dlockz
Hall Of Famer
Yes, Marino being Plan A, B, and C doesn’t mean that literally they never tried anything else. It means that nothing else worked when they tried it and so Marino had to win games or the defense and (lack of) running game would lose them.
The talent on the Dolphins between 1986-1988 absolutely fell to pieces. And the rebuild beginning in 1989 was a good step, but it wasn’t successful enough. The defense got better, but it wasn’t elite or dominant; on its best day it was pretty good. And the running game was never solved under Shula post-1985, ever (arguably it wasn’t solved until 2002 and trading multiple first rounders for Ricky Williams). The Dolphins teams post-1985 and through 1999 were only going to go as far as Marino carried them— period.
It was sad looking at numbers, we have not had a top 10 offense since 1995 and only one offense that scored in top 8 since that time. Not sure any nfl can touch that streak