Drive Time: Dave Hack and Nat Moore Honored

This is Drivetime with Travis Wingfield.

What is up, Dolphins and welcome to the Draft Time Podcast. I am your host, Travis Wingfield. And on today's episode, part two of a two parter, a special bonus edition here of the Draft Time Podcast, we have two esteemed

Hegie Daffy, and.

We are joined today by someone that I have been told around the building is best described in one word, legendary, Dave Hack. Dave's career began with the Dolphins in nineteen seventy four and went all the way to the Division Championship season in two thousand and eight. He was the director of the football Video Department for twenty four years, and because of that service, he has been chosen for

Thank you very much, Travis, and thank you for having me.

And I think one of the things that folks that you part of your person that resonates with folks so much, Dave, is kind of your personable side. And the first thing you mentioned here on the show before we started recording was you wanted to acknowledge a couple of friends of yours that are no longer with us and people that were close to you and the Dolphins organization.

That's right, and I'd like to have my thoughts and prayers go out to the Vigorito family and the Crowder family on their recent losses.

It's very kind of you, and that's definitely being felt here in Dolphins Nation. And you know this, this family and this this bloodline goes back a long time and you're a big part of that.

Dave.

MI w wanted to have you on you so thoughts and prayers as he mentioned there, to those two families. And you know, Dave, I have so much I want to get into in such a short amount of time here let's start with this. Let's go let's go explosive right off the top, like the twenty, Like the modern Dolphins offense that throws the ball down the Phildo Rican wattle all the time. Let's go explosive. So you worked with some of the game's biggest personalities and figures in

Dave.

I worked with coach Don Shula for twenty one years, and he was a no bs kind of guy.

It was football playing and simple.

And one of our biggest problems at the early stage is when we were exchanging films, was films coming from the West Coast because of the travel and the time and all that, and I would always have to go in there and wait for like a raider game to come in from the West Coast. I'd go in there and he'd want to update from the airlines, and he'd go, Dave, what do you got from me an excuse or explanation?

And I go, well, coach, I got both, which one you wanned?

And was he receptive to the answers to those?

Oh?

Yeah, he knew that I didn't control the airlines and I was doing the best they could.

That's so good.

Yeah.

It's a position that really is vital to an organization, right because everything they do pretty much from Sunday after the game to the next Sunday before the game, I mean, all the study and preparation, they got to have that tape. So you are a vital part of the organization. And I mean it sounds like that's kind of why you're being honored here, but I'm curious to the feedback you got from all those coaches and just how valuable that role was for you.

Well, i'll tell you what. The role changed so much over my career. When we started with sixteen millimeter film, the ability to make what they call now cutups was primitive, and when we got into videotape, that launched into a whole new wave of what I can do with these images. And then we started making it into a digital format

How many how many man hours do you think that saves going from a physical cutup that you had to physically make right versus the digital kind of editing of it was, It's got to be a huge difference.

Oh, a major difference.

And one of the good things about it is if you had a coach that like we had. Joel Collyer was with us, and we gave him the ability to write to the database, he would make his own cutups and so you had, you know, so basically guys cutting up sixteen millimeter film to pushing a few buttons on his desk in his dreamy land.

He had anything he wanted.

That's just amazing. As someone that you know, tries to learn as much as I can about football through watching tape myself. I mean, I imagine that you picked up a thing or two because as you're cutting these up, you're watching as much film as these coaches are, right.

Oh yes, and I was shooting it, which was even a better learning curve for what I was doing when I started with the Dolphins. That's what I wanted to do, is to be a cinematographer.

You know.

We wore a lot of other hats and our job as things went along, but my favorite thing to do was on Sunday for three hours, I get to take out my earplug from my phone and my radio and all that, crawl into the viewfinder on my camera.

And shoot a game.

To be a cinematographer and just be stuck in that moment. I'm kind of jealous of that because my job these days entails, you know, tweeting about everything that happens. I want to go into the film room of view and just watch the game. David sounds very peaceful. Let's go back to the very beginning here, because when you began back in nineteen seventy four, did you grow up a Dolphins fan?

