PITTSBURGH (KDKA) — Former Pitt star and NFL Hall of Famer Dan Marino is back home this weekend helping to open a new restaurant at Settlers Ridge.

But before worrying about whether his apron is straight, the current CBS football analyst sat down with KDKA’s Rick Dayton for some one-on-one football talk.

This weekend, the NFL pushes into the second half of the season. Already, there have been plenty of surprises, even for Marino.

“Cincinnati with a young quarterback, Andy Dalton – they are in the division with Pittsburgh,” said Marino. “They are a good story. I think they are 5-2 or something.”

Listen to Dan Marino’s interview with 93-7 THE FAN here:

Recent doormats Detroit, Buffalo, and San Francisco are off to strong starts too. Yet the perennial playoff Colts are the league’s only winless team.

“Historically, you look at their defense and they were pretty darn good most of the time and now they are invisible,” said Marino. “It’s kind of sad because they had a great tradition there with Peyton [Manning]. Hopefully, he comes back and they can turn that around.

The buzz around the city, of course, is the second meeting of the season between the Baltimore Ravens and the Pittsburgh Steelers.

“To turn it over seven times… what happens in that is they got behind and Ben starts turning it loose and trying to make something happen, like trying to pull off a miracle,” Marino said. “Then, things start going bad and you start to turn it over a lot. I don’t think that’s going to happen again.”

So, what does the former Central Catholic star predict for the second half of the season?

“Pittsburgh will win this one. Oh yeah, after what happened to them in the first week,” he said. “They got embarrassed, and how they are playing of late, and their defense is playing lot better, and they are more balanced offensively. I like the Steelers.”

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