 1999, Miami hired a new coach in Dave Wannstedt and was going in a different direction. If Marino wanted to extend his career there were opportunities elsewhere.
“Minnesota was interested in me, in what would’ve been my 18th season, [and the] Pittsburgh Steelers talked to me,” he said. “Those two were the main teams.”
Marino hails from the Pittsburgh area and attended the University of Pittsburgh, so that was probably a tempting option for him. Instead, the Steelers stuck with Kordell Stewart who had a solid bounce-back season in 2000. The Vikings, meanwhile, were looking to replace Randall Cunningham after a disappointing 1999 season and instead went with Daunte Culpepper, who led the team to the playoffs that season.
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