Larry Little Fins Flashback Super Bowl VII

We recall the historic victory and the legendary Don Shulo, the coach of the Miami Dolphins for not one, but two Super Bowl championships, with Hall of Famer himself Larry Little. All of that more on this Friday, May the eighth edition of the Drivetime Podcast Dolphins and by now we all know the story the undefeated Dolphins up against Washington for an NFL championship and what would later be known as the only perfect team in NFL history, which stands

to this day. And joining me to discuss Super Bowl seven, hall of Fame offensive lineman Larry Little and joining me now on the Drive Time Podcast. He spent twelve years with the Miami Dolphins. He's a two time Super Bowl champion, six time first Team All Pro and Pro Bowler, a member of the nineteen seventies All Decade Team, Dolphins Ring of Honor and Pro Football Hall of Fame, and a resident of perfect Ville. He is Larry Little. Larry, welcome in, sir,

Thank you very much for having me here today. We're very happy to have you in. And of course we have some somber news to kick off this podcast because I do want to get the take of all the Dolphins alumni on Don Shula, and I just want to give you the floor here and start by asking you who was Don Shula to you? Well, actually, he was the man that probably made me to be the football

player I was because when I first met him. I went to this press conference when he first came to the Dolphins, and uh, because I was here a year before he came. He came in nineteen seventeen and I was here in nineteen sixty nine, and I walked up to him and said, hi, Coachla, my name is for the press cards and my name was Larry Little. I'm your right guy. The first thing he asked me, how much do you wait? And I told him. I said, I'm two eighty five, and he did walked off from me.

He said another word, when I got to be pointing reporting the letter had my weight to be your reporting, what would be to sixty five? No goodness? So you know, and when I lost that weight, that made me actually made me a better football player. And those weights definitely

different the times we play with now. But I was curious to get your take, Larry, because a lot of your teammates, Sonka Fernandez, they talked about Shula kind of giving you guys a moment in the locker room after losing Super Bowl six and saying, I want you to remember this feeling, remember how this feels, and use this next year, use this as motivation. How much did that

stick with you personally? What did I concur what? Manny and said, everybody's stuck with us because there was a terrible feeling that they have to losing their game to the Pallace in New Orleans, And uh, I was you know I thought about that when he said that, I said, no,

I know ever want to feel his way again. After after the super Bowl game, you know, we would on to go have a great, a great year of that year and some people do say, Larry that we've had this experience before, whether it was college or the pros, or maybe losing a game before you get to the playoffs is better for some reason, Like we heard about the I think it was the two thousand eight Indianapolis Colts or something to that effect. But you guys put

perfection on the line every single week. Was that more added pressure knowing that every week we have to win otherwise this this perfect records gone not? Really what happened was we never really spoke about it during the season. I think the only time we felt pressure. Oh no, I felt pressure as a team. But when we uh when I last game in the regular season and we were fourteen and old, and I see it now, we don't win these next three games, we we would not

accomplish our goal of winning the super Bowl. And then but the Windows game we had to go and defeat it. And so that's what happened and we won the next few games. They were an easy game. These teams played us stuff, but we managed to win one with another. I'm the way to win you did. And the way the NFL schedule worked back then was the conference title

games rotated back and forth between the home venue. So being the better record, you didn't get that home game, and so you guys had a tougher road than maybe you should have had. And I'm curious to get your take on this. Because you entered the Super Bowl Game as underdogs, was that kind of a slap in the face or maybe some extra motivation for you? Well, first of all, we had to go into Pittsburgh for the empty championship game, and you're going into Pittsburgh on New

year Ease and the temperature was sixty eight degrees. So that then our favor if you normally you get the twitter and that by going into pretty the Super Bowl game, I felt we would disrespected because we were playing against a bunch of old men. At the time, we called him an over the hill game. No way we will let old men win that game on Super Bowl Sunday.

I love it and you guys that year a then NFL record with two thousand, nine hundred sixty rushing yards and your work in all areas of the running game. Larry was a big, big part of that, but largely getting out in space on those sweeps and just running people over. It's it's fun to watch your highlight tape even to this day. What was it about your skill set that made you so effective on those blocks out

in space like that? Well, one thing, you know, with my speed and like I said, and not a lot of those twenty pounds when coach came in and my weight stayed right around two six five and not all,

I could always run. But you know, there was there's something about me that when I got there, I knew what they had a cornerback, especially when they tried safety trying to take me on that was like trying to commit suicide because you know what, I would let it deep You cornerback, get gotta take your head on and get away with it. So I took a lot of

pride to what I was doing, you know. And I had to get out that fab most of the time anyway, because I was pulling for mercury and mercury with fast hell and I uh, you know, so I had to got them in front of him. And but you know a lot of people look at me that we're running sweets, but a lot of people to pay your attention to me with the one on one block and inside either

and I was pretty good at that. I would like to think, well, I don't think you'd go to six Pro Bowls and six First Team All Pros without without being pretty good at that. So I think you're right

on that one, Mr Little. I want to ask you, is there a specific moment in that game, the Super Bowl game that you recall as a favorite, Whether it was like a block you made, or maybe it was a play that one of your teammates made, was there a moment where you just said, yeah, this is this is when we're gonna go ahead and go win this game and go undefeated. I tell you we had to play called Pete Express, and there was my uh chilling

feeling myself in exchange blocks. He would block back. I will pull around and block the linebacker, but the linebacker ran out of the picture, so I had nobody to block. The next thing, I knew it was Uncle running the ball, and because that way, I slowed up, because no way Zounc would ever catch me if I didn't slow up.