Well, I was born in Illinois, but I moved to Miami when I was two months old. My parents brought us down to South Florida, and I was always a big time Dolphin fan, especially seventy two and seventy three season.

I can only imagine. You got to be up close and personal to this legendary figure, right, and you're kind of young, trying to feel your way into the industry, were you were you nervous about being around the coach and the team like that, a.

Little bit apprehensive, But I knew I had a job to do, and the thing I wanted to do most was to be a good photographer. And so when the opera tunity came with the Miami Dolphins to join their video or their film staff back then, I had to take it. I was a young man and that's what I kind of wanted to do.

And then the next year you were there. How did that job come to be in nineteen seventy four.

Well, I worked in a business that was sales, service and rental of professional motion picture equipment. So I was a hardware guy from day one, and the folks that were doing just got the deal with the Dolphins to bring their film processing and everything in house. It was a ground floor thing for me to take my skills and add it to what they were doing.

So that was one of the questions I had for you later on in my list here, I was talking about the repairing of hardware because I was talked to our current video director and Mike Nobler, and again, Dave, the way that they talk about you around here is it's I mean, as a guy that was honored by Dan Marino and who gave you the phone call to let you know you're going into the Hall of Fame. It kind of reminds me of the way folks talk

And when we went from film to video, I was already familiar with the equipment. So one thing led to another, and you know, I built and wired her own studios, and when we moved into the new training facility in Davy, I did all the wiring for all the meeting rooms and then the studio and everything myself.

That is no small feat. Have you seen our new facilities here in Miami gardens by chance?

No, I haven't, but I did watch somebody flew a drone through there. Yeah, and it was really cool whoever did that. But I just recently went to the Jacksonville Jaguars brand new training facility here in Jacksonville, and they said the architectural group that did that training camp did the one in Miami too, So I got to see maybe a preview of what you actually have there.

Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. And I asked, because I'm in a studio right now that has all these you know, these cameras that are operated by a control room on the other side of the wall, and we got the TV studio back there. I just I imagine that's kind of like a like a kid in a candy store situation for you. But what I want to know, Dave, maybe almost as much as anything, is what a day in the life is like for you in that position. But with how your career spanned so many different spanned

When I started with the Dolphins, it was all sixteen minimeter film, and I remember one time we were back at Saint Thomas University, We're getting ready for the draft, and we didn't have the resources then it was just film and they were pretty much done watching film, you know, it just turned on the TV and watched the draft.

So what was that like five or six hours?

Oh yeah, it was a long break.

In the actual it wasn't the show it is today in primetime TV and all that.

It was a different world.

Yeah, it certainly is. I mean shooting now we have they did an announcement of the schedule during the draft this year that they announced the announcement of the schedule. It's like everything with the bells and whistles these days, and that's cly. A positive thing is that it shows the NFL's growth over many, many years. And one of the things that you did was become a director after

Well, I was a young man starting a family, so financially it was very good for sure to take on the new role. And I was already familiar with the equipment, so it wasn't a big change for me. But it did require you learning new skills, and so I took all my old skills piled them into that, and I think I was fairly successful.

At that, I would say so. I think the Pro Football Hall of Fame calling certainly would verify that for you as well. And we've kind of touched on this a little bit day, but I want to just maybe go a little bit further into it, because to the layman, the idea of transitioning from the sixteen millimeter to digital the evolution of technology. Was it difficult to learn that for you or was that kind of an easy transition as you know, someone that had been doing it for so long, Well.

That was that was an easy transition for me. And actually it wasn't from film to digital. It was filmed to analog tape first, and then the computers got into it. And then what happened was you we were able to take the images from the videotape and put them into a computer and then marry that with the database. So it was actually three steps to get to our final product today and it's all digital pusher button stuff.

So were you the one that had to kind of get coach Saban up to speed when he got here on how the NFL films worked.

Actually, Nick had was far enough along where he was coaching that they knew the digital side of the world and so they were familiar with it. So we didn't have to do much early training with his career. They already knew what was going on. But with the Dolphins and our coaches first started messing with computers and all that stuff, we actually had to teach some of them how to use a mouse.

Doesn't surprise me. I mean, it's a football coach, right. That was an age where computers were only for nerds, right, That was the general thought back then, right.

