17 stories from 'Undefeated: Inside the 1972 Miami Dolphins’ Perfect Season’

Writer Mike Freeman explores the undefeated season of the Florida team in his book.

5. Players pursue other livelihoods

Former player Manny Fernandez stands over his Wall of Fame plaque Joe Rimkos Jr./The Miami Herald/AP

One clear indication that player salaries were a lot more modest in the early 1970s is that many of the Dolphins had offseason jobs. Offensive lineman Larry Little worked as a substitute teacher, Manny Fernandez as a carpenter, defensive back Tim Foley sold Amway products, and Dick Anderson, another DB, sold insurance. Anderson even worked from the locker room during the season by using a pay phone. This was at a time when even starting players might be making only $30,000 – or less! 

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Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

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