It feels like a perfect match on the face of it – Formula 1's most famous driver joining its most iconic team.
Lewis Hamilton has never tried to hide his admiration for the team. After all, it's a feeling familiar to most F1 fans. The Ferrari brand is immediately recognisable around the world and those famous red cars are inextricably linked to so many moments in the sport's history.
The Brit's public admiration for Ferrari has probably played a part in fuelling the regular rumours linking him with a move to Maranello. But the Daily Mail was clear in its report this week that the Italian team is preparing a huge financial offer to try to tempt the seven-time world champion to walk away from Mercedes.
If the report is accurate, then clearly Ferrari's hope is that they can convince Hamilton that he has a better chance of winning their record eighth title that he craves while behind the wheel of a red car. As for what the Scuderia would get out of it... well, is having the sport's most successful-ever driver on the books not enough?
But while that sounds great on paper – and to shareholders and sponsors – it is an idea that smacks of desperation from a fallen giant. Ferrari have been starved of success. After dominating the first half of the 2000s, the 2008 constructors' title remains their most recent success in the world championship.
Pressure from the boardroom at Maranello is always intense and it will only grow the longer the drought continues. Perhaps that is why, if the report is true, they are suddenly trying to throw money at a seven-time world champion in the hope he can bring his title touch to the team.
However, while hiring someone with Hamilton's CV can never be dismissed out of hand as a bad idea, it's hard to see how it will be the move which restores Ferrari to the front of the grid. Mostly, that's because their drivers are not their main problem.
Charles Leclerc has a habit of pushing too hard when trying to drive at the absolute limit, which he needs to break. But his talent is undeniable and, ironically, there isn't a better qualifier on the grid. Carlos Sainz took a long time to get used to this generation of F1 cars but is now showing signs of the racer who beat Leclerc in their first season together.
Even if they were both perfect, they still wouldn't deliver a title for Ferrari this year because the car cannot match those dominant Red Bulls on race day. And that's without going into their strategy deficiencies, reliability concerns and habit of allowing internal politics to get in the way of what is actually best for the team.
And that final point is pertinent when exploring whether it would be a good move for Hamilton. The Brit has made it clear he remains fully committed to F1, but it is certainly not the only thing that is important to him. All his very important work on social causes remains a significant part of who he is and much of that is supported by Mercedes.
Ferrari would, no doubt, allow him to continue those causes and would most likely lend their support as well. But, when the signing of an all-time great eventually fails to miraculously provide the team with silverware all on its own, how long before those other passions and projects become a 'distraction' in the eyes of the ferocious Italian media?
Rumours linking Hamilton to Ferrari are not new and this certainly won't be the last story of its type. But this latest supposed effort stinks of a desperate vanity project from the higher-ups at Ferrari and, for Hamilton, has the potential to be a childhood dream move which rapidly turns into a fully-grown nightmare.
