How/When did your fandom start?

[Dave Gray]

http://www.miamidolphins.com/news/article-1/Voice-Of-The-Fan-Becoming-a-Fan/c3400ac7-022e-4ecf-9571-e0360139e2c8

The team asked the owners of various sites to tell them how being a fan started for them, linked above.

How did it start for you?

[Phishfan]

I was sold on Dan Marino. Before settling on the Dolphins I was young and was basically a fan of players. I picked a team to root for based on which player in the game I liked the most. Eventually I stuck with Marino and the Dolphins and haven't looked back.

[DaLittle B]

When I was 6-7 or my cousin was the coolest kid I knew,it was his favorite team.(Around 1984-1985) I got called out a few years later why I was Dolphins fan,I started following them,trying to learn about them,watching games,when they were on.Dan Marino was awesome, so It was pretty easy to go wow,yeah I like this team.

My cousin told me about 7 years ago how he became a fan,he found 2 football helmets at a garage sale (A Falcons helmet,and a Dolphins helmet).Something about the Dolphins helmet he liked better,than the Falcons helmet.

[Tenshot13]

I've told this story before, and no one seems to believe me because I was so young.

I was three years old watching the 1985 Bears v Dolphins when Miami screwed up the Bears perfect season.  I remember being a kid, rooting for the Bears because a Bear could eat a Dolphin(Kid logic).  I then saw Dan Marino throw a bomb to Mark Clayton.  The defender tackled Clayton before the ball got there, and Clayton caught the pass on his back.

I've been a Dolphins fan ever since.

[Fau Teixeira]

we were living in new england at the time after living in south florida for years, and my dad was watching the 1985 dolphins bears game and that was the first time i paid attention .. i was 8 at the time

[Sunstroke]

As a little kid in the early 70's, my dad worked as the sports anchor on the local KUSK TV, channel 7 in N. AZ. Arizona didn't have a professional baseball or football team back then, but KUSK was an affiliate for the Oakland A's and San Diego Padres in baseball, and the 49ers in football. Everybody liked the A's at the time, because they were pretty good in the 70's, so I started following the Padres during baseball season and the 49ers during football season. The 49ers were pretty mediocre at the time, and they got downright awful by the time I got to HS.Then Bill Walsh, Joe Montana, Jerry Rice, etc..., and things changed in a hurry.

I've followed the same three sports teams my entire life...the 49ers, the Padres and the Suns. I just can't see myself changing any time soon.

[Tenshot13]

As a little kid in the early 70's, my dad worked as the sports anchor on the local KUSK TV, channel 7 in N. AZ. Arizona didn't have a professional baseball or football team back then, but KUSK was an affiliate for the Oakland A's and San Diego Padres in baseball, and the 49ers in football. Everybody liked the A's at the time, because they were pretty good in the 70's, so I started following the Padres during baseball season and the 49ers during football season. The 49ers were pretty mediocre at the time, and they got downright awful by the time I got to HS.Then Bill Walsh, Joe Montana, Jerry Rice, etc..., and things changed in a hurry.

I've followed the same three sports teams my entire life...the 49ers, the Padres and the Suns. I just can't see myself changing any time soon.

Anyone who's been here a little while, knows the Dolphins are your 2nd favorite team.  How did that happen?

[Sunstroke]

Anyone who's been here a little while, knows the Dolphins are your 2nd favorite team.  How did that happen?

I'd say it was just repeated exposure. I moved to FL in '97 (November will be 20 years), and as a football junkie, I just absorbed everything from local media on the Phins. Plus, I like to think that I lean more toward the "be nice to folks" personality set, rather than the "be an asshole to folks" variety, so after a few hundred beers and shots with Phins fans, I found myself cheering for them. Marino, McDuffie, Chambers, Zach and JT...I enjoyed cheering for those guys, and I even liked the quirky guys that hit Miami, like Cecil "The Peeper" Collins. I've only gone to about a dozen games in my 20 years here, but I usually watch them on TV every week. As long as they aren't playing the 49ers, I'll always be cheering for the Dolphins.