I remember the first computer at our old training camp was a word process or used by Shula's secretary, and that was it in the building.

Was Sheula pretty computer savvy?

Actually? I was surprised. Yes he was.

Yeah, all right, he was pretty good at everything. It sounds like, yeah, he was. Something else that kind of fascinates me, Dave, is the relationship of a coworker of yours that was also your brother Bob, for twenty years together you worked with him.

Yes, I had that privilege of working with my brother, and we were always very good at if we had a situation where we needed to think tank it, we were always good at coming up with the right answer. Like when we went to the digital we had to go into the computer room and design our own racks and stuff to make our server work in the building we were in, and to distribute all that video and database information to everyone.

So that was quite a challenge.

Yeah, it sounds like I think that was one of the things that I was talking to our again, our current director of football video here, Mike Knobler, was talking about let's see it was she was the name of it? I had it written down here. Oh, Sports Pro that that new implemented system of you guys had. I think that was that was around around Coach Saban's time, wasn't it.

Yes, Well, we had a small version of that, and we with Coach Saban there we were able to secure funding for a more advanced version of that. So we really took off after that. As far as our technology.

Yeah, Mike was saying it was the gold standard in terms of your guys, like forty stations for coaches and and just kind of creating again the gold standard was at that time.

Yeah, we had a lot of support from our vendor too to implement and give us the latest technology, which was great.

That's that's really cool. And one of the other things he mentioned was a letter that you guys, he said, either you or your brother or together wrote a letter to thirty one organizations about this idea of going something to DVC pro, which is a digital version of the tape, and it was going to be a big expense for all the teams with new cam cameras and recorders and new decks. But you guys said that wasn't a great idea and it worked. Can you take us through how that all?

What?

How that all played out.

That's the longer story than we have time for.

But there was a move because our beta cam Sony betacam equipment was aging and they were changing. Sony was changing on their business model, and so we wanted to make sure the NFL was in the right place for the next set phase of what we're doing and members sending in a meeting.

And if you ever sit.

In a meeting and you're the only guy holding up your hand to vote on something, you need to look behind you, because everybody else.

Had their hand down looking at me like you're nuts.

But I did offer a letter to all the owners and it was like with Sony versus Panasonic, all we ever heard was Panasonic, this is Panasonic, that they never really invited Sony to the table.

To speak their mind.

And so I put a with my letter, put a hold on the proceedings to go with Panasonic and to do more research on what we actually did and what we actually needed. And I think I was the only person to turn around a unanimous vote by the Competition committee to put a hold on Panasonic and to review Sony, And once Sony got back in the fold again, the decision was to keep our legacy hardware and modernize it and move on from there and not do a radical

Well.

Yeah, I mean, that's a lot for someone that doesn't understand or that doesn't have a first hand experience in that field to really kind of take in. But it just speaks to the evolution of where we are and

Don't forget RFID tags in the shoulder pads, right right. So speaking of shoulder pads, there's two guys I'd like to call out, and they're my wonderful friends there are still with the Dolphins. It's your equipment guys. Yeah, Joey and Charlie are my good buddies. They always will be and I want to give a big shout out to them.

Oh, they're the best yests. That's a great, great spot to do that. Have you got a chance to watch every single touchdown pass and watch every single game of the Electric Dan Marino's career, And in his speech he acknowledged that you were the only person that saw all four hundred and twenty touchdowns. I'm curious what that meant to you. And do you have a favorite Dan Marino touchdown pass?

Yes?

I do.

Dan and I talked about this one time. We played a game versus Pittsburgh for the AFC Championship and and we won that game. But I remember late in the game, there is one pass I think it was to Mark Clayton that put us right down on the goal line, and you knew in your and you look at the clock and knew how we were playing. We're going to the Super Bowl, so that was one of my favorite Dan Marino touchdown.

I got one more Dan Marinos story.

For you, please.

There's something that a lot of people didn't see about Dan Marino.

You know what Make a Wishes Travis. Yeah, there with the kids and all that making the wish.

Dan was one of the most popular Make a Wish guys ever. And I can't tell you how many times I saw after a game, win or lose, he would compassionately take the time to go over and interact with these Make a Wish kids and it was outstanding.

