The Dolphins are back, in the perfect kind of midnight Mountain West–shootout type of way that endeared them to us so many weeks ago, before the franchise slogged through its own version of the pain cave and had to play a handful of weeks without a tenable solution at quarterback.
Tua Tagovailoa is back, too, and not just in the he’s-adequately-managing-this kind of way, but, in a new role that we may be a little unfamiliar seeing him in: franchise quarterback. Count me among those who knew Mike McDaniel’s history as Kyle Shanahan’s secret weapon and envisioned Tagovailoa operating with suddenly heroic powers, but ultimately wondered what the offense would be like if someone more elite was pulling the trigger. A real quarterback, as we might have crudely put it.
Well, on Sunday, Tagovailoa may have had the best statistical game for a quarterback in franchise history. He is the only Dolphins QB ever to have thrown for 350-plus yards, three or more touchdown passes and no interceptions while maintaining a completion percentage of 80% or better. No one is saying he’s better than Dan Marino, we’re just saying Marino has never had this perfect of a 60-minute stretch in his 17-season career.
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And while it’s absolutely ludicrous to make any sweeping conclusions about Tagovailoa versus what is capable of anyone in a McDaniel offense, we did see side-by-side examples of the team playing with the equivalent of a replacement-level player in Skylar Thompson and an above-replacement-level player in Teddy Bridgewater (who, by the way, was one of the most efficient players in football last year in a stale Pat Shurmur offense). Miami is markedly better with Tagovailoa. He is the best option for this team right now. For once in his professional career, he is needed more than he needs the graciousness of a coach willing to actually work with him and not bench him every time he makes a mistake.
Tagovailoa will always have to shoulder the burden of “yes-buts” when people are discussing his ascendance. He has Tyreek Hill (and Jaylen Waddle), even though Patrick Mahomes was never punished for this. He has a great coach, even though Tom Brady was never punished for that. He has a simple-to-digest offense that allows him to make quick decisions and higher percentage throws, even though Peyton Manning was never punished for that. Tagovailoa is nowhere near any of these players, but even if he someday found himself in the conversation, it’s unlikely his preceding reputation on the field would allow him access to the table to make his case.
We have already decided that Tagovailoa has a certain ceiling, while the Dolphins are exploring a much larger space.
But Sunday against the Lions, in critical situations, he was perfectly placing balls to Trent Sherfield on tightly covered comeback routes, or dropping passes to Hill that had nothing to do with the receiver outsprinting an opponent. In one case, on a second-and-5 early in the third quarter, Tagovailoa connected with Hill on an in-breaking route in which Hill was in the middle of four defenders, each of whom was five yards away or closer. The basketball equivalent would be hurling a half-court pass to Muggsy Bogues in the paint.
He is playing beyond those preconceived notions. It is impossible to argue that he is not vastly better than the limited, erratic thrower who entered the league two-plus years ago.
So what does it all mean? Tagovailoa is playing really well right now. And if you take the evidence up until the moment he sustained a horrifying concussion against the Bengals in Week 4, right now has lasted for more than a month. Like it or not, that injury opened the door for the Dolphins to think otherwise. It allowed them the chance to blink on Tagovailoa, and they have not.
All of this sounds like how you would describe a franchise quarterback. He is someone who gets the ball to playmakers. Someone who doesn’t make a ton of mistakes. Someone who completes a high percentage of passes that, even though some will contend it’s a meaningless stat, is still indicative of a quarterback who is moving the football forward.
He is someone you are not in a hurry to replace, which is of course a credit to his new coach, but is finally, after days like Sunday, also a credit to Tagovailoa himself.
