PRO FOOTBALL: HALL OF FAME: Marino enjoys final fling with favorite target

Canton, Ohio --- With a final flick of Dan Marino's right wrist, the 42nd class of Pro Football's Hall of Fame was enshrined Sunday as he fired a pass from the stage to a surprised former Dolphins teammate in the crowd.
The 35-yard toss ended a warm afternoon as the Hall and a sun-splashed crowd of 21,776 welcomed four new members, all quarterbacks --- Marino and Steve Young through the front door, Fritz Pollard and Benny Friedman posthumously.
Marino, the NFL's all-time leading passer by most statistical measures, and former 49er Young, the game's all-time most efficient passer, were inducted in their first year of eligibility.
With 61,361 passing yards and 420 touchdown passes among his many NFL records, Marino was the star Sunday.
"As a young man, God blessed me with a special talent to throw a football. I've always been asked, 'Did it bother you that 26 teams passed on me [in the NFL draft]?' And I always said no. Well, I lied," he told thousands of raucous fans wearing his jersey.
"But those 26 teams passing on me gave me the chance to play for the Miami Dolphins [who picked him 27th in the famously deep 1983 draft]."
Young won two NFL MVP awards and six passing titles, and retired from the 49ers after the 1999 season with a record-high career passer rating of 98.6.
His father, Grit, presented him, going out of his way to talk about how his career was nearly derailed by a former Brigham Young assistant.
"Quarterbacks coach Doug Scoville had not recruited Steve. [Jim] McMahon was No. 1, Steve No. 8. Canton seemed a long way away," Young's father told the crowd. "As luck would have it, the quarterbacks coach left, and Ted Tollner came in. By fall, he was listed as No. 2.
"His junior year, one of the first games he started was against Georgia, in Athens. Pouring rain, a miserable day, and Steve had ... five interceptions. Canton was a long way away."
Young, who'd been a wishbone quarterback in high school in Greenwich, Conn., told the crowd his career began with a nightmare in a youth football game.
"I was scared to death to see [his mother, Sherry] sprinting across the field, with good speed, I might add," he said. "In horror she sprinted past me and picked up the kid [who'd just hit Young] by the shoulder pads, and said, 'That hit was illegal.' Mom, now you know why we never gave you a field-level pass."
Friedman in the late 1920s became the league's first prolific passer, his early statistics dwarfing those of other quarterbacks.
"His 20 touchdown passes in 1929 were more than any Bears quarterback has thrown in 38 of the last 39 seasons," said presenter Don Pierson, a Chicago Tribune football writer and member of the senior selection committee that inducted Friedman and Pollard. "[Bears founder] George Halas said it was Friedman's success that convinced officials to taper the [shape of a] football. Dan [Marino] and Steve [Young], you have reason to thank Benny Friedman."
For years after the Hall opened, Friedman lobbied to be in it. A biographical sketch of him in "Total Football II" by Harper Collins said, "No doubt Benny's insistence right up to the day he died actually hurt his case. He became tiresome --- even though he was probably right."
Friedman also railed against the league in the 1960s and '70s for not paying pensions to players who played before 1958. He died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound in 1982, years after having a leg amputated because of diabetes.
Pollard, a running back, was one of the first two African-American players in 1919 in a league that in 1920 was re-named the National Football League. He became the NFL's first black coach when he co-coached the Akron Pros (while playing) in 1921. In 1923, he became the first black player to take snaps at quarterback.
"We've always been at a strange range of emotions about this," Pollard's grandson, Dr. Stephen Towns III, said prior to the ceremony. "The family's always felt he should have been in since [the Hall] started in 1963. He helped start this league."
And Marino finished Sunday in style.
"Now, it's time. I'm going to start licking my fingers, and you know what happens when I start licking my fingers?" he said as one of his sons tossed a ball to him.
"Every quarterback wants one more Sunday in front of his fans, with a football in his hands and one more chance to go deep. Clayton, go deep."
Mark Clayton was surprised. But he stood, backed down the aisle, and snared Marino's last pass.
The crowd cheered wildly one last time.

Matt Winkeljohn - StaffMonday