Then early '70s the Miami area was incredibly frustrated when the Dolphins were relegated to the 1 PM games far too long, even after they had obviously surged under Shula. Once you reached 4 PM level that meant the supreme NBC announcing team of Curt Gowdy and Al DeRogatis. It was so amazing in those early '70s when the Dolphins finally were advanced to the 4 PM slotting and also the Monday Night showcase with Cosell, Meredith and Gifford. It felt like the entire country was watching. Then when it was an obscure 1 PM game against some Crap team it didn't feel the same. The Dolphins thankfully would use Csonka to grind out those games in methodical fashion and finish at 3:35 PM so there was still plenty of time to grab a snack or something prior to the 4 PM theater.
I was a tad too young to recall the early 70’s stuff. I grew up in NorCal and when I started watching at 6 years old, it was very much like you said — with MIA usually being a late game. Or on MNF.
Back then there was no push for every team to get at least 1 primetime game. MIA was always on MNF the maximum amount of times. As were the good teams of the era, such as DAL, MIN, OAK, PIT, HOU, SD, etc.
I grew up liking to listen to Dick Enberg & Merlin Olsen calling games, along with Don Criqui, Bob Trumpy, Charley Jones, and Bryant Gumble in the studio. And, of course, the MNF crew of Gifford, Cosell, and Dandy Don. I think Curt Gowdy was still doing some games in the late 70’s but I seem to remember him doing baseball more than anything else.
I grew up in Raiders territory, but fell in love with MIA first. The 49ers weren’t any good back then and were always blacked out locally because they didn’t sell enough tickets.
While I’m Dolphins through and through, I knew as much about the Raiders back then because their games often were played at the same time as MIA so that’s who we got locally on NBC. Stabler, Hendricks, Otto, Branch, Biletnikoff, Hayes, Van Eeghan, I knew them all.
But because of the time zone differences, and MNF I usually got to see MIA play 6-8 games per season. Sometimes more. But it sucked having to follow their games via in-game and halftime highlights.
I remember that halftime of MNF is often the only way you got to see highlights back then. You made the comment that it felt like the whole world was watching. Well, often, they were! I fully remember the Dolphins-Pats game in 1980 when they broke the new about John Lennon. That’s how most people heard about it. Very different times back then, as you fully know.
Circling back to the Sunday games, I also remember waiting for the late game to end so they could switch to another game that was still in progress. That’s another way I sometimes caught part of a Dolphins game if they weren’t televised in my area. One game that comes to mind was the 28-28 tie with the Jets.
Then came the early 90’s and satellite dishes. I spent several years sports bar hopping on Sunday’s hoping someone could pull in the Dolphins game that week. Then came DirecTV in 1994ish and rescued me from having to do that.