[Tenshot13]

I'd say it was just repeated exposure. I moved to FL in '97 (November will be 20 years), and as a football junkie, I just absorbed everything from local media on the Phins. Plus, I like to think that I lean more toward the "be nice to folks" personality set, rather than the "be an asshole to folks" variety, so after a few hundred beers and shots with Phins fans, I found myself cheering for them. Marino, McDuffie, Chambers, Zach and JT...I enjoyed cheering for those guys, and I even liked the quirky guys that hit Miami, like Cecil "The Peeper" Collins. I've only gone to about a dozen games in my 20 years here, but I usually watch them on TV every week. As long as they aren't playing the 49ers, I'll always be cheering for the Dolphins.

Haha, I remember everyone was so high on Cecil Collins when he was still Diesel and not Peeper.

[DZA]

1985  When I came to Miami after living in the Virgin Islands. Back then, the only teams people ever heard of in the V.I. the  Redskins , 49'ers, Cowboys.  Growing up in Miami , it became natural to stick with the Home Team.  So Thats why Im Miami Everything.  Well in Baseball Im a Met's and Marlins Fan... Baseball did not come to South Fla til 1993. 

[Dolphster]

I totally lucked out with the timing of my fandom.  In 1971 I was 7 years old and coming from a big sports family, I was already pretty in tune to sports by that age.  In 1971 we moved from Ohio to South Florida, just in time for the perfect season.  How could I not turn into a huge Fins fan after the perfect season occurred during the early part of my being sports conscious?   I know people consider it a beatdown to listen to me always going on about the perfect season (my poor wife, LOL), but hell, getting to live through it at such an impressionable age had a huge impact on me. 

[Thundergod]

1986, when I started to follow football. My father is a Dolphins fan, so naturally, I became one too.

[Sunstroke]

1986, when I started to follow football. My father is a Dolphins fan, so naturally, I became one too.

My dad and I had the exact opposite relationship with our teams. He was a diehard LA Rams and Dodgers fan, division rivals of my favorite teams.  It was in those formative years with my dad that I was taught the value and honor of trash-talking. Football season, I held the switch, as my 49ers were much better than the Rams. Come baseball season though, I took the brunt of the abuse, as his Dodgers were "always" better than my Padres. Good times...

[BuccaneerBrad]

I was born and bred here on the west coast of Florida.  My family is all Bucs fans so I was raised as one.  Long seen as a loser team, they won a Super Bowl in '02.   Now the fans can't be fooled anymore

[Downunder Dolphan]

Mine started with the Epic in Miami in 1982. I was 13, we were getting live broadcasts of the NFL playoffs early morning here in Australia - there were some memorable games that series, The Catch at Candlestick Park, the Freezer Bowl at Cincinatti, but the overtime Dolphins Chargers game was the one that really captured my attention....

A year later and the Dolphins marching to the Super Bowl and that was it, they were my team. Before the game I thought the Redskins would be too strong in XVII, but I admired the way the Killer B's kept us in it until the last quarter - oh, and that kick return by Fulton Walker, still my favorite Super Bowl moment ever.

A year later came Marino and the emergence of the Marks Brothers, another contender and a genuinely fun team to watch, although the later half of the 80s were a disappointment as at first the Pats, then the Colts, and then the Bills overtook us...

The early '90s brought new enthusiasm, and by that stage I was buying/importing jerseys and stuff directly from the team sales department: ah, the old pre-internet days where it was all done by fax and long distance phone calls! An expensive exercise, but through those calls I became friends with Willard, sent some Australian Grand Prix merchandise in return. He was a Miami U graduate, so naturally I became a Hurricanes fan, and about the same time some of their games were televised here in Australia too. Over the first half of that decade it seemed like Miami had bridged the gap to the Bills and seemed poised for a genuine tilt at the Super Bowl again, regular season games were being televised here. Good times and great memories!