Scott Mitchell: I Belong

00:00:00 Speaker 1: You're now diving. I'm little have been that tank who sitting down with Seth living ojay and this is strictly for them true Dolphins number one of course, y'all. This ain't the other never sports talk that might have been that fish tank. Welcome back to the fish tank right here on the Miami Dolphins podcast Network, Seth Lovitt and the man with the best hands in the podcast business, O J. McDuffie. Juice. We're going back to your rookie year right now, Yes we are. And then little some you know what I mean. That's the something right there, Big Seth, you know I get when we get offensive guys on the show, oh man, because you know you like to go defense all the time when it comes to our podcast, Man, I do. We're on the right side of the ball right now, man, So let's get it. Let's get it popping man. Yeah. Well, with that, please welcome Scott Mitchell enter the fish tank and last minute notice, we reached out and that was it, man, It was just like that's all we had to do was ask to Scott, thank you for diving in. Yeah. I don't have the long term memory, so you got to hit me right now. Otherwise forget it. So I got to do it right now. It's never going to happen, don't we all, we all, we're all affected by that, right, Scott Man, it's crazy it is while it is hot. That's right, that's exactly right. So and we've got a lot to talk about. I mean, it's interesting your your time here in Miami was relative to your entire career was only kind of a short window. But there's so much to talk about, and I'm excited to do that. But before we get into all of it. I don't know how much football you watch these days, or if you're watching Hard Knocks or if you turn it on ESPN, But did you turn on the television and kind of have to look twice and say, wait a minute, is that another left handed quarterback throwing the ball for the Miami Dolphins. Okay, let me just a little disclosure about left handed quarterbacks. Watching one is the worst thing in the world, like a left handed funny throwing the football except for me, I look good doing it, but but all the other like toua, it's like man, I just oh man, it just this is hard and he's awesome, you know, he he's seven an incredible year. Mike Mcmanniel's so fun to watch. I would love if I'm a quarterback to have that guy as my coach and just awesome. And then Tyreek Hill, my goodness, it's like almost as good as as OJ. I mean, it's yeah, it's it's fun to see the Dolphins do well. I have a tremendous soft spot in my heart for the Miami Dolphins, always will. And really what it's about for me is that's who picked me, right, That's who drafted me. That that like they said, of all the people out there, we want you, and that always meant so much to me, still does to this day. I have unbelievably great memories of my time there, living there, my teammates, my whole experience. I mean, it was it was incredible. Quite frankly, I wish I could have spent my entire career in Miami. And this thing called free agency came along and kind of kind of changed things quite a bit. You know, Scott, it's so funny talk about the way left quarterbacks look like You've seen the people that have made too or righty and they showed them mechanics and it looks normal. It looks so normal when they when they do the mirror thing when he's going right handed, and it's like, it's weird. You say that it's kind of like a left handed jump shot to me too, you know, same thing. We're just weird just in general. I've seen I've seen it in the mirror, Like I happened to have a mirror. I don't know on that Joe Montana was on the TV and so it flipped it around and it looked like him throwing left handed. Go that, that looks like every left hander. And so it really is the normal. You remember Gary Stevens, right, Oh yeah, Gary was freaked out. So so we get drafted. I get drafted right, and he's like, I've never coached a left handed quarterback. I don't know how to coach a left handed for he goes, we got to go out to practice early because how are you going to get the center quarterback exchange? I mean, the center's gonna have is he gonna have to snap it left handed? You know what about the laces? And I looked at him, I'm like, okay, this is this is professional football, right, I mean it's the same way like they snapped the ball I'm going to get the laces the same if if I was right or left handed. We had to go out on the field and we had to do it like in slow motion. And then he was like okay, like we're fine. So yeah, And I don't know about you. I don't know if you ever played with a left handed quarterback. But do you go by juice because I remember you, because I'm happy to call you whatever you want, whatever you want to call them. Good man, Well he got you as a rookie. I was probably Otis mcduffey when you said McDuffie, like like receivers say, it's different catching a ball from a left handed quarterback with the spin. Yeah, I say that all the time, man, And we'll talk. We'll definitely talk more about Gary because he was definitely a big part of what what we were doing back then. Man. But let's go back a little bit. You talk about you know, you're a Utah guy, born and raised in Utah, You attendant University of Utah, and then overnight, following your junior season, you are selected by the Miami Dolphins in the forefront of the draft and you're headed to probably the most non Utah place in the country you have Miami, Florida. I mean, what was that transition? Like, man, was it a culture shock? If it was beyond a culture shock? And not only just just the whole culture, but like the climate, like out west, it's like really dry. It can be one hundred degrees and it's a nice day and you can have you know, ninety ninety in Florida and man, I'm sweating, like you go would make me nervous. We got you, dog, we got you. He's thinking about being in South Florida. I know it is. Yeah, So the weather, the humidity just killed me when I first got there, and that was May. You know, you get drafted to go to mini camp. So it was very different. What I remember most though, really it's like like I adapted all that it was. It was totally fine. And people, you know, they gave me a hard time. You know, I've never had a drink in my life, and Marino was always like, man, if we win to super Bowl, I'm gonna get you drunk. You know, we're gonna People couldn't believe that that's, you know, how my life was, and that it's a pretty conservative lifestyle in so many ways. But I love South Florida. I love the culture of South Florida. It suited me very well, and it was it was really a tremendous, tremendous experience. But I remember that right after I got drafted, went into the locker room and I saw Dan Marino for the first