A ’72 Dolphins 50th anniversary celebration: Five questions with Mercury Morris
To commemorate the 50th anniversary of the Dolphins’ Perfect Season, The Miami Herald is running weekly conversations with members of the 1972 team that went 17-0.
Five questions with former Dolphins three-time Pro Bowler Mercury Morris, who ran 190 times for 1,000 yards (5.3 average) and 12 touchdowns during that ‘72 season and formed an elite running back triumvirate with Larry Csonka and Jim Kiick.
▪ During the past 30 years, you have been the most outspoken and animated member of the 1972 team when it comes to defending the team’s legacy and challenging anyone who asks you about a team “surpassing” your record. Why is this so important to you?
Morris said he doesn’t believe the ‘72 team has been disrespected, but it galls him when anyone suggests the Dolphins’ undefeated season could be overtaken. He said that’s simply not possible, and he doesn’t suffer fools who suggest it is possible.
“When the Patriots went 18-0 and then 18-1 [in the 2007 season], a guy from ESPN came up to me before the Super Bowl against the Giants and said, ‘if the Patriots go 19-0, they’re going to better than you.’ I said, ‘How?”
He said, ‘how many games you play?’
I asked him, ‘When were you born?’
He said, ‘1972.’
I said, ‘Don’t say another [expletive] word to me about the ‘72 team; you were [expletive] on yourself then and you are now. It’s like asking what’s the second-largest canyon? There is no besting 17-0.”
▪Of the work you have done promoting the ‘72 team, what did you enjoy the most?
Morris cited the Reebok Perfectville ads.
Two days before the Patriots attempted (and failed) to complete a perfect season by losing to the Giants in the February 2008 Super Bowl in Arizona, Morris, Jim Kiick, Garo Yepremian and Hall of Fame guard Larry Little took photos in front of a faux road sign that said, “Welcome To Perfectville, Pop. 1, Founded 1972.”
Commercials were shot to either welcome New England as a second resident to “Perfectville” or to cement Miami’s continued status as the only perfect team in NFL history.
Morris gave Reebok the inspiration for the commercial with his original comments to “tell me when [the undefeated Patriots] are on my block and ready to move in.”
Morris said his most enjoyable post-career project was “by far the Perfectville ad because there was so much drama around it. They chose me and I chose every guy in it. The whole thing was, ‘Who can break the Dolphins’ record?’ Actually, nobody can.
“It was fun and it paid. I got $20,000 and I got $8,000 for the other guys. I had to go to the game and it was such fun.”
▪You had several spats with Don Shula. What caused them?
Early in his Dolphins career, he angered Shula by seeking a second opinion on a leg injury, which Morris didn’t appreciate. “He’s reaming me out for talking to another doctor to see what I should do about my thigh!”
Then Shula angered Morris by not giving him a carry in the 24-3 loss to Dallas in the Super Bowl in January of 1972.
“I was mad because I didn’t get a chance to play. I was the only running back on the team who could run sweeps. The only time I was off bench that day — except for kickoffs — was for the national anthem. One of the coaches told Shula [I was upset] and he comes up to me after the game and said, ‘If I find out you said anything to the press, I’ve had it.’”
But in a calmer moment, Shula told him: “I wouldn’t want a guy on this team who didn’t want to play” and “we wanted to go with the guys who got us here” — meaning Csonka and Kiick.
“I said coach, ‘getting here wasn’t the thing. Winning was the thing. Don’t you think I would give us a spark?’ After the Pro Bowl that winter, Tom Landry [the winning coach in that Super Bowl game against the Dolphins] said I could have made a difference in that game and he’s glad I didn’t play against them.”
Months later, Shula calls me into his office before camp started and said ‘I’m going to give you opportunity to play to see if you’re capable of doing it.’ I said that’s all I wanted. He didn’t want to break up Jim Kiick and Larry Csonka, but he understood it was best for the team [to add me to the mix]. And Jim understood that.”
During the 1972 season, Csonka ran 213 times for 1,117 and 5 TDs. Morris had 190-1,000 and 12 TDs and Kiick finished 137-521-5 TDs. Kiick caught 21 passes, Morris 15 and Csonka 5.
“It isn’t easy to gain equality with two guys, not to break up Butch and Sundance but bring another element so we could win,” Morris said. “Speed is what I came with. I loved playing with Jim and Larry because we won. It was only about winning. My breakout started halfway through the season in ‘72; I scored five touchdowns in two games against the Bills and Jets in the middle of the season.
“Before the Super Bowl, Don “said Washington ‘is going to be keying on you.’ He said ‘we’re going to use you as a decoy.’ But all I cared about was winning.”
Morris ran 10 times for 34 yards in that Super Bowl win against Washington.
▪How did you feel when Csonka and Kiick left for the World League after the 1974 season, and what then led to your final falling out with Shula?
“I didn’t really like it because it forced [the running game] to be rebuilt. When Benny Malone came, he wasn’t that much bigger than me. He tried to run like he was Csonk. And that left him with a shorter career.
“In 1975, after the first six games, I was second in the league in rushing and Malone had gotten hurt earlier in the season and wasn’t playing. Shula said he was going to alternate me with Benny. We had a back and forth in the locker room. After one game in the second half of the season, I said, ‘it doesn’t matter because I’m out of here after the season.’”
Morris said he would be happy to go to Pittsburgh, Cleveland, Oakland, “any place but San Diego.”
Days before the 1976, he was traded to — where else? — San Diego, where he played his final NFL season.
“I told reporters, ‘You tell Shula he will do no better than wherever I’m going. The Chargers were 6-8 that year and Shula [and the Dolphins] were 6-8.”
▪So if someone asks you now what you thought of Shula, what would you say?
“We were close when it was over and I wrote him a letter after I came back from San Diego that I got more from him that means something than stuff I want to hang onto that means nothing. We were close from then on.
“Coming from a team with George Wilson coaching, when it was too hot, we would go swimming instead of practicing — to Don Shula, where we never had a drink of water on the field in six years. To go from 3-10-1 (under Wilson) to 10-4 and then going to a Super Bowl and then 17-0” was special.
This story was originally published November 2, 2022 at 8:00 AM.
