Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
Gase and Tannehill work well together for Dolphins
Streak sees team move playoff picture
Miami Dolphins rookie coach Adam Gase is confident and has an aggressive personality. Dolphins quarterback Ryan Tannehill has a quiet confidence to him and is fairly low key. But their relationship has clicked in a way that had never happened for Tannehill with any of his previous coaches during his first four NFL seasons.
As a result Tannehill, has the Dolphins (7-4) on a six-game winning streak and in playoff contention entering today’s game at Baltimore (6-5). He has nine touchdowns and one interception during the winning streak, and by most accounts this is the best stretch of his career.
“I feel like I’m progressing,” Tannehill said, “and that’s what I want to do right now is keep getting better, keep working every day in practice and putting our team in a situation to win.”
Tannehill isn’t the only reason the Dolphins enter December as hot as they’ve been in a decade. But he was one of the big factors in Miami’s California sweep with his fourth-quarter heroics against San Diego, Los Angeles and San Francisco, and Gase is a big factor in Tannehill’s success.
“I think in a funny way,” offensive coordinator Clyde Christensen said, “[Gase] wants to see [Tannehill] turn into him . ... Ryan is kind of the humble guy, and then you got the young guy who’s head coach with swagger.
“But I do think that [Gase] has injected some confidence in [Tannehill] and some swashbuckler a little bit, if you will. I think he also has called games that really complemented him.”
The results are showing on the field. Tannehill’s passes seem to be thrown with purpose and precision recently. There aren’t any of those uncertain flutterballs of past seasons.
Reflect on the low outside fastball Tannehill threw to wide receiver DeVante Parker in the end zone for the game-winning 9-yard touchdown pass against the Rams, or the 43-yard dart he threw to wide receiver Kenny Stills for a touchdown late in the third quarter against the 49ers.
One of the first things Gase did with the Dolphins was publicly and privately profess he’d have Tannehill’s back. Tannehill reveled in that vow, and Gase has maintained that promise.
But Gase, who came to the Dolphins with the reputation as a quarterback guru, had to change his strategy a bit to accommodate for Tannehill’s athleticism. Gase most recently worked with Chicago quarterback Jay Cutler and Denver quarterback Peyton Manning, a pair of pocket passers.
“He does a great job of adapting extremely quickly and doing things that Ryan can do,” Christensen said of Gase.
“I do think that he has got him believing in what he’s going to dial up. The more those guys get on the same page, the better we’re going to be.” But there’s still work to be done. For the season, Tannehill has a moderate, but respectable 15 touchdowns and eight interceptions.
He also has critical numbers that are improved, but could be better.
Tannehill is 12th in the NFL in third-down passing with a 93.5 passer rating, including five touchdowns and one interception while completing 57.7 percent of those passes.
Tannehill is 14th in fourth-quarter passing with a 94.8 passer rating, six touchdowns and three interceptions while completing 62.6 percent of those passes.
Tannehill is 13th in overall passer rating at 94.7 while completing 66 percent of his passes.
Tannehill is in the top half of the NFL in many key statistical categories, but he’s not in the top third of the league in many of them.
What matters for Miami is that Tannehill is making timely, gamewinning plays and keeping the Dolphins in the playoff hunt. And what might matter more than that, in the big picture, is that the TannehillGase relationship seems to be working better than most thought it would in their first season together.
“It has been really a good mesh,” Christensen said. “I think they’ve really come out where they see the thing, they see how we’re going to win a football game the same. That’s rare in this league.
“It’s still hard to win them, but you have a lot better chance if your play caller and head coach and your quarterback are on the same page and thinking the same.”