Meet Dancing Stars Marlee Matlin and Jason Taylor

• Mar 10, 2008 09:02 PM ET
• by danceteam

As Dancing with the Stars' newbies get ready to dazzle on the dance floor - the hit reality competition returns Monday, March 17 - we've got a week-long guide to who's hoofing for Season 7. Check back each day for our profiles of more pairings. - Deborah Starr Seibel

Jason Taylor

Age: 33
Best Known For: Playing for the Miami Dolphins and being named the 2006 NFL Defensive Player of the Year
Lives In: Weston, Florida
Partner: Edyta Sliwinska
Advantages: He's got fast moves and the right attitude. "I've never admitted this, but I always wanted to learn how to tango," says Taylor. "I've seen it in the movies, and I thought it was sexy."
Disadvantages: Taylor hurt his left foot at the end of last season and has dislocated "about every finger in my hand," he says. And unlike almost every other contestant who has been on this show, Taylor doesn't want to lose weight, "because I still have a day job."

Marlee Matlin

Age: 42
Best Known For: Winning a best-actress Oscar for 1986's Children of a Lesser God
Lives In: Los Angeles
Partner: The season's only newcomer, Fabian Sanchez, a world mambo champion and four-time Fred Astaire National Champion
Advantages: An iron will. Matlin's whole career, she says, has been about defying expectations. "I've been doing that ever since I won the Academy Award and critics said I won out of pity, just because I'm deaf."
Disadvantages: An unusually strong reliance on Sanchez, who will demonstrate the moves as her interpreter relays the instructions. "Effectively, all she'll be able to hear is the beat," says DWTS executive producer Conrad Green.

Don't miss TV Guide Network's 25 Things You Didn't Know About Dancing Favorites , airing Sunday, March 23, at 8 pm/ET.