time. Later on in my career, when I played for the Detroit Lions, they had this thing called the Quarterback Club. All the quarterwa you go to Orlando, Florida, Hawaii, wherever. And so I knew Dad, right, we were teammates and all that stuff. But what was fun is to watch all of these other players. There was so much respect, so much fanboy from all of these guys. And these are the best quarterbacks in our era. You know. I give you a who's who of names, and you know, and it's like a lot of Hall of Famers, a lot of Super Bowl champions, and they all were just like googling over over Dan Marino. And I'm telling you this is no joke. I was the same way. And I went to every meeting, I sat right next to Dan Marino every day, and I was just like I wanted to ask his to get his autographed, like every day, like and to me, he was the coolest person I think I've ever like. He was such a persona so like he was Dan Marino. I can to this day remember walking into the old Miami Dolphins locker room, which I don't think you saw OJ did. Yeah, that was a nasty place. Oh I remember just and I walked around the corner and there he was, and I'm like, oh, my goodness, this is this is Dan Marino. So I think that was more of a shock to me was seeing Coach Shoe because Coach Chulo's scared the heck out of me all the time, and everybody were legendary people, and so that was really the culture shock to me more than just you taught to South Florida. I can imagine it would be. You know, it's funny. Also, I'm hearing you tell that story about Dan saying if we win the Super Bowl, I'm gonna get you drunk. So I don't drink either, never have and for different reasons probably, but that's just me. And I worked for the Dolphins and now work for Jason Taylor. That's my day job I've been for the last nineteen years. I run Jason Taylor's Foundation. Well, when I worked for the team. He used to say the same thing. I'm not going to pressure you to drink, but if we win the Super Bowl, like literally the same thing. So we probably got it from another Pittsburgh guy that he knows. Unfortunately neither of us had that experience, but that was, Yeah, that was kind of the same deal that he had on there in prepping for this thing. In the six hours sixteen hours since you said you would do it, I was doing some reading and one of the things I read was that when you were drafted initially, you kind of fell and I don't know if it was because it was your dream to be a starting quarterback, but it was like, here I am, and it's amazing that Dan Marino's there, but maybe this is the worst thing that could happen in my career because I'm never going to get to play behind this guy. But then you said it ended up being for what you just said, having Don Shula there, having Dan Marino ended up being kind of the best thing that could have happened to you. I came out as a junior and it was the first year nineteen eighty nine Barry Sanders actually came out. He was like one of the few juniors, and then the nineteen ninety draft, it was just in Exodus. There were just a ton of guys. A lot of Hall of Famers came out that year, and they were all juniors, and so a lot of people didn't know anything about me, you know, they were kind of behind the eight ball. In fact, David Schula, he was the quarterback coach for the Cowboys, worked me out and actually told his dad about the workout. He says, the best workout, the best quarterback I saw in the draft was this guy out in Utah. I never talked to anyone from Miami Dolphins. I never spoke anyone. So I go through this pre draft process and everyone that I had talked to said, you're you're a late first round draft choice, no later than the second round. And I ended up going in the fourth round. And I think there were eight guys drafted before me. You know, you hear about the Brady six. It's like, you know, I remember how many guys got drafted before me, And like, I was just so devastated because I made a choice to leave school early. I thought I'd made the worst decision of my life. And I remember after coach Schula told me that the Dolphins had drafted me. And I'm in my apartment, you know, It's like about six o'clock at night, and I'm looking up at the ceiling, just going, man, this sucks. You know, this is this horrible. Not only did I go late, but also to the Dolphins and they only keep like two guys. You know, they only keep two quarterbacks, and one of them is Dan Marino. It's not like you know he's going anywhere. And I just remember I went to that first mini camp blown away, like I go, I can't do this. Like watching Dan Marino practice was like watching an artist painting the Sistine Chapel. I mean it was just unbelievable every freaking day, like it was so so cool. And I just watched it that and I was just I was blown away. I just said, I can't do this. I don't think I can do this. And I went home feeling sorry for myself. I'm just like, this sucks, you know, and I just said, look like it or not, this is your shot. Like there's no redos, there's no hey, could I get drafted over again? Could I change my mind? It's like this is your lot and you have to make the most of it. So I just put it in my mind that I was going to the Miami Dolphins to be the starting quarterback, and it just changed my whole focus. In fact, there are newspaper articles because I told the reporters that later, I said, and they just laughed at me. And I'm sure everyone laughed at me. But if I didn't have that mindset, I would have never made it in the NFL. And so my path was different. And man, it was special sitting between Marino and Don Shula for four years and I learned a lifetime of experience at football just being there and watching that every day and witnessing it, and it was it was really a blessing for me. But later, Jeff George, who was the first pick in the draft my year, we had a conversation and it was funny because it was after we had retired. I go, man, I was so envious of you. You were the first pick in the draft. You were a quarterback. You know, you were contemporary, and I just hated you, you know, because you were and he goes, dude, I was so envious of you. I was stuck on an island. I would have killed to have had a mentor to he goes. I just I learned the hard way, the hard hard way. I would have loved to have had a coach like Shula, to have a mentor like Dan Marino, he goes. My whole career, I was envious of you because I could see how it really had helped you in your career and in your development. So it's funny how these things we look at in our life that we just see him as these disappointments, you know, and failures, and they turn out to be really the very best thing. I would I would not give up my time being around Dan Marino and Don Shulifer. And