(Note: After I wrote this article, it was revealed that Tua Tagovailoa reported concussion symptoms following a tackle in the first half of the Packers game. Tagovailoa is now in the NFL’s concussion protocol).
Tua Tagovailoa has been failed once again by the NFL’s concussion policy
Right now, there is no quarterback in the NFL going through the same kind of backslide as is Tua Tagovailoa of the Miami Dolphins. It has seemed throughout the season that whenever Tagovailoa and Miami’s potentially explosive offense puts things together, circumstances will collide and conspire to tear them apart.
The latter phenomena certainly happened in the month of December for the Dolphins after a first three months of the season in which Tagovailoa was as hot as any quarterback in the league. From opening week through the end of November, Tagovailoa was a legitimate MVP candidate. He completed 198 of 284 passes for 2,564 yards, 19 touchdowns, three interceptions, and a passer rating of 115.7. But in his four December games, Tagovailoa completed 61 of 116 passes for 984 yards, six touchdowns, five interceptions, and a passer rating of 80.5.
Of course, the fourth quarter of Miami’s 26-20 Sunday loss to the Green Bay Packers, in which Tagovailoa threw interceptions on three straight drives and the Packers scored 13 unanswered points, was the nadir of the entire experience.
This was another first-act/second-act issue, in which Tagovailoa went from Shakespeare in the Park to “Puppet Show/Spinal Tap” all too quickly. In the first half against the Packers, he completed nine of 12 passes for 229 yards, a touchdown, no interceptions, and a passer rating of 144.4. Tagovailoa had more than one explosive play in that first half, but this absolute banger of a 52-yard throw to Tyreek Hill with 11:44 left in the second quarter would seem to indicate that Tagovailoa’s December blues were behind him.
And then, a second half in which Tagovailoa completed seven of 13 passes for 81 yards, no touchdowns, three interceptions, and a passer rating of 33.3 — which means that Tagovailoa would have been better off handing the ball to his running backs on every play.
Asked about those three picks after the game, Tagovailoa tried to provide as much clarity as possible.
“On the first one, I tried to throw it over a defender, but I ended up really throwing over the defender and Tyreek, so that one got away. The second one, I might have said the wrong play. I’m not too sure. But there was just some communication errors on that. Then the third one was just not a good ball for my receivers to have been able to make a play on that.
“You know, it’s tough. You get an opportunity to play on Christmas Day against a really good team, and I go out there and really — not being able to put my best foot forward for our team. In hindsight, this is something that we’ve got to be able to just move on from. Like I say with ‘Bev,’ (Darrell Bevell) he says, ‘let every play stand on its own merit.’ So for this game, we want this game to stand on its own merit, as well.
“Obviously, we’re going to learn from these mistakes, but this isn’t something that after a loss we should be going home and taking to our families, our kids, our other halves. We leave it all here and we go enjoy Christmas, and then we come back in when time is, and we learn from it.”