On Wednesday, Dolphins coach Mike McDaniel confirmed Tua Tagovailoa has a concussion and is day-to-day. He also named Teddy Bridgewater the starter in the event Tagovailoa can’t play Sunday against the Patriots.
“Moving forward today, and the whole team’s approach is Teddy Bridgewater is the starter,” McDaniel said.
The Miami coach noted that Tagovailoa’s day-to-day status is not ideal for a team that has to do a week of game-planning, so the team will prepare for Bridgewater to start against New England. It’s unclear if Tagovailoa will be able to play now that he has entered the concussion protocol for the second time this year, this being his third head injury.
In September, Tagovailoa was assessed for a head injury against the Bills and an unaffiliated neurotrauma consultant cleared him to return to the game. That consultant was later fired. A week later, in Miami’s Week 4 game against the Bengals, Tagovailoa was knocked unconscious after hitting the back of his head on the ground. He was briefly hospitalized.
The incident triggered a joint NFL and player’s association investigation, which led to the league changing its concussion protocol to mandate that any player who shows possible concussion symptoms—including a lack of balance or stability—sit out the remainder of a game.
With the news of the latest concussion, the NFLPA is once again investigating the handling of the injury, according to ESPN. It’s unclear when Tagovailoa sustained the injury this past Sunday against the Packers, but he played the whole game and later self-reported symptoms on Monday to the team.