it's one of the great moments of my career, it really is. And it's just a very very special time. That's incredible, what an incredible story. And you know, even thinking about Jeff George and the trials and tribulations, and I mean, it really goes back to that cliche of the grass is always greener and the fact that you guys were looking at each other and that is wild and what you know, thinking about Sorry, there's so much the process. There is really cool stuff, Scott. But thinking about you being in the media once you got past the fact that, Wow, that is Dann Reno. And now you're going to work and you're sitting there and you say, you learn so much from him. And it's funny because now he works for the team. He's not in a coaching position, but he'll hang out in the quarterback room every now and then and he'll they'll turn to him and hey, Dan, what do you see? Just to get a get Dan Marino's perspective, what was that like for you? Because I know that jump from college football to the complex offenses that exist in the pros, But what was that like for you to sit down there and be able to truly get inside the mind of a passer like that in that meeting room. I didn't fully appreciate how great it was because it's all I knew. I got drafted into it, right, It's all I knew, and I'm there for four years and then I leave, and when I left, I was like, oh, oh, I see how and you know how so much of it was. I heard Tom Brady say this not too long ago. He says, look, if they're all short, throw it deep, and if they're all deep, to it short. And if they're inside, run it outside. And if they're outside, run it inside. It's not a complicated game. And I think what was so beautiful about the system that we ran in Miami, which was very hard to learn, Like, it was a hard system to learn, and there was a lot of adjustment to it, and but but man, when you learned it, it was like it was just like you never felt like you were in a bad position. You know, you never felt like you were in a In fact, you were. You were you were responsible to get yourself into a good play coach Ula. My first day, I mean, I'm I am off the bus pulling into Saint Thomas and the first thing they hand me is a playbook. They go, we have a meeting at eight thirty and practice is at nine o'clock. And by the way, you call your own plays in practice. And I go like, I'm a like, I don't know any of this. And I was just, you know, I was I was up all night trying to you know. I figured if I learned like three plays, I'd be all right, because I couldn't call what Marino called because then they think I'm just copying here. So I had to If I knew three plays, I'd be okay. But Shula goes, Look, I can have the best plays in the world, but if you don't have confidence in them, and if you don't believe them, they don't work. And on top of that, it makes you learn the playbook. And it sucked. Like in the beginning, it was brutal, it was hard, but it was the smartest thing I've ever seen in my career in the NFL. And so what happened Like Marino, he just he understood one. He just understood the system so well. He knew where things were going to happen before they happened, you know, his anticipation, his throat, you know, it was just it was just amazing. But he had this ability to really break things down and not overcomplicate it. A lot of people think it's this really complicated game, but it was really it was just I can't even tell you how often I think about this, because I think about football strategy all the time and how dumb so many people are. Right, It's like they just can't to figure it out. And it was really about you know, he I think so many players they get focused on a guy like this is my first option, and their focus is on kind of that guy and who's around him. And Marino's focus was really He's like, you got to see the picture. You don't see a guy, or you don't you see the whole picture, and how the secondary and the and the linebackers are are working conjunction, and how your route combinations are trying to influence however you're trying to attack the team. But if you don't see the picture, then you're going to be late, you know. And so it was it was really I think for me, really breaking the game down into simplicity and seeing a picture, right. And of course you know, he gave me his rules like the first like we're in the stretching line right after I'm drafted, and he goes, you need to understand the rules. So here are the rules. If Danny ain't throwing, we ain't going, right is pick a guy and let it fly. And I'm telling you it is so true. And he goes, you cannot beat a perfect throw, Like I don't care how good you're, if you have the perfect throw, you can't. And so so these are the things you know, I heard from Dann Marino. And then the other one was the day you were born. And you don't know this because you were just being born. But the day you were born, your mother cried. She cried all day long because you weren't Damn Marino. Oh this is this is a true story. This is true. Oh no, no no, I haven't told you that. You wait. So I go to I go to Detroit, right, and I'm this. I'm like, like, you know this hot free agent, you know, and sign this deal and everyone's like, how did they give that guy that much money? You know? And the whole deal of over three years was eleven and a half million dollars for three Like, the salary cap was thirty five million dollars for an entire team, right, and quarterbacks are probably making more than that in a season now. So I get to Detroit and my first year we played pretty good and I got injured. And then and then we start my second year and we start zero and three, and Wayne Fonts, the head coach, he goes, all right, he brings all these players in his office and he goes, what's the deal. And to a man, they all said, man, he brought this quarterback here. Let him throw the ball. So we're zero and three and we're going into a bye week and I sit down with our offensive coordinator Tom Moore, and we'd change. We simplified our whole offense, and we went to about eight basic passing plays and they were all Miami Dolphin. Okay. And we started and we played the San Francisco forty nine ers, who had just won the Super Bowl on Monday night foot ball. They're three and zero, we're zero and three, and we ended up beating him. In that year, I threw for forty four hundred yards. I had thirty three touchdowns. Herman Moore had one hundred receptions over a thousand yards receiving. Brett Perriman had over one hundred receptions over one thousand yard. Barry Sanders rush for fifteen hundred yards, and we all just laughed, right, But it was just about getting the ball to your playmakers, but doing it in a way that's, you know, kind of you cut out a lot