Dan Marino Rookie Cards: Complete Guide to All 8

Dan Marino rookie cards never snuck up on anyone.

After all, here was a guy who came out of Pitt with a chip on his shoulder after falling to 27th in the 1983 Draft after a drop-off in performance in his senior season and some ugly rumors about his life off the field.

Real or not, fair or not, the storm of controversy sapped what looked to be a top-tier draft profile and left Marino looking up at five other QBs when the picks were in.

But it also left him with the Miami Dolphins, defending AFC champions, and paired with Hall of Fame coach Don Shula — not to mention other offensive weapons like Mark Duper, Andra Franklin,

Intro paragraph

1984 7-Eleven Discs Dan Marino (#15E)

It’s tough to confirm all these years on, but there is at least a possibility that 7-Eleven stores of a 1984 vintage could offer more Dan Marino splendor than any other retail space in the land.

After all, it’s easy to imagine packs of Topps football card stuffed up under a low shelf, between the Gummi Bears and Big League Chew, and underneath the hanging packs of jerky.

And, where there are Topps wax packs, there just may be paper packs of Topps Stickers.

Then, of course, at 7-Eleven, you could always wash down your purchases with a brain-snapping Slurpee. If you were perusing one of the branded convenience stores on the east coast that fall of 1984, your cup might have featured a magic-motion coin featuring the Dolphins’ gunslinger.

Today, you’ll have to pay a bit more for the privilege of owning a psychedelic Marino disc than the cost of a brain freeze.

Value: $150-200

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1984 Dolphins Police Dan Marino (#9)

The Dolphins teamed up in 1984 with Miami law enforcement as well as other local agencies (Kiwanis, hospitals, etc.) to produce a set of over-tall cards featuring 16 players and legendary coach Don Shula.

Despite a start-studded lineup that included the likes of Mark Clayton, Mark Duper, A.J. Duhe, Dwight Stephenson, and others, though, it was — and is — Marino who carries this set.

Surprise!

Value: $45-55

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1984 Topps Dan Marino (#123)

This is it. The one. The big kahuna of Dan Marino rookie cards.

Heck, for a lot of years, the 1984 Topps Marino was the big kahuna among all 1980s rookie cards, or at least those outside of the 1981 Topps Joe Montana RC.

A couple of old-man Super Bowl titles for John Elway sort of dampened the relative impact of this card, but it was still the Marino rookie (and to a slightly lesser extent the Eric Dickerson RC) that redefined what we might expect from values of a *new* football card right out of the pack.

If you check into the PSA 10 market, you’ll find prices in the $4000+ range. That makes our mere MINT targets look almost cheap by comparison.

Value: $325-350

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1984 Topps Dan Marino Instant Replay (#124)

If you were lucky enough to get your hands on a Marino rookie card at #123, you had to find a way to add #124 to your collection, too.

They were a matched pair!

And, though this 1984 Topps Instant Replay card has never walked with the swagger of Marino’s base RC, it’s spent 40 years trouncing all over most mere superstar cards of the era.

Value: $30-50

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1984 Topps NFL Star Set Dan Marino (#3)

Inserted one per rack pack, the 1984 Topps NFL Star set was a run of 11 super glossy cards on thick, white cardstock. As with some others on this list the Marino “rookie” here had to elbow for daylight among some other great names. Here, consider the full checklist:

Curt Warner
Eric Dickerson
Dan Marino
Steve Bartkowski
Todd Christensen
Roy Green
Charlie Brown
Earnest Gray
Mark Gastineau
Fred Dean
Lawrence Taylor

Only Dickerson could hold a candle to Marino when it came to hobby appeal, and even his beastly flame didn’t burn as long. (Yes, LT eventually got into that realm, too.)

Value: $150-200

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