Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
Dolphins likely lose a rising Tannehill for season
MIAMI GARDENS — When it was all over, after Ryan Tannehill was fitted with crutches and hobbled to his locker, they came across the room to hug him, one by one.
Coach Adam Gase. Vance Joseph, the defensive coordinator. Teammates. Tannehill, as tough as the West Texas ground he came from, bent over on the crutches he’d just received, his eyes misting.
“Hey, how you doing?” asked Matt Moore, who replaced the Dolphins’ starting quarterback in their 26-23 win Sunday over the Arizona Cardinals and who likely will replace him for the rest of the season after Tannehill’s anterior cruciate ligament injury to his left knee.
Moore and Tannehill hugged a few seconds and talked a few more, and then there wasn’t anything more to do than there ever is in these heart-wrenching scenes. Moore went one way to talk to the media. Tannehill went the other way through the exit on crutches.
The Dolphins season goes on. “I don’t have it officially yet, but it doesn’t look good,” Gase said of Tannehill’s injury. “We’ll get it confirmed [Monday].”
For the past five years, Tannehill. has got up from more hits than anyone in the NFL. But when Arizona defensive tackle Calais Campbell hit him low and hard late in the third quarter Sunday, it wasn’t a question of playing through pain or getting stitched up.
He stayed down on the field as a quiet settled over Hard Rock Stadium, the concern mixing with regret because Tannehill’s five years of hard work were finally paying deserved dividends these past two months.
His final pass on Sunday was a crisp 11-yard throw over the middle to receiver DeVante Parker. That was Tannehill’s ninth consecutive completion on a rainy day. He ended by completing 15-of-20 passes for 195 yards with three touchdowns, an interception and a sparkling 124.0 rating.
That’s the winning manner he played most weeks since the Dolphins’ stumbled out of the September gates, too. One week, he led a comeback win in Los Angeles. One week, former Hurricanes and Dolphins coach Jimmy Johnson, who is an analyst for FOX, called him a “franchise quarterback.” One week, Gase confessed that Tannehill. was why he took this job.
Now, just as South Florida was warming to him, just as he had talent around him, Gase stood stone-faced after a big win with the kind of news that changes seasons.
“For a guy that’s done what he has done here, the shots he has taken all season … for him to not really see it coming and couldn’t really defend himself, it’s just a rough way to get knocked out of a game,” Gase said.
There was talk that Campbell’s hit was a cheap shot, an illegal hit. But Gase was right in saying: “It’s football. I don’t know what to tell you. It’s what this game is sometimes. Things happen.”
For a few minutes after Tannehill left the game, it even felt like the end of a movie, the point where the credits roll and the screen goes dark on the Dolphins. Arizona scored two fourth-quarter touchdowns to tie the game.
But Tannehill, no doubt, will be the first to say how this team finds ways to win. Some Sundays it was with his arm. Other Sundays it was with a big play on defense or special teams.
This odd Sunday came down to three Dolphins subs getting four Arizona turnovers, the Cardinals missing two extra points (one blocked and returned for 2 crucial Dolphins points) and Moore throwing as many passes as he has the previous three years combined.
His fifth and final pass swung the day, too. It was a 29-yarder to Kenny Stills at the 1-yard line. But Moore didn’t get emotional about that winning play. He did about Tannehill. “My heart breaks,” he said. This is how it starts now for Moore, who has a lively personality and arm but hasn’t started an NFL game in five years. This is how it ends for Tannehill, whose five years of hard work was finally paying big and deserved dividends these last two months.
The shame of it all is it took something like this for Tannehill to get what his perseverance deserved. As he limped to the locker room, his season likely done, fans gave him a standing ovation.