of you just let people play, you know, kind of thing. And Tom Moore was fired a year later, went to the Indianapolis Colts and implemented that system with Peyton Manning. So I got Bobby Ross and three yards in a cloud of dust, and Peyton Manning got our offense. And to this day, so Tom's still coaching. He's still you know, he was in Tampa with Bruce Arians. And he goes, We're still running those same concepts with Tom Brady and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and Bruce Arians. Wow, And that's how good that offense was and those concepts and and and so you know, having that and experiencing that and seeing that it holds up over time, you know, it was a great thing to be a part of. Man. Oh man, that is that's all right. Yeah, that's a great story because it's it really goes back and we started with the playbook from Shuler because I remember I got like one opportunity in a mini Camp Scott with the number ones, and but they called a play Danny called a play Obviously I didn't know it because I didn't I wasn't given the same advice to learn the whole playbook like you were because they had we hadn't installed it yet. Man. So that was my last time running with the Ones for a very very, very very long time. So I definitely get that part, man. But the fact that that playbook, which was in my opinion, probably one of the dumbest playbooks, but so brilliant in the way you have had the concepts worked out, because think about it. You know, you line up in one receiver or five receivers, you call eighty four, we call eighty five, we call eighty six, we call eighty seven. You know, like you better know if you're playing foodback, tied end, split slot or whatever whatever it might be. Man, So it's all memorization instead of like nowadays when they tell everybody slot this, split that z this, you know what I mean. It was crazy, Yeah, it really was. And the thing that to me that I really appreciated because I also was coached with from Brian Billick, who went I played in Baltimore and Brian. Brian's philosophy was if you run a play, I'm not gonna I'm not going to run that same play for four more weeks because I know the defense gets you know, four weeks of game film. So I'm not going to I'm not gonna run that. And so you you never got good at anything. And from the day I got to the Miami Dolphins, that system never changed until the time I left. And you hear the guys before me, they're like, yeah, back in nineteen seventy three on Wednesday, you know, in November it was the same practice. And it's kind of funny, but that was I think really the beauty of Don Shula is that he had the ability to stay focused and to stay with something because so many people get bored, you know, they want to fix it, or they overthink it, or they and he was just about, you're going to master these plays. You're going to know them inside out. You're going to be able to run these plays intuitive. When I first started playing, which was nineteen ninety three, I'm like, this is easy. I remember going because you you know, until you play the NFL, you go, what is it really like? And I just remember, I mean other than the first play that I threw for interceptions for a touchdown, fire fell down, by the way, But I just I just came in and I was like, I know this. It wasn't bigger than me. And I knew it because I had practiced it and I've lived it and I've watched it and it never changed in the in the four year or it was really three years before I before I ever really got a chance to play. And so that was I think the beauty of Shula is he could just stay with something and you know, I go to other teams and like they put in fifteen twenty thirty new plays every week all we got to do. And it's like, what about our offense that we use all the time. I mean, why shouldn't that hold up? You know, and a lot of coaches just don't believe it will. Yeah, Scott, I was going to talk about, you know, in nineteen ninety three, our lives changed a lot. I mean mine, of course as a year I got drafted, and you, of course you talk about the time that we went to Cleveland, and for me, it was like a dream for me to be it was dreamed to be drafted by the Dolphins. And I was telling Big saf that, you know, I knew I wasn't going to play a lot then because you know, we had over fire at that point, We had mark Ingrew at that point, Dupe was hell, he's steal in at that mini camp and everything. And because of that, you know, I spend most of my time on scout teams. So you and I had a lot of work before you know, we got that opportunity or you got that opportunity in Cleveland, man, and everything changed for everybody in that minute. Man. So you talked a little bit about that. Man, walk us through that experience. When you know, when you say you didn't get an opportunity till ninety three, you've been there for a little while. Then all of a sudden, you're thrust into the limelight as a mind me Dolphins quarterback. You know, so many people go, Man, you were just at the right place at the right time. You were so lucky. You know, you you hit it right. You became a free agent, and I'm like, man, there was no luck involved in that whatsoever. I beg to go play in the World League right, which you know, if you're a real NFL player, Like that's humiliating. And I was like, I'll do anything, Like I seriously whatever I have to do to get on the field and play because I don't get a lot of reps and I don't have a lot of opportunities. And one and this was another thing that Marino said. He says, when you do get your opportunity, you better make it work, like as you don't get second chances in the NFL. If you don't make an impression, see you later. Like there's you know, it's it's a tough thing to break into and a tough thing to stay into. And he even said that when I went to the World he goes, if you if you suck at the World League, dude, you might as well just go home. Like you better play, you better do well, right and and but it's true, right, So so I worked. I used to go out before games because I knew all the coaches would be sitting out, you know, early, and I knew I was never going to play. And so I go out with one of the front office people, and we were we were buddies, and he was about my age, and and I would I would throw. I would throw all the routes. And I was just hoping that maybe some coach might see, you know, hey, wow, who's that guy. Man, he looks pretty good. You know, maybe we could we could trade for him or something. Because but when I when I went in the first game with with the Dolphins, I had worked, I bought up. I was so ready for that time. And the night before I don't know if you know this, OJ, I was in the hospital. Like I I got sick on the airplane flying to