NFL 25 Dream Teams that ended up being failures
By Nick Villano
NFL 25 Dream Teams that ended up being failures: 17. 1995 Miami Dolphins
Going right back to the 1990s, the Miami Dolphins led by Dan Marino was supposed to be a perennial contender. He was by far the best quarterback in the NFL statistically, and he was always lifting players up to his abilities. Don Shula was still the head coach after 25 seasons at the helm. This was going to be business as usual for the Dolphins, who expected to win a Super Bowl eventually with Marino.
It started as most would expect. The Dolphins started the season 4-0. They were looking like the top team in the AFC. Out of nowhere, it seems, they were 6-6 and fighting to make the playoffs in what turned out to be a bad conference. Irving Fryar was a Pro Bowl receiver, but he wasn’t this year. He failed to break 1,000 yards despite playing all 16 games. O.J. McDuffie didn’t do much to help on the other side. Nobody in the running game broke 900 yards, and the Dolphins finished the season 9-7.
They did make the playoffs, but the team wasn’t good enough and they got beat in the first round pretty easily. It led to the Dolphins owners demanding that Shula fire people on his staff to show accountability. Shula didn’t want to blame his coaches for the inability of his star players. He eventually retired because of the spat. It eventually led to the Jimmy Johnson era in Miami.
This was just the strangest season and it led to major changes the Dolphins hadn’t seen in decades. It all happened because the star players on the Dolphins just didn’t click, and they fell well below expectations.