Do the Miami Dolphins turn to Tua Tagovailoa if Ryan Fitzpatrick struggles again? | Opinion
So Ryan Fitzpatrick starts at quarterback for the Miami Dolphins against the Buffalo Bills after throwing three interceptions last game. But what if it happens a second week in a row?
What if Fitzpatrick continues to struggle?
What if the the player keeping the seat warm for Tua Tagovailoa continues to soil that seat?
Well, eventually the Dolphins will move on to Tagovailoa. But it is almost certain that even if Fitzpatrick has a second bad game in a row, the Dolphins are unlikely to switch to Tagovailoa then, either.
That’s because the Dolphins’ game after Buffalo is at the Jacksonville Jaguars on Sept. 24 in prime time. It’s a Thursday night game and because the Dolphins would have only a couple of practices, most likely limited to walk-through sessions, before traveling to Jacksonville, it would be difficult to insert Tagovailoa as the starter and prepare him in time for that game.
And because the Dolphins aren’t about to simply throw Tagovailoa to the proverbial wolves when they finally put him on the field, it’s hard to fathom them making a switch at that point.
This, of course, assumes the worst: That Fitzpatrick plays poorly for a second consecutive week. The Dolphins hope that doesn’t happen. The Dolphins hope Fitzpatrick can find a comfort zone against the Bills and play in rhythm -- something he wasn’t able to do in the 21-11 loss to the Patriots.
“I think we all know the bad part; but I think he never really got in a great rhythm,” Dolphins quarterback coach Robby Brown said Tuesday. “He had some good things that he did really well. We have some things that we can improve upon. That’s the way it is every game, but we just need to try to get in a rhythm and get it going.
“I think he did some good and some bad, just like we all did.”
While Fitzpatrick was throwing three interceptions, Tagovailoa spent his first afternoon on an NFL regular-season game sideline trying to absorb as much as possible.
“I think it obviously with no preseason games, it was his first one, so he’s got the hat on listening to the call, those types of things,” Brown said. “Then we come over and get him into the tablet, listening to what Fitz is saying about the tablet. ‘Hey, we’re getting this or that. We’re getting this front. This guy’s going here. This guy’s going there,’ and realizing how fast those decisions are made I think it was very good for him.
“He was very in-tune. He knew the game plan well, so he was in-tune to what we were doing and he knew what we were saying. There was never a time where he was like, ‘What are we talking about?’ ”
As the backup, Tagovailoa doesn’t get many practice repetitions with the first-team offense. When he starts getting more of those, it will be a sign to everyone that a change is about to happen.
In the meantime, Tagovailoa will be playing the game in his mind.
“I think he’s trying to play every play in his own mind, so that experience was good,” coach Brian Flores said.
Tagovailoa will be doing a lot of mental preparation if not necessarily a lot of physical preparation with the first-team offense during the practice week as well.
“He’s in a unique situation in that he’s got a 16-year vet in front of him that’s tremendously willing to help, that he can learn a lot of the game from. He’s got an offensive coordinator that’s been around the game a long time,” Brown said. “So my job is to kind of try to figure out what is working that he’s learning, try to be a translator so to speak, because you’ve got two guys maybe speaking a language that have been together for a long time in Chan (Gailey) and Fitz and then I’ve been with Chan several times.
“Then I kind of try to figure out what’s working for him and then go from there. But he sits in every single meeting that Fitz does. He goes through – you try to get him mental reps because you don’t get a ton of reps during practice, but you try to get him the mental reps and then narrow the game plan each and every day like, ‘Hey, OK let’s learn this part, this part, this part,’ and he did a really good job last week.”
Does that sound like Tagovailoa is ready?
It doesn’t to me. So this is a process that will probably carry on beyond this week even if Fitzpatrick struggles.
“That was the first time, so we’ll try to improve upon it each and every time and get him more and more in-tune to what we’re trying to do,” Brown said of Tagovailoa. “But we’ll try to get better each and every week and fine-tune it as we go.”
This story was originally published September 15, 2020 at 8:08 PM.