Cleveland. So they took me to the hospital and they said, there's no way you'll play in the game. It was like a food poisoning thing. It was it was They said it was pink eye. Oh wow, I was puking. I had a They put me in my own room in the hotel. I didn't sleep the entire night, like I was up all night. Now maybe some other guys that's a normal thing, you know, I don't know. I needed my sleep. And so I remember looking up at the ceiling laying in my bed about four o'clock in the morning, going, this will be the game that Dan Marino gets hurt and won't I won't get to play. In fact, when I was in the hospital and the doctor said, hey, look he can't play tomorrow, the the athletic train and goes, oh, it doesn't matter. He doesn't play anyways, you know, he's just so when I went to breadakfast and doctor Canal goes, you know how you feel, and I said, well, I didn't have any sleep. I feel better today, so I could play it in an emergency and he says great. He said, just dress, don't warm up, and stay away from everyone. So I didn't. I went on the field in my uniform. Think about it. I didn't stretch, I didn't throw a pass. I didn't. I did nothing. I was like some dude in the stands, you know, just just sitting there on the sideline, you know. And when Marino gets hurt and Chula turns to me, goes, Mitchell, you're in, I go I can't. I can't believe that. Like I've worked so hard for this moment and it's here, and like I'm not ready, Like how do I warm up? Like how do you warm up in four minutes? And it got so funny. I just started to laugh. And I go in to play and my first play is an interception for a touchdown, right, And I know everyone's like, oh, he's not Dan Marino. He's sick. You know, he's never played. This is this is going to be ugly day. And what people don't realize is is we got the ball back right, because you throw an interception for a touchdown, you get the ball back right. So the next play, I throw a pass. We're in the two minute drill, and I throw another interception, but the guy was just barely out of bounds and so it was an incompletion. But it's like this guy is like over and this is just and I go in the I go in the in the locker room, and and old Cleveland Brown's Municipal Stadium locker room is like it's like a cracker box, like it is. It's awful. And I remember looking around the room and I can and Coach Schule is like, everything's gonna be fine. We're gonna be you know, Mitch is gonna be fine. We're going to be fine. And I looked around and I could say, no one believes this, like this is this is a bad deal. Right here. I go. I go onto the field first play, We're in the huddle, and I look at everybody and I just say, don't worry about me. Just do your job. I'm fine, I'm ready for this. Just do your job, and we're going to be just fine. And I ended up being the AFC Offensive Player of the Week the first time I played, and I threw, I threw a couple more touchdown passes. You know, we won the game, but there was a moment and this this ranks up as like one of the top moments in my life. I was walking out of the huddle when we're going to the line of scrimmage and I'm looking at the Cleveland Browns defense and I look over and there's Clay Matthews, right. Clay Matthews played forever, you know, it's one of those names in the NFL. And I looked over right at him, and I just said, in my head, I own Clay Matthews today. At that moment, it's like I belong here. And I realized, like, because I can't tell you how many times in my life I dreamt about being an NFL player and about playing and it's like it's like the dream of a lifetime, and here I was like living it, like my dream had become a reality right in that moment. Even though I'd been on the team and you know, I'd been around and for three years, this my fourth year. It was that moment when I go I belong and I'm telling you, one of the coolest moments in my life. Unbelievable. I love the I O Clay Matthews. I want that. I want that to be the title of this podcast episode. By the way, Scott, but that was so great. You know, the Browns fan growing up, man, I know a lot about playing them boys. Man, it was so much fun for me to be in that game too. That's good stuff, man, that's great. So so you know, Danny didn't just go down because he stubbed his toe, right, it's a torn achilles. He's done for the season. And now you're the guy you win the Player of the Week award. How much of a whirlwind was that for you, Scott? I mean, you go from having eight career pass attempts to you step in and now you're the starting quarterback of the Miami Dolphins. You've just replaced Superman. You've got a really good football team, and there's like an entire city counting on you now and you're having success. It's not like you're going out there. I mean you're playing well. That had to just be a whirlwind because you went from from all this time that you like you said, you're begging to go to play in Orlando in the World League, and now all of a sudden, all of this Well, part of what really helped me, or one of the things, was like nobody cared who I was until I started playing, and I'm like, oh, I see what this is all about. You know, as long as I'm in this position, then I'm important. And as soon as I'm not, I'm not I'm not going to be important anymore. So I kind of I kind of saw that side of it for what it was, and I knew, I knew what put me on the field, what kept me on the field. And that's what I really focused on, is just kind of being cordial and dealing with a lot of that stuff. But I just know that I was very I was very prepared for it, and we had a tremendous team, and I was so relaxed and I was so comfortable. And again, I was so shocked at how easy it actually was. And and it's not easy, like it is not easy, but man, I was I was so prepared for it, and I was I was just in an environment with a good system, a quarterback friendly system, and great player. I mean, we had just great player. Keith Buyers, Keith Jackson, you know, all these guys. I me know, O Jay, you know he's trying to get on the field, right, talk about that. Those were some great players. And it was funny because Marino goes, you know, he was so good to me. He really was. And then and he goes, look, don't worry. The first game I started, I threw three interceptions. I was terrible. So if you're it's okay, you know, you're gonna be, you know. And I just remember thinking in my head, I'm not going to throw three interceptions like I'm not, because you know, he was a rookie when he when he went in, it was a little different deal, right, And and and then I ended up being the player of the month, the FC Player of the Month for November, and it was like or October, and it was it was like I'm just telling you, it was just