The 2023 NFL season just ended last weekend with the Kansas City Chiefs claiming their third Lombardi Trophy in the last five years with their win over the San Francisco 49ers.
In just his second season as Miami Dolphins head coach, Mike McDaniel got his team to the postseason for the second year in a row, a feat that no Dolphins coach had achieved since Dave Wannstedt did so in 2000 and 2001.
Despite that fact, some believe that Miami will miss the cut next year.
On his FOX Sports show “The Herd,” Colin Cowherd spent time this week projecting who will make the playoffs next season, and the Dolphins weren’t one of the seven teams that he named. His picks included the Chiefs, Buffalo Bills, Cincinnati Bengals, Indianapolis Colts, Baltimore Ravens, Jacksonville Jaguars and Los Angeles Chargers.
In fact, Cowherd gave a reason for his line of thinking.
“Nothing against Miami, but Tua was completely healthy this year,” Cowherd said. “Think that’s going to happen again next [year]?”
Cowherd is correct that 2023 was the first season that Tagovailoa played all 17 regular-season contest and their lone postseason game. With him under center, the Dolphins finished the year with an 11-6 record and lost to the eventual Super Bowl champions. Tagovailoa led the league in passing yards and set career highs in yards, touchdowns and completion percentage.
Going against Cowherd is that when Miami made the playoffs in 2022, just a year ago, Tagovailoa dealt with multiple concussions that kept him out of a number of games, including the team’s playoff loss to the Bills.
There’s so much that can and will change by the time the playoffs come around in 11 months, but if the Dolphins go into the year with the exact same roster that they did in 2023, they’d be better set up for success if Tagovailoa were to go down. Mike White, who is the presumed backup, has experience in the system, unlike Teddy Bridgewater and Skylar Thompson, who were asked to lead the team down the stretch in 2022.
McDaniel and general manager Chris Grier have done a great job of putting talent around their starting quarterback and he certainly excels in that role, but even if he were to get hurt again in 2024, they should be able to keep moving forward until Tagovailoa is ready to go again.
And, more than that, having the Bengals and Colts in the playoffs and keeping Miami out because of quarterback health doesn’t make much sense.
Colts quarterback Anthony Richardson missed most of his rookie season with a torn ACL. Bengals quarterback Joe Burrow, who was taken in the same draft as Tagovailoa, suffered a torn ACL in his rookie season and missed seven games due to a wrist injury in 2023.
It doesn’t make much sense to pick and choose.