Mercury Morris, part of Dolphins’ two Super Bowl wins and their perfect season, dies at 77

By TIM REYNOLDS

MIAMI GARDENS — Eugene “Mercury” Morris, who starred for the unbeaten 1972 Miami Dolphins arsenic portion of a star-studded backfield and helped the squad triumph 2 Super Bowl titles, has died, the squad said Sunday.

Morris, a three-time Pro Bowl selection, was 77. In a statement, his household said his “talent and passionateness near an indelible people connected the sport.”

“Beyond the field, Mercury was a devoted father, a loving brother, a loyal friend, and a pillar successful the community,” his household wrote successful the statement. “His beingness extended acold beyond football, arsenic helium touched the lives of galore passim his clip successful Miami.”

Morris was the starting halfback and 1 of 3 go-to runners that Dolphins manager Don Shula utilized successful Miami’s back-to-back rubric seasons of 1972 and 1973, alongside Pro Football Hall of Famer Larry Csonka and Jim Kiick. Morris led the Dolphins successful rushing touchdowns successful some of those seasons, finishing with an NFL-best 12 successful 1972 and past 10 much successful 1973.

Those 2 seasons — the champion successful Dolphins’ past — conscionable happened to beryllium the champion of Morris’ eight-year vocation arsenic well. He rushed for a career-high 1,000 yards successful 1972, past ran for 954 much on with a league-best 6.4 yards per transportation the pursuing season.

“I deliberation Shula gave everybody a antithetic benignant of absorption and intent being coached by this guy,” Morris said successful 2008. “We were middle-class radical and middle-class fans, and Shula was a blue-collar worker. And helium had benignant of a enactment ethic that truly allowed you to spot that if you enactment hard and you bash what you’re expected to do, past things are going to crook retired for you — not each the clip but you set to that and bash what’s indispensable to effort to bash arsenic champion you can.”

Morris made nary concealed of being filled with pridefulness astir the 1972 Dolphins being the archetypal — and inactive lone — undefeated and untied squad successful NFL history, pulling disconnected a cleanable season.

He besides tried to marque this clear: No, the Dolphins were not rooting against the teams that came adjacent to matching their feat of perfection and did not person champagne connected crystal waiting for the infinitesimal that the past unbeaten squad successful a play gets defeated.

“And for the record, we DO NOT TOAST each clip an unbeaten squad loses,” Morris posted connected societal media successful 2015, erstwhile the Cam Newton-led Carolina Panthers started 14-0 earlier losing the next-to-last crippled of their regular season. “There’s nary champagne successful my glass, lone Canada Dry Ginger ale! Ha!”

That consciousness of wit besides got pointed astatine his beloved Dolphins astatine times. When Miami was 0-8 successful the 2007 season, connected its mode to a 0-13 commencement and 1-15 record, Morris offered different of his galore memorable quips.

“The Dolphins are not embarrassing me, due to the fact that our record’s astatine the apical of the heap,” Morris said. “That’s not my team. People say, ‘Your squad is doing bad.’ I say, ‘My squad each has AARP cards.’”

Morris had immoderate idiosyncratic struggles aft his shot vocation ended, astir notably being sentenced to 20 years successful situation aft his 1982 condemnation connected cocaine trafficking charges. He fought the conviction, admitting helium utilized cocaine — successful portion to woody with galore lingering injuries — but ne'er sold the drug. His condemnation was overturned by the Florida Supreme Court successful 1986 and Morris became a motivational talker urging radical to debar drugs.

“Was I bitter? Not really,” Morris wrote successful his publication “Against The Grain,” published successful 1998. “I would not urge 3 days successful jailhouse to anyone, overmuch little 3 years. But I indispensable beryllium honest: I needed to spell done what I did to make the quality I had erstwhile I became a escaped man.”

Morris went into the Dolphins’ Walk of Fame successful 2013. He remains 4th connected the team’s all-time rushing database with 3,877 yards down Csonka (6,737), Ricky Williams (6,436) and Ronnie Brown (4,815).