like, all right, let's go. And then I got injured and I had a third degree separation on my left throwing shoulder, and oh man, it was it was so hard because we were in such a groove, you know, we really were in such a groove, and that whole team just had injury after injury, you know. And I mean a lot of it started when Marino got hurt. But that was a really good football team. And I really think had that team actually been completely healthy, you know, probably would have contended to go and win a Super Bowl. And then when I came back, like they initially told me, they said, you're done, like you're going to have to have surgery. You know, this is a sixteen week process. And I managed to get back on the field, after I think three or four games, but my arm was a rag, like I is not anywhere close to healthy, and you just you'd lose that timing with everyone, and it was just so hard to get it back. I mean, I think we were we were nine and two after the snow Angel game in Dallas on Thanksgiving, the best record in the NFL, like and and lose the next five games, don't make the playoffs, and so that that wasn't that team. And there's just a lot, a lot of injuries. But you know this, this football is a humbling sport. You know, you can be on top in one minute and then on the bottom just as quickly. And it deserves your respect, your attention, and your reverence. And I think that's one thing that I, you know, I learned throughout my career. You know, if you're not working hard and harder than the next guy, that guy is going to run you over. And so you know, you live and you learn those things as you go along. But and I really seriously I talked to my agent. I said, I don't want to leave here. I really don't want to leave here, and he goes, no, you don't understand. I got a five million dollars signing bonus, and they gave me a check, you know, and I've never seen that much money in my life, and it was it was like it was life changing for me. I couldn't believe how many zeros on the back, you know, just just zeros just kept going, you know. And and yet if I'd have known what I know and believe now, I really I would have strongly considered staying with the Dolphins because I was familiar. It was a system, it was a place that I loved because Detroit and ain't a friendly place like I got foods for five years at home and in introductions, and I had good years, and we had good teams. We went to the playoffs, and it was a it was a tough deal, really tough deal man. So so Scott, we had we had great Cody on the show recently and right around the time of all this, all this was happening, he wrote a column, you know, stadium, it was time to consider the possibility of trading Dan or moving forward with you at the quarterback position. How much attention you know, we panded this and then that, you know, as the season went or came to a close, and you had to think about what your future was going to be about in the NFL. But you talked about you wanted to stay. I mean, was that ever consider racing? Considering what was going on with the narrative around Dan Marino's career, it would have been interesting to have stayed because Dan came back, had a tremendous year. You know, he kept playing, didn't you know, And and he wasn't the same player, you know, I mean it was, you know, just he was. He was a different player. You could see just him dropping back and you know it still had the same fire. And I just tell you no one had a greater fire than Dan like he was just it was just it was fun to watch him serious like it was entertaining. Actually, I used to tell people, sorry, I'm going in the rabbit hole here. I used to tell people, Man, don't watch what's on the field, Like watch the sidelines. Watch watch Shula and Marino get into it, or Marino get into it. Just watch Marino get into it with anybody right back later. Oh man, I'm sorry, I just get really competitive, you know, I just you know, don't take it personal, you know, but I there's probably I'm just telling you going back to leaving Miami. There was discussions about it, like staying right, it was just so much more money, Like it's like, how do you turn down that money? You know? And and at the time it was a lot of money. Yeah, and it's like, you know, and it's a chance for you to go and be a starter and be out of the shadow of Dan Marino and and and all that stuff. But I just learned later it's not it's not if you're a good or bad player. It's if you're a player that fits well into a system and with a coach and a structure, that's where you're really going to see uh success. And I refer to a guy like Steve Young, who he was with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and he was nowhere near a Hall of Fame quarterback with the Buccaneers, and then he got traded to the Niners and it changed, it changed his fortune. And you see it. You know, Brett Favre would languish in Atlanta with Jerry Glanville. I mean, Jerry Glanville didn't like Brett Favre and and then he goes to Green Bay and he really flourishes and just hasard you know, the right system that fits him. And that's that's what I look going back, is that system. I loved it. I loved being in it. It was amazing. I loved just I love South Florida, I love playing there. I loved you know, I love my teammates, like like, I think so fondly of these guys and and uh and so you know, there's a lot to be said about maybe taking less money and getting in the right situation. And you know, I was young. I don't think I was even mature enough to make a decision like that. I was gonna say, how do you know that? Right? You're you're this close to your dream of being that guy and all that money, and you know, he said it was a lot of money back then. Relative to now, it doesn't seem like it. But that's still a lot of I mean eleven million dollars contract, right, I mean that's still a lot of money. So I mean, how could you have the perspective now that you have. Yeah, they hadn't have gotten injured, you know, and that would have played out, and it may have been a different scenario. You know, the Dolphins may have gone and said, look, we're going to make this move. You know the NFL is you know, you don't want to keep guys till they're past their prime. You want to keep them to a point where you know, the forty nine ers did that brilliantly. The Cowboys used to do that brilliant you know. They they would, you know, get rid of guys that still had some value and and and keep the team competitive so you don't go through this big cycle of ups and downs. Yeah, and in fairness to Greg Cody, who you know, did talk about it here, he was like, look that that wasn't an anti Marino college Like I love, I have, you know, reverence for Dan Marino, but it was