Tagovailoa clear-eyed about the changes that need to happen
‘If you can’t get the job done, then that’s on you. That’s on no one else,’ the Dolphins quarterback says ahead of Sunday’s game against the Bills.
Tua Tagovailoa is more honest about how he’s played than a lot of his defenders.
And his biggest fans seem more upset by Brian Flores benching him in the fourth quarter against the Raiders than Tagovailoa was.
Tagovailoa, speaking ahead of Sunday’s critical game against the Buffalo Bills, was clear-eyed about his issues Saturday in Las Vegas.
“I’d say for me there’s really no extra added pressure,” Tagovailoa said. “The expectation for myself is very high in how I perform and how I go out there and try to lead the guys to victory.
“Obviously, this past weekend, I didn’t play to that standard,” Tagovailoa continued. “It’s more so me knowing that we’ve got to go out here and get
the job done. If you can’t get the job done, then that’s on you. That’s on no one else.”
Flores pulled Tagovailoa for the second time in five starts Saturday because of performance. And that performance, he readily acknowledges, was not good enough.
It took him 22 pass attempts to manage 94 yards, and the Dolphins went three-and-out in five of his eight possessions, not including a kneeldown at the end of the first half.
Ryan Fitzpatrick, meanwhile, provided the spark the Dolphins needed, leading Miami to points on each of its last three possessions, including his game-changing throw to Mack Hollins with just seconds left on the clock.
And yet, Flores had zero hesitation in naming Tagovailoa the Dolphins’ Week 17 starter — a show of
support that must have helped Tagovailoa’s confidence in recent days.
“With our whole QB situation, I think Flo does a good job with communicating with me, Fitz, as well as our coordinator [Chan Gailey] and quarterbacks coach [Robby Brown],” Tagovailoa said. “Kind of seeing, ‘Hey, are you in a groove? Or what can we do better?’ And if no, it’s always communicated. There’s really good communication between all of us.
“I trust that he has the best interest, not just for us, but the whole team, [in
mind].”
While most remember Tagovailoa as a superstar in college, he’s actually been similar situations before. He sat and watched behind Jalen Hurts as a freshman in 2017 before relieving him in the national championship game.
A year later, Tagovailoa was the Alabama starter but went down with an injury in the SEC title game. Hurts replaced him. In both instances, the quarterback change was a success; the Crimson Tide rallied to win those highstakes games.
“I think there just needs to be understanding, situational understanding of what we want to get done as a team,” Tagovailoa said. “From that perspective, you’ve just got to get out of yourself and into the team and see it from that perspective instead of yourself.
“... It’s all about what you can gain from everything,” he continued. “For me, it’s a learning experience. Like I said in all of the previous interviews that I’ve had, it’s not like a one-and-done thing. It’s continuous. Especially during your rookie year.”
Tagovailoa’s maturity — which is remarkable, considering he doesn’t turn 23 until March — is a big reason that a potentially thorny quarterback situation has been relatively low-drama.
Flores leads, the quarterbacks buy in, and the rest of the team follows.
“I think at the end of the day, it just comes down to our 11 guys against their 11 guys,” Tagovailoa said of Sunday’s game. “It’s football. This time it’s a lot different because there’s no fans. But you do know that there’s a lot at stake. It goes back to what I said before: You’ve got to go out there and perform.
And this is crunch time and now’s not the time to be making mistakes and all these things. You’ve got to really zero in on what you’ve got to do to help the team become successful and get a win.”