Mercury Morris, Elusive Rusher on a Perfect Dolphins Team, Dies at 77

[marble falls]

Mercury Morris, Elusive Rusher on a Perfect Dolphins Team, Dies at 77

Part of a talented backfield triumvirate that also included Larry Csonka and Jim Kiick, he helped lead Miami to two Super Bowls and an undefeated season.

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/09/22/obituaries/mercury-morris-dead.html

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Mercury Morris in 1972 scoring against the New England Patriots. Morris, who was born Eugene, gained his nickname from his quick unpredictability on the field.Credit...Jim Bourdier/Associated Press


By Alex Traub
Sept. 22, 2024Updated 5:10 p.m. ET

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At the height of his career, Morris was part of an unusual three-man rushing rotation alongside the fullback Larry Csonka and another running back, Jim Kiick. Csonka and Kiick were powerful bruisers; Morris, who was born Eugene, gained his nickname from his quicksilver unpredictability on the field.

-snip

Initially, he had been used mainly as a kick returner. He did not get a single handoff during the Dolphins’ loss to the Dallas Cowboys in the 1972 Super Bowl. Csonka and Kiick, conversely, gained such fame for their partnership on the field and their friendship off it that they were nicknamed Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.

-snip-

To cope with severe headaches, Morris began using drugs. In 1982 he returned to the national news, not for football but instead for being sentenced to 20 years in prison after convictions on several charges related to cocaine trafficking. The convictions were later overturned, and Morris spent years making the case that he had been innocent of crimes other than drug use.

-snip-

In 2022, Morris described Kiick’s struggles with chronic traumatic encephalopathy, also known as C.T.E., to The New York Times. He said that he had to coax Kiick out of his car and direct him to an airport terminal to bring him to the filming of “The Perfect Backfield.” But even when Kiick’s dementia became severe, Morris continued seeing him about every week.



Morris served three years before having his conviction reversed. The courts had found he'd been entrapped.

[Botany]

1. Csonka, Kick, & Morris add in Bob Griese, Paul Warfield, and Larry Little.

Memories are weird.

[marble falls]

3. Even as a rabid Brownies fan - this class of dolphins was a monster team. Larry Csonka was local boy, from ...

... Stow, not 15 miles from where I grew up.

[Botany]

5. The genius of Art Modell has always been underestimated

His Paul Warfield for Mike Phipps trade was awesome. It took Don Shula about 5 seconds to take
that deal. Csonka has a great “all over your face nose.”

Link to tweet

[marble falls]

6. I've got nothing good to say about that carpet bagging jackass. Cleveland made him rich and he left in the miidle ...

... in the middle of the night from the stadium he forced Cleveland to build him at Burke Lakefront not five or so years before. And frankly, I liked going to see the Tribe and the Brownies at Muni, one of the largest stadiums at that time. His big complaint? The wind off the lake in Winter. Where did they build the new one? Right on the lake, and where there were no other bulidings to break those deadly winds off the lake.

Zonk had his nose broken by his own count, at least six time since high school.

Did you ever get to read the huge Sports Illustrated Mercury Morris article/interview from around his cocaine conviction? He was honest and blamed no one for his use. I always admired him, but that article caused me to respect him a lot more. He blamed no one other than himself for being dragged into further jeopardy over his own drug use.

[LisaM]

8. Yes, that makes me unable to root for Baltimore.

Even yesterday, when they were playing the Cowboys, and even though I like a number of members of the Baltimore team, I find it almost impossible to root for them (I don't like their name or colors, either, but that's a different issue!)

[marble falls]

9. I got a terrible gift once. Tickets to the Bears vs Baltimore Browns (their first year as Ravens). I was rooting for ...

... them both to lose. It was great seats, in the end zone, my favorite football weather - not so cold with big fat snow flakes falling.

[NBachers]

2. I lived in Miami at that time. It was just great to have these guys and this team in the news day after day.

[marble falls]

4. They just owned the game for four or five years. Almost the Chicago Bulls (Jordan/Pippen years) of the NFL ...

... (Scottie Pippen would have been considered a franchise player if Jordan had played somewhere else).

[NBachers]

7. They never stopped being royalty in South Florida. None of 'em.