That is just a great story to kind of put together the two ledges we're talking about here on the show of Dan Marino and Dave Hack. Dave, I appreciate those those stories and the intel. I do want to close with this, and you do a great job of kind of deflecting some of the praise here I've noticed in this interview, but I do want to hear what this means to you when when you heard about this honor, when Dan gave you the phone call and you kind of your holy bleep, I saw the video. It was

Coming from Dan and coming from my peers. It's a priceless thing for me. It shows you how well organized our group was to even be able to have an award like this, and I think it's just wonderful to be honored with some of these other pioneers in the field, and.

One of those pioneers being a different field, but in our organization here, Jason Jenkins will also be given a or be elected into the Pro Football Hall of Fame and the Awards of Excellence too, So two really big names in our organization, two guys with legendary status being cemented into the PFH Pro Football Hall of Fame. I should say, Dave, thank you so much for your time today. Congratulations on this honor and a brilliant life in football. And it was nice to meet you.

Travis Move is my pleasure, and thank you for having me anytime.

I appreciate you, Dave. That was a lot of fun to get to know Dave there and talk about his story. For a guy that saw thirty four consecutive years of Dolphins football without missing a game, uh yeah you might. He might have a few stories to tell you fans out there about what Dolphins football was and has been for for a long, long time, last break right there, speaking of Dolphins legends, coming back on the other side and talking to Nat Moore. That's next Draft Time Podcast,

How you doing fantastic.

You know, I've heard so many great things about the show and look forward to the opportunity to share a little bit of my history with the Miami Dolphins.

Yeah, that's we're all about that. I remember back when when I first started here, was right before the pandemic happened, and we launched this idea to look at old Dolphins games because everybody was doing that right right, and we had we had you on talking about the eighty five Bears win and the touchdown you scored in that game. And I haven't I don't think i've I've had you on the show ever since then. But it's it's a it's good to have you back on here.

Well, thank you, thank you.

So the reason we're having you on today is a pretty big deal. So Second, a portion of Northwest second app So I've tried to read this here because it's a lot of numbers between fifty ninth and sixty second Street were named Namore Away, right next to Miami Edison High School, where you played your prep football. So to kick it off, let's start with, you know, the honor. Take me through the emotions and the excitement when you heard this is going to happen.

Well, you know, I heard a year ago that there was a possibility, and you know, those kind of things don't really really excite me.

You know. I think we do the things we do because we care.

And the Miami Dolphins have given me a gigantic platform where I can make a difference in all in Miami or South Florida, where I grew up. And because of that, so many people support you. I'm able to get my former teammates and all the Dolphin players, sponsors, partners that come to the table to make South Florida a better place to live. And then all of a sudden they want to honor you for that, you know, and that's they call it an individual award, But I don't believe in individual awards.

I played football for a living. It took eleven.

Guys doing their job on one play from five to eight seconds to be successful.

That one play. So when it actually happened is when it really hit.

Me that this was something special and extremely extremely appreciative. They couldn't have chosen a better place to put my name, because that's where I harnessed my skills, right there at Edison High School. Matter of fact, right there on sixty second and second Avenue where I saw the signs across from the gymnasium where I played basketball. You know, basketball

Yeah, at five foot nine, what's been pretty good to taket to that level.

Well, you know, one of the great things about playing with the Miami Dolphins back in the old days was that there was no off season draining, right. We had this barnstorming basketball team, so we would travel around and play games against coaches and teachers and firefighters and polleys and help them raise money and we'd make a little

Right, Yeah, you mentioned that you know this was something. And I read the story on the Miami Herald about when you when they unveiled the street name, and you were there for the ceremony, and I believe you spoke, and the article was like, but Natt wasn't trying to like get the attention on him for all this, because that's that's the entire idea of the servitude that you

Yeah, I think.

You know, as a successful individual, your success is based off so many others. But how do you show young people, young kids, that they can do it too? You know, back in the late nineties, no early nineties, excuse me, when Super Bowl came back to Miami, we started a football camp and once again I'm serving on a committee. And there was two events for Super Bowl, and everybody forget that there were two.

