SmashMouth

Drew Brees told the story in December, and he's likely to think of it again Sunday.

That comes with the territory of surpassing one of the NFL's all-time great passers in more than one statistical category.

Nine months after he surpassed Dan Marino and moved into third place on the career passing touchdowns list, Brees will begin Sunday in need of 36 passing yards to overtake the Hall of Fame quarterback for third on the career yards list.

That would put Brees ahead of Marino in three significant career totals, after he moved ahead of him in career completions in Week 2 last season.



Brees has told the story about how at some point early in his career, while with the San Diego Chargers, he stood on the field before a road game against the Dolphins and glanced at the names listed in the team's ring of honor.

Marino at that point had been recently retired, and was a passer Brees watched on television as he grew up playing high school football in Texas and then in college at Purdue.

Brees wondered then if he might someday be so fortunate as to play in the NFL long enough to post the kind of numbers Marino did during his 17 seasons.

Brees told that story in December, after he tied and moved ahead of Marino in career touchdown passes in a Week 14 win at Tampa Bay. Brees has since raised his career total to 432, putting him 12 ahead of Marino's career total of 420.

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