There are few things more important in either music or football than tempo. Tempo helps to define the structure of a song, just as it helps to define the structure of a drive in a football game.
When the Dolphins and Bengals faced off on Sunday, Miami offensive coordinator Chan Gailey had to fix a small problem — Tua Tagovailoa, his rookie quarterback, had missed the team’s previous game against the Jets in a 20-3 win (because it’s the Jets), and that game Tagovailoa an extra week to think about his Week 11 game against the Broncos in which he completed just 11 of 20 passes for 83 yards and a touchdown before head coach Brian Flores put Ryan Fitzpatrick in the game instead. While it was right to bench the rookie, everybody in that building knows that it’s Tagovailoa who provides the team’s long-term answer at the game’s most important position.
That said, I had never seen Tagovailoa play as frantically as he did against the Broncos, and when quarterbacks play “too fast” from a physical sense, it generally means that they’re not trusting what they’re seeing — i.e., playing “too slowly” from a mental standpoint in the moment. That’s not to say that Tagovailoa can’t handle the NFL — he obviously can — but every young quarterback will have his crucible moments, and then, it comes down to what your plan is after you get hit.
Why it was right to bench Tua Tagovailoa — and why it’s right to start him next Sunday
So, it was up to Gailey to get Tua back on track. In the first half against Cincinnati, Tagovailoa completed 12 of 19 passes for 111 yards and no touchdowns, and the Bengals were up, 7-6. Not the worst from Tua, but clearly the Dolphins wanted more from their passing game.
So, at the half, Gailey made the call to mic in a quicker offensive tempo with the increased use of no-huddle. By the end, the Dolphins had a 19-7 win to move their record to 8-4, and Tagovailoa had completed 26 of 39 passes for 296 yards and a touchdown.
“I’d say the only thing that was different was our tempo,” Tagovailoa said of the contrast between the first and second half. “We just got on the ball, and then we played. The question previous, the reason we did that was, it confuses the defense not to get into their calls that they want to get into whether it’s a pressure call or a coverage call. So I think that was our only adjustment. We’ve just got to play football. That was it.”
Bengals safety Jessie Bates III agreed.
“Yeah, I think they sped it up a little more in the second half. That’s exactly what they did, actually. In the first half, we stopped the run and eliminated the explosive plays. And then in the second half, I think they got us on our heels when they went hurry-up and that empty formation they continually go into, they kind of got us backed up.”
The play that flipped the script came with 12:35 left in the third quarter. Miami had second-and-7 from the Cincinnati 40-yard line, and Gailey was calling no-huddle all the way through that drive, which started on the Miami 25. This was the fourth straight no-huddle play, and the Dolphins had success both running and passing the ball out of it.
Here, Miami lines up in an empty formation. Running back Myles Gaskin is wide left, with receiver Antonio Callaway in the left slot. At the snap, both Gaskin and Callaway run what appear to be quick in-cuts, but against Cincinnati’s Cover-1 defense, Gaskin then turns his route upfield, easily leaving safety Vonn Bell in the dust. At the last second, Bell splits his attention between Gaskin and Tagovailoa, who’s scrambling to his left to extend the play. The aforementioned Mr. Bates is the deep safety, and covers the front side instead until he realizes where the ball is actually going.
How to stretch an already-stretched defense with empty, a rollout to the left, and a late-developing route up the numbers, by Dolphins OC Chan Gailey. pic.twitter.com/3HP2d3oMmu
— Doug Farrar (@NFL_DougFarrar) December 7, 2020
Halftime adjustments don’t always work, but it made all the difference for the Dolphins and their young quarterback. You might expect to see more quick-tempo based on the situation, and Tua Tagovailoa could also benefit from empty packages that give him clear openings in one-on-one matchups.