One was the game and the other was the Commissioner's party.

There was no NFL Live, there were none of the parties, there was none of that. And I remember serving on the committee and everybody's so tickle pink about having the Super Bowl, And I said, why, what's in it for the people here locally?

They're not going to get a.

Ticket to the Commissioner's party. They sure as hell I ain't gonna get a ticket to the game. So why should South Florida be so excited? And they said, well, well, what do you think, what do we need to do? I said, let's do something for the kids. It's it's the heartstring of everybody. And we start doing football camps and that first year we had over five thousand people in the parking lot as guys from all around the league came in because they were once just like those kids.

He goes, can you do this at every Super Bowl?

And for twenty some years I would reach out to all my friends across the league and we would do football camps, not to teach them football, but the show kids that we were no different than they are. If you want to have success, it's easy. Work at your craft, stayed the heck out of trouble, and give yourself an opportunity. Don't take yourself out the game.

Yeah, I tell a story all the time. I was a probably third fourth grade. I was from the Seattle area. They brought Kingerfred Junior to my school. I never forgot that and that it was so it was so impactful my life, like that I was teased right here, the superstars right here, you know, and just to be around the athletes and see that, to your point, it has a really really big impact. So was that kind of how the foundation that that Moore Foundation kind of began was with those football camps.

Well, I always, even when I was playing football, I always sort of did fundraisers for different charities in the community. I started with a fashion show with Bob Greasy and all those guys walking down the aisle, they go never again, Never again as their photograph.

That So the following year I went to.

Running golf tournaments, which I'm still doing, and we realized that we could raise more money and we could give more back into the community with the mind pop charities to help them keep kids out of trouble off the streets.

And in the.

Process, you know, when I retired, I decided, you know what, I'm doing it for all these separate charities, why don't I just turn around and have my own foundation do it one time raises much money instead of trying to raise ten thousand of this in, ten thousand for that, seventy five hundred for.

This one, and then disperse it.

And then eventually that we got to where we decided to do the endowment fund, which is what I'm most proud of.

That's really cool. I was reading about that in the article I told you about on the Miami Held earlier. Can you maybe just expand upon the Endowment Fund and what works like that is and what it does.

For kids, Well, it's an opportunity for kids to receive funding for four years for college. Or we have a vocational trade part to it as well, where folks can come in and most of us construction trade, but they can come in and learn a trade and in a matter of four months they're working and they're making forty to fifty sixty thousand.

Dollars a year.

So our goal is basically just trying to give people a leg up. And Erica Simmons does a fantastic job of running the Endowment Fund or the foundation for many many years and we're very proud of it. And our goal is to continue to do what we're doing, but even more so to raise more money and have it where that fund is there in perpetuity.

That's outstanding. Yeah, you and your team doing a great job of making a big difference in these kids' lives. And you know, I can't turn on CBS Miami without seeing either than that more trophy or that you know something something with you and your foundation, or the high school player of the Year or whatever it is. It's

I think what comes to mind when I think about that accolae is what a screw up I was, tacky and how one athlete just showing up changed my life. You know, the Miami Dolphins back in nineteen sixty six started the franchise and probably was the worst franchise in football and nobody.

Really wanted to go see him play. They weren't that competitive.

And one of my math teachers got to know one of the Dolphin players and just like we do where we send players to schools, got him to come out and he's speaking to the entire school and we're sitting an auditorium and drivers them looking at him on the stage and I'm just looking and I can't tell you today what he said. I was so meslenized by his size. Then the only thing kept going through my mind is, Damn,

The guy's name was Jimmy Warren.

And when Jimmy came off stage, I was like, Damn, I'm big as he is right now. If he can do it, I can do it. What do I need to do to get to where he is? And that's why that that thought is always in my head about putting athletes with kids, because you never know the impression.

It wasn't anything he's said, It was just him me seeing.

Him that said, if he can play pro ball, why can't I. I just need to stay on the straight and narrow and The funny part about that story is five years later, I'm in the NFL. He's no longer with the Miama Dolphins. I'm with the Miami Dolphins. I run the opening kickoff back for a touchdown against the Raiders, and he's with the Raiders and he's the guy chasing me.