more of could you go get a lion's share because he still had value and at that point in time, you know, Tom Brady plays till he's forty, who knows whatever. At that point in time, a guy's in his eleventh year and coming off this mysterious Achilles injury. So it was just really interesting perspective all the way around. But you talked about Detroit, right, So you go there and I apologize I'm going to kind of fast forward through two thirds of your career here, but you know, it just kind of you addressed the fact it was a tough place to play. You had a four thousand yard season, of thirty plus yard touchdowns, the whole things, and this idea that you got booed literally every crazy time you went out there. It is crazy. But I read Scott that you said that when you retired after a twelve year NFL career, that when you retired you felt like a failure, which is pretty heavy stuff to read for a guy. I mean, the average career is three and a half years, you know, and you did the things that you did, and that you felt like a failure. And then that feeling of failure, the frustration with your career obviously led to some other challenges in your life, and many of them manifested into you know, we talked about it before we get on the show here, but it manifested into this significant the weight game. And you know, for a guy who's a big guy, you know, six six and a half two hundred fifty punds, was you're playing weight now all of a sudden, you're three hundred and sixty plus pounds and you find yourself on a reality show. Yeah, that was something that I reluctantly didn't want to do. Yeah, I really didn't. And well let me go back to feeling like, you know, you failed in your career. And I think you can ask any player. I think you could ask Dan Marino this that there's probably more you could have done. Like he goes, I never get I never got to win a super Bowl. I don't know what that's like. And for me, that was all that's all I wanted, Like like like I never looked at like, Okay, what's you know, what's my career look like? You know? And I always looked at like, ma's just want to win. I just want to win the super Bowl. And when I played, I go, I'm not going to the super Bowl until I until I go as a player, right, I wasn't going to give myself the pleasure of that. And it's just it's just how you're wired. Right, You're just wired to be competitive. And you go, give me another game, like, give me another quarter, give me another throw, whatever, whatever it is, I'll get it done. You know, You're just you're just wired that way, and it really never you're never satisfied with it. And I think that's part of what keeps you around, what keeps you going. When I was done at twelve years. I still physically could play. I just didn't have anyone that wanted to sign me. And I'm telling you that's worse than having an injury that I would have rather had my leg snapped off. So it's like, Nope, you can't ever play again, as opposed to no, I can still play, but you guys are just not letting me. That was hard and it was really hard to deal with. And I actually came to terms with all of this failure or feeling like I was a failure when I went on this reality TV show and it was it was a humbling experience and and I think, what what I really got from it? This is very real to me. I mean it's it's it's all. This is a reality TV game show, right going this game show and whoever loses the most ways wins a prize at the end. I mean, that's that's how it works. But for me, it was it was like real as rain, you know, it was. It was a very personal journey for me, and really it was about surrendering to your weakness and surrendering to being humble and the thing that like is so challenging for you if you will if you will turn to it and just surrender, it's where you really find strength. And and for me, why I was so reluctant is I just knew people will probably take sh at me. Look at that guy, Look what you know, Look what happened to him. He let himself go. You know, he's looked, he looks terrible, he looks awful. And and for me, it was quite the opposites, like I was willing to take those shots or whatever people were going to say, because it's it's something in my life I have struggled with and it's the darnest thing in the world, and it really is. In fact, I have stuff here right next to me working on, you know, losing getting in a healthy state. So it's been it's continues and it's been a struggle for me, but it's it's one where I just said, you know, I've got to accept that I can't do this on my own, that I need help from other people. It's just the thing that in my life that's the challenge. And what I learned on the show was those those failures, those moments in your life that aren't the most pleasant or you didn't succeed at, actually are the things that are the greatest blessings because you find so much more about yourself and who you are and what you're made of, what you're capable of in those moments than you would if everything was just kind of hunky dory. And so I really treasure some of those those tougher, more painful moments in my life, and they really helped me realize more of who I am and what I made of and developed a lot of things in my life that I cherish, you know. I like who I am, I like what I become in my life, and so much of that came out of those moments that maybe were disappointments or the maybe failures. Wow, I appreciate you sharing that, man. That's incredible, man, Yeah it is. I mean there's a lot of people that can learn from that, right there. Man. You know that's that's that's that's great stuff, man, And it's always for everybody. I think. It's a constant battle with things in life, man, and to hit it head on, bro and face it head on, man. That's uh. I mean, I got my own own issues and battles. I know how you feel, Bro about having those failures. Look, we all came up a little short when it came to the football field. Most people do, right, I mean, hell, there's only a few world champions out there, man, And you know, I know, it's always tough, man, when you're in the most high profile position in sports for the most part, you know. So yeah, just very good stuff to hear you. You know, face that head on, man and deal with it man, for sure. Yeah, no doubt. And I don't mean to no, thank you for sharing that. Yeah, I don't mean to flip a serious moment into something funny, but I did it. After all of that, well, first of all, let's just say this, right, so the show was the biggest loser. He lost one hundred and twenty four pounds on the show. So it wasn't like you went on and got voted off the island in the first week or whatever. You know. One hundred and twenty four pounds is absolutely incredible. But jew so apparently, and