This week's installment of my favorite greatest season of all-time moves on to #6. Though it was difficult to keep this out of the top five it had to be done. The sport is football and the year 1984.
In just his second year in the league, Dan Marino had the greatest season the NFL had ever seen by a quarterback. Blessed with a quick release and a rocket right arm, he produced a season-long performance that required its own section in the league record books once he was done. He threw for 5,084 yards, breaking Dan Fouts' record of 4,802. The MVP's 48 touchdown passes obliterated the previous record of 36 shared by Y.A. Tittle and George Blanda. For a quarterback infamous for never winning the Super Bowl, 1984 also represents Marino's only Super Bowl appearance. In fact, there is one chief reason his performance still ranks better than those produced more recently by Indianapolis' Peyton Manning and New England's Tom Brady: The application of the rules was different. Both Manning and Brady benefited from the league's decision in March 2004 to place a greater emphasis on enforcing the illegal contact rule, which penalizes defenders who touched receivers more than five yards away from the line of scrimmage. If Marino had that advantage going for him, nobody would've ever matched the season he produced 24 years ago.
In just his second year in the league, Dan Marino had the greatest season the NFL had ever seen by a quarterback. Blessed with a quick release and a rocket right arm, he produced a season-long performance that required its own section in the league record books once he was done. He threw for 5,084 yards, breaking Dan Fouts' record of 4,802. The MVP's 48 touchdown passes obliterated the previous record of 36 shared by Y.A. Tittle and George Blanda. For a quarterback infamous for never winning the Super Bowl, 1984 also represents Marino's only Super Bowl appearance. In fact, there is one chief reason his performance still ranks better than those produced more recently by Indianapolis' Peyton Manning and New England's Tom Brady: The application of the rules was different. Both Manning and Brady benefited from the league's decision in March 2004 to place a greater emphasis on enforcing the illegal contact rule, which penalizes defenders who touched receivers more than five yards away from the line of scrimmage. If Marino had that advantage going for him, nobody would've ever matched the season he produced 24 years ago.
3 comments:
#6? You just lost all credibility with this one...he's the greatest pure passer to ever step on a football field and he put these number up in the pre-Manning/Brady NFL when cornerbacks were still allowed to play pass defense...c'mon Deez, your better than that...and Marino was better than anyone...
do you that Shorty has a biased opinion on Marino?
i knew i was going to hear something from you or mif why he is not in the top 5. but when you look at the 5 in front of him, it was just hard for me to put him ahead of the other 5.
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