And I was like, Jimmy, none of this would have happened if you did.

He talk about that afterwards, Oh yeah, yeah.

It got to be really good friends with him.

Matter of fact, through the years, his wife at the time is very close with my wife, so we have a good relationship. But you never know what impression you can make on young people by just showing up.

Right, And that's the whole idea behind the street sign, right, is it brings attention to what you're doing, not to you. Necessarily, it does, but that's not your goal. It brings the attention to what you're doing, which is the most important thing here. And this might be an obvious question and answer no, but I feel like it needs to be asked. You you're born and raised here. You mentioned leaving coming back. You've spent so much of your your really most of

I think it's to people. It's a melting pot of the world, you know. I mean, you name the nationality, they're here. And unlike back in the sixties and extens when we had the race riots and all that going on, everybody seems to get along. We have some issues. Every city, every great city, has some issues. But overall, the one thing that I know about this community is when things get tough, everybody comes together to help each other.

And that's all you can ask.

We're never going to agree on everything, but when things get tough, you know, you talk about the pandemic, all of a sudden, we're feeding everybody. Everybody's coming to the table because we believe you get a hurricane. Same thing. That's what's great about this community. We fight like brothers and sisters. We don't agree, but when things get tough, we all come together for the betterment of the community.

It's when you mentioned that I can all I can think of is Jason Jenkins and the meals and everything, all that stuff, and just how instrumental he was to all that. Yeah, it's it's been cool for someone that came here from you know, an outside perspective, from the Pacific Northwest to come down and see all the impact that you and yourself and Jason Jenkins had on the Communit just really really cool stuff. I guess I'll end with this, not what's next, what's coming up for them?

I think it's just the same things. You know, if the old saying, if it ain't broke, you don't fix it. You know, you always try and grow it. So we'll try and get more partners, more sponsors, take care more kids.

The more money.

We raise, the bigger the endowment becomes, the more students.

You know.

I go to an event in Montgomery, Alabama called the Jimmy Rain Foundation. It's been going on twenty five years now, and I don't know exactly how much money is in that endowment. And this is a big event where mostly SEC schools, old coaches, players, et cetera, all show up and it's a big fundraiser, a dinner and a golf outing. They have in the last twenty five years set over eight hundred and seventy some kids to the college of their choice.

The first year they did one well.

So when I go and I see things like that, the vision becomes why can't we do this? Why can't we eventually have an endowment that's so big that kids know that if they do things the right way, they don't have a chance to apply and maybe get a scholarship where they can go to the universe of their choice.

So when you have these these thoughts and grandeur ideas, who do you how do you get the ball rolling on that? You've kind of got my brain curious here, what's what's the process of Like they can do it? Why can't I?

What do you? What do you do?

Then? Do next? Like what's the next step in the world.

You spend more time with them figuring out how to and then you you bring in your people, and then you start to target the people that you know can synergize the vision. You know, nobody does any thing by themselves, you know, and without partners, without sponsors, without the celebrities, the athletes showing up, without the the the vendors, you got nothing.

The question is how you get the ball in the room for a cause? And the ones that.

Do that well succeed and is really able to do a lot. And I can't thank the Miama Dolphins enough for allowing me to bring my endowment fund into the Mima Dolphins Foundation, because I did close down my foundation and hopefully it'll be a part of the Miami Dolphins Foundation forever. You know, when I think about it, I wouldn't have it if it wasn't for the Miami Dolphins. You know, I wouldn't. Wouldn't would have never had an

Well, it's a crowd to you for taking the platform and running with it the way you did your entire football and basketball career. You made the most out of everything you could possibly do, so not more. We appreciate your time today. Congratulations on the on the street renaming Miami Edison High, and just everything you've done. It's really cool.

Now.

We appreciate your time today and thanks for joining us. Thank you for having me a day of legends here on the Draft Time Podcast, talking to Liz Jenkins, tom Garfinkel, to Tony Wiley, Dave Hacken, of course Nat more right there and for more on the nap more and down. You can visit Miami Dolphins dot com to read all about his foundation and what he does here for the community. Not is a star player who's work and impacting the community transcends the football field. So appreciate NAT's time on