tell me if this is true, Scott, Apparently you're sitting at home watching television with your mother after all of this, and Danny I was on television with a nutri System commercial and he's bragging about losing twenty two pounds and your mom turns to you, this is the best thing jus and she says, you're better than Dan Marino. We lost twenty twounds, two pounds better. He ain't nothing. Is that a true story? Yeah, there's another one that's actually kind of funny too. My mom like she's a straight shooter, like she just she told you how it was. And she she called me one Sunday and she lived in Arizona. I live in Utah, and she said, this new family came to church and I went up to him after it was over, and I introduced myself and I said, hey, I just love families with all these boys, you know. And the family had five boys. And so the mom introduces her boys and she goes, this is our oldest. His name is Daniel Scott, and we named him. My husband's favorite quarterback in the NFL is Dan Marino. And then we were at the University of Utah when Scott was there. Oh my god, my mom goes, well, Scott's my son, right, they have this moment. My mom calls me and so I asked my mom, it's like, man, how come I got the middle day? And my mom goes, because damn Marina was better than you man, she's a straight suitor for real. Se Well, maybe what Danny told you back in the day, or that when she cried that day, maybe all of our mothers went through that moment. I don't know. She did well, Scott Man, we kept you a long time, man man, but having you on our show, man, we uh, you know, we end every episode of our podcast what we call the fish tank two minute drill. Now we've had some defensive guys. I talked about that, you know, Seth. That brings these defensive guys on, and they haven't handled very well. They do not they do not do very well. But now we got a quarterback in the tank, sass. Yeah, and so today I expect the two minutes. You're the run smooth, well oiled machine here, you know. So well, we're gonna do, Scot. We're gonna put two minutes on the clock and you've got one time out. Okay, we're going to fire off some quick hitting questions and we're gonna see how we come out, how we come out. We're here, all right, you ready? That's good? All right? Except get it started here we go. Okay, we talked about to at the top of the show. There have actually been ninety three left handed touchdowns thrown in the history of the Miami Dolphins franchise, at least that I could document. Maybe I'm missing some, but ninety three. So Tua's got seventy six and counting by the time this airs. Hopefully he's got more than seventy six, because it'll be after Monday. You had twelve Jim del Gazo in nineteen seventy two through two touchdowns, and the question is, can you name either of the two non quarterbacks who tossed the remaining three left handed touchdowns? One was a teammate of yours, Keith fires layups. That's good, really good, Okay, non left handed quarterback, a non quarterback who was left handed and through touchdowns. He actually through two, but it was much later. Yep, I'll give you a hand wildcat. Oh Ricky Williams, Right, well, Ronnie Brown, it was Ronney Brown because he was the one under center. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I love it. All right, Okay, all right, it's a wide out. I'm a big believer that you gotta you gotta look good to play good. Yes, what uniform did you look best? In? The Utah Red Dolphin aqua Detroit Blue, Cincinnati Bengal Tiger stripes or the Orlando Thunder Lime green. Oh, man, I hated the lime green. That was actually the owner of the team was a bathing suit manufacturer, and it's his wife's favorite color of bathing suit. That's unbelievable today that that color would be really in. But there's nothing better than the Miami Dolphin. Man, Yeah, I love it. I don't think anybody listening to this is gonna argue with you on that one. Okay. Anyone who follows you on social media, Scott, they will see the adventures of red Oh yeah, you gotta tell us about red Hat and what's the craziest place Red Hat has been to. Red Hat is actually on his way to K two to actually go. So it's it's all a part of just building a social I hate being on social media. It was just a fun way for me to kind of get into these crazy things. And Red Hat's got some he's got some crazy things that are going to happen, but uh yeah, he's he's gonna hike hike uh K two. So wow, all right. We talked about Dan Marino. What was the most impact impactful piece of advice that Damn Marino gave you during your time from this Hall of Fame quarterback. What was the most impactful advice he gave? I know you talked about pick a guy and let it fly. You know, it's not you know what I mean, what's the most impactful thing? So he said, drop back as fast as you can. And actually Johnny Unit has shared that same infat with with Dan fouts wo and he says, there's something about dropping back as fast as you possibly can. It just gives you that little bit of extra time to see what's going on, but it also creates a sense of urgency within yourself. And it's the truest thing in the world. And it would be the first and the last and most important thing I ever ever taught a quarterback. Now they're all in a shotgun. They're really not that fast. That's the one they do that. Yeah, right, that's probably why they do it. Now they're already back there, right, that's exactly right. Oh, great stuff, Scott, Thank you so much, man. And I got to say for the advice, it's funny to hear this. So you know you're there from ninety to ninety three telling these things that Danny said and they just asked too her recently, Hey, when Dan's sitting in there, what's the best advice he's given you? And he said, yeah, Danny tells us all the time, pick a guy, let him fly. So I mean that hasn't changed. The game may have changed, that advice hasn't changed. But this was really wonderful. I appreciate you, you know, a answering the call so quickly, but really sharing so much of your story man, you know, the really some of the personal stuff. And I think that dolphins are gonna look back and really reflect on this a smile. I truly enjoyed this, Scott Man. This was so good man. It's great to catch up man, and I definitely appreciate you man. I know that work we had to put in on the other field sometime when those other guys were in club men. I called it, you know, doing their work. But you got you got in there pretty much right away in my rookie year man, So I appreciate you man. Yeah, this has been fun. Thank you very much. Thanks for diving in, Scott. Just like Jew said, thanks for diving into the fish Tank. Presented by iHeartRadio. 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