The Miami Dolphins’ long-debated quarterback decision has seen its fair share of deviations away from the favorite in the clubhouse, Alabama’s Tua Tagovailoa. But not quite like this. NFL Network’s Daniel Jeremiah produced his latest 2020 NFL mock draft earlier this week and Jeremiah forecasted the Dolphins to draft Oregon quarterback Justin Herbert with the 5th overall selection. That, however, isn’t the surprising part.
Jeremiah’s forecast saw Miami faced with the chance to draft both Tagovailoa and Herbert with the 5th pick — and Herbert still getting the call.
Miami fans as a collective are likely to loathe the decision; as Tagovailoa has been pegged as the team’s presumptive savior for the last year. But with Tagovailoa’s medical prognosis up in the air and reports surfacing that some teams, including ones in the top 10 overall, are flunking Tagovailoa for his medicals, Miami will need to be absolutely certain of his long-term outlook or else risk seeing their top-5 investment in a quarterback come up empty. Miami is in an enviable but complicated position. In a perfect world, this is the Dolphins’ big shot to land their quarterback of the future. While missing on a quarterback won’t be crippling provided the team does well to build around him, having to go back to the quarterback well again in another 2-3 seasons would prove costly to Miami’s hopes of building a legitimate contender.
That could be used as a case against Herbert, but it could also be used as a case against Tagovailoa. What’s most obvious for the Dolphins here is to keep as many picks as possible to ensure that no matter who the quarterback is and no matter how he pans out, the team will have the ammunition to build the best possible team around him in 2020 and beyond.