Dan Marino

The Miami Dolphins chose Marino as the 27th pick in the first round.

He did not Expect to be available for the team to draft, so he never spoke to head coach Don Shula or anyone else from the Dolphins before the coach called after the selection.

Opinion was divided on the wisdom of the team's decision; Chris Berman said that Shula was "the best", but Paul Zimmerman was skeptical of the coaching staff's ability to help Marino "overcome the problems he's had".

Shula later said that being passed up by so many teams "motivated [Marino] to show everybody else what a mistake that they had made".

Daniel Constantine Marino Jr. (born September 15, 1961) is an American former football quarterback who played in the National Football League (NFL) for 17 seasons with the Miami Dolphins and currently works for the same team since 2014 as a special advisor.

He was drafted in the 4th round by the Kansas City Royals in the 1979 amateur draft, but decided to play college football instead.

Marino attended the University of Pittsburgh, and played for the university's Pittsburgh Panthers football team from 1979 to 1982.

As a freshman in 1979, Marino led the Panthers in a 24–17 triumph over West Virginia in the Backyard Brawl and a 29−14 win over longtime rival Penn State.

Overall, during the three seasons from 1979 through 1981, Pitt garnered 33 wins with only 3 losses (three straight 11–1 seasons) and was constantly ranked in the Top 5 of both major media polls.

Pitt's 1980 Marino-led team finished No. 2 in the season-ending rankings (The New York Times computer poll rated Pitt as No. 1).

Marino was part of an elite team during those two years that included two other future NFL Hall of Fame players: Defensive lineman Rickey Jackson and center Russ Grimm, as well as future Pro Bowl linebacker Hugh Green and future Pro Bowl guard Mark May.

In 1980, Pitt added future NFL players Bill Maas, Dwight Collins, and Tim Lewis, while their offensive line got a third future Pro Bowl player: tackle Jimbo Covert.

"There were games when my uniform never got dirty," Marino once remarked.

"There were games when I never hit the ground. That’s incredible."

He played college football for the Pittsburgh Panthers, earning first-team All-American honors in 1981.

Following the 1981 regular season, Marino led the Panthers, who had been ranked No. 1 most of the season, to a last-minute triumph over the No. 7 Georgia Bulldogs in the 1982 Sugar Bowl by throwing a game-winning pass to tight end John Brown with less than a minute remaining in the game.

Marino later cited this as the most memorable pass he'd thrown in his college career.

Marino finished ninth in voting for the Heisman Trophy in 1982, after finishing fourth the previous year.

Marino finished his four college seasons with 8,597 passing yards, 79 touchdowns, and 69 interceptions.

Marino was the last quarterback taken in the first round of the famed quarterback class of 1983.

He held or currently holds dozens of NFL records associated with the quarterback position, and despite never being on a Super Bowl-winning team, he is recognized among the greatest quarterbacks in American football history.

Best remembered for his quick release and powerful arm, Marino helped the Dolphins become consistent postseason contenders, leading them to the playoffs ten times and one Super Bowl appearance in XIX, although a title victory ultimately eluded him during his career.

Marino is considered by many to be one of the greatest players to never win a Super Bowl and has the most career victories of quarterbacks not to win a title at 155.

A nine-time Pro Bowl selection, six-time first (3) or second (3) team All-Pro, and All-AFC six times, Marino was voted NFL Rookie of the Year by Sporting News.

The Pitt football team's fortunes and Marino's statistics dipped during his senior year, which saw the team transition from head coach Jackie Sherrill to new coach Foge Fazio, culminating in a 7–3 loss in the 1983 Cotton Bowl Classic to Southern Methodist University and their "Pony Express" of Eric Dickerson and Craig James.

Marino's selection status in the 1983 NFL draft plummeted after his weaker senior season at Pitt and rumors of recreational drug use.

Five other quarterbacks—Ken O'Brien, Tony Eason, Todd Blackledge, and Hall of Famers Jim Kelly and John Elway—were drafted ahead of him in the first round.

Bill Hillgrove, who was with the Marino family on draft day, later recalled that when the New York Jets selected O'Brien, Marino "became visibly ill".

(O'Brien, who played for Division II Cal-Davis, was so obscure that Marino later asked his agent Marvin Demoff "Who is Ken O'Brien?")

The following season in 1984, Marino was the NFL Most Valuable Player (MVP), when he set single-season records of 5,084 passing yards, 48 touchdown passes, nine 300-yard passing games, and four 400-yard passing games.

Marino was the first quarterback in NFL history to reach 5,000 yards passing in a season (1984); 50,000 and 60,000 career passing yards respectively, and also the first quarterback to reach 40-plus touchdown passes in a season (48 in 1984), and 400 career touchdown passes.

He was voted the 1994 NFL Comeback Player of the Year, and the 1998 NFL Walter Payton Man of the Year.

At the time of his retirement, Marino held more than 40 NFL single-season and career passing records (many of which have since been surpassed), including career passing attempts (8,358), completions (4,967), passing yards (61,361), and touchdown passes (420).

Marino was enshrined into the Miami Dolphins Honor Roll immediately after his retirement in 2000, inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame in 2003, inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 2005 in his first year of eligibility, and is currently one of only three former Miami Dolphins to have his jersey number retired.

In 2019, Marino was named to the NFL 100th Anniversary All-Time Team as one of the 10 greatest quarterbacks in NFL history, as determined by a panel of coaches and media members.

Marino was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and is of Italian and Polish ancestry.

He is the oldest child of Daniel and Veronica (Kolczynski) Marino, and has two younger sisters, Cindi and Debbie.

His father delivered newspapers for the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.

Marino grew up on Parkview Avenue in the South Oakland neighborhood of Pittsburgh, and attended St. Regis Catholic Elementary School.

He attended Central Catholic High School in Pittsburgh, where he started in baseball, and won Parade All-American honors in football.