And as I slowed up, he ran right back and I knew then we you know, he gained about twenty five or thirty y'all will never takeular play, And I said, it's gonna be this game gonna be easiest back, and you know it would have been the only shutout in Super Bowl history had not Garro your premium Huh maybe that bone head play leading the game? Well, I was

gonna ask you did that? Did that really stick in your craw because there was a chance, like you guys had mentioned to go seventeen and oh with the seventeen zero score, had the field goal been good? Did that really bother you guys? Well, Nordon Bob's later on, but at the particular time could kill when he got to the sideline he shot. Somebody would call I wouldn't go with falls calling. Somebody called him a cow but I would never go that far, called a Garro a coward

because he went too many of the game falls. Agree with that. And I wanted to close with you on this one, Larry. Was there a specific story about Don Shula that you can tell us, like what's your best Don Shula story? Well? Uh, one with when well we practiced that biscade call and they're able to fence behind our practice field and there was just rookie that was late for practice and he tried to sneak into practice by climbing over that fence. Behind the huddle, and coach

caught him and totally you were cut. You go back the same way you came in instead of the food walking out the gate to go to the locks, where we climbed back over the fence to go back to way Shoes told him to go. So that that always would always stick out with me, because I mean, you cut, You're not gonna be here anymore while you climb back over fence when you could have walked right out of the gate to go back to the locker room to

get your equipment, turning your equipment. The one when Mercury goes Murpurt full of drama all the time, and Mark came he would hit pretty hard and he came to the sideline they were doing a preseason game, and Murk came over. He should elapse right a tron of shoes and grab his pants and she was pushing him to the ground. Get off me, Get off me, Get off me. And Burger look crying and carrot on that he always

did at times. And and when he went and sat on the bench about ten minutes later, that went over and sat next tune him and said, you know what, when you will know what They grab shoes fans. He treated you like you goddamn dogs. I can listen to these all day, Larry. If you've got any more, please keep them coming. Okay, I have more, but we were there. They're they're a little more raciate. Those two. Well, we we appreciate your PC and this hair on the podcast.

We appreciate your time and your stories. It's it's great to hear with me, Larry, and uh and just thank you. I appreciate at it. Thank you, alight back and so there he goes. Larry, little short but sweet, but man, what a football player. He was on the video component of our conference call. He had award after award and plaques hung up all over the background. I jump on the phone call with him and I asked him. I say, hey, Larry, you've you've accomplished some things in your life, huh And

he said, oh, yeah, I've done a few things. Just very humble, very modest about it all. I love the story about him having to drop the way at to get to to sixty five. Honestly, as someone who is younger as a Dolphins fan, I thought he was gonna say he had to gain more weight up because nowadays two eighty five is light for the offensive line. But

back then Larry. If you haven't seen him or his highlight videos, I highly highly encourage younger fans to go back and take a look at Larry Little on YouTube. There are some short clips. They're not in game footage, but there are videos of Larry Little doing his thing, and you watch him ountain space. You heard him talk about it how almost much of a challenge it was, or a suicide mission for a defensive back to try

to take him on in the open field. He viewed that as a personal mission, and when you watch his highlight tape, you can definitely tell that it was his personal mission to end that player's misery on that particular play because he just bold guys over, great footwork, great out in space, just a fantastic player. I don't really have to go into the details because you know it from his background, the six All Pro honorees, the six Pro Bowl invitations, and the probe Football Hall of Fame status.

I mean it speaks for itself. What a great conversation that was with a Legendlary Little. I had one comment I wanted to ask him about, but I didn't have a chance to get in there he mentioned that story about the player jump in the fence. How much does that remind you of the Major League movies when Wesley Snipes thinks he got cut and winds up running the forty yard dash in his pajamas when he jumps over the fence and makes the team. That's exactly what I

thought of in that instance. But Don Shula not gonna be quite as lenient as a fictional manager in a baseball movie. So a great story, they're a great podcast, like a great detail of that nineteen seventy two Super Bowl seven victory. The Dolphins improved a seventeen and oh the only undefeated team in National Football League history to get all the way through from the opener to the Super Bowl unbeaten. Larry Little, What a fun podcast this

was to do? All right? We have plenty of content up on Miami Dolphins dot com, including the article that accompanies this podcast, on Your Fins Flashback. We also have the schedule released as now out. The Dolphins sixteen game slate has been put out there dates and times, go ahead and check out Miami Dolphins dot com to get your tickets. Today, you can check out the podcast We Broke down the schedule, talked about some matchups. How good was it to talk some actual football on that podcast

and get into the matchups of this upcoming season. We broke it down week by week. Check out the article on Miami Dolphins dot com. Check out that edition of the Drivetime podcast. But as for this edition of the Drivetime Podcast, that is gonna be my time you all please be sure to subscribe to the podcast on Apple, podcast, Spotify, wherever you get your podcast from. Go ahead and leave us a rating, leave us a review, give me a follow on Twitter. It's at Wingfield, NFL for all the Dolphins.

At Miami Dolphins, we have a new episode of the fish Tank podcast, Seth and Jews talking about the legendary coach Don Shula. The Audible with Kim and Bo Miami Dolphins dot Com. Until next time finds up