Tua Tagovailoa will be a boom or a bust in the NFL with no middle ground
By Brian Miller
The Miami Dolphins may or may not be on the Tua Tagovailao bandwagon but one thing is becoming more evident, he will either be great, or he will suck.
Unless you are a quarterback that is drafted number one overall or traded up for with a lot of draft capital traded to move up for a quarterback, there is room to be average. The Miami Dolphins are expected to draft a quarterback in April’s draft, maybe even Tua Tagovailoa but one thing is becoming clear, there is no middle ground on the Bama QB.
The hype that has been drummed up on social media sites like Twitter and Facebook over Tagovailoa is through the roof. There are a lot of fans who believe that the QB class begins and ends with Tua but as such, so does the level of expectations for on-field performance.
In NFL circles, Tua doesn’t have to be the next Aaron Rodgers or Patrick Mahomes or any other QB, he doesn’t have to win a Super Bowl or lead a team to the playoffs. Matt Stafford is not considered a bust at quarterback and has never taken the Lions deep into the post-season. Players like Justin Herbert, Jordan Love, and even Jake Fromm can have great statistical careers and even poor ones and may never be considered a bad pick. For Tua, that isn’t the case.
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The hype surrounding him has left little room for being average. It’s not fair to the player, it’s not fair to the person drafting him, and while the NFL may never view him as a bust, fans who have poured their energy, belief, hype, and those who don’t like him, will hold him to a different standard. He will either be great or he will be a bust. No one will be satisfied with just being good.
Perhaps all he needs is to be good and if he is, and teams win with him at the position, stats won’t mean anything but in the end, stats won’t mean anything anyway. Herbert could lead the league in passing for the next 10 years and never reach the Super Bowl and some fans will blame the team around him. Tagovailoa could do the same thing and more than likely, a large contingent of fans will simply blame Tagovailoa.
The good news? It doesn’t matter what social media thinks or what we think or what anyone else thinks. It is what Chris Grier, Stephen Ross, and Brian Flores think. Tagovailoa’s legacy has only been written for Alabama. 10 years from now, chances are no one will remember the pre-draft fervor and hype. They will only know how good he is, or if he is not.