QB Review: Not one to remember for Tua Tagovailoa

The Miami Dolphins lost their matchup against the Denver Broncos on Sunday and Tua Tagovailoa was more of the problem than the solution.

The Miami Dolphins did not play like a playoff contender on Sunday against the Denver Broncos and Tua Tagovailoa would be better off forgetting this one.

Well, at least their offense didn’t.

After a few weeks of good performances by rookie Tua Tagovailoa, the young quarterback seemed to be rattled a bit by the Broncos defense. For the first time in his career (yes, I know it has been only four games), Tagovailoa looked like he was extremely uncomfortable in the pocket.

His performance on the day was bad by anyone’s standards. From a numbers standpoint, he finished the day going 11 for 20 for a whopping 83 yards and 1 touchdown that came off of a Xavien Howard interception giving the offense great field position (all stats courtesy of ESPN.com). Tagovailoa was also sacked 6 times, which puts a decent amount of responsibility on the offensive line for this performance.

But, regardless of the poor offensive line play, Tagovailoa just looked off in this one. On Miami’s first offensive possession, Tagovailoa missed two wide-open receivers on touch passes that he is known for making. On the second drive, it was more of the same. He didn’t look like he was getting his feet set and he looked like he was struggling to read what the defense was giving him. If you couple that with the fact that he still is a rookie quarterback, it was the perfect recipe for disaster.

The fact that he was benched is a telling sign of just how poorly the offense was playing in this one and Ryan Fitzpatrick didn’t fare considerably better, throwing an interception in the end-zone that could have led to a game-tying extra-point try.

All in all, Tagovailoa was bound to have a “rookie” game and get exposed by a defense with some decent players. This offensive line, also, was also due for a weak performance, given its early-season success. A lot of this felt like it was going to happen at some point and the fact that it happened now may be beneficial for this young team, given that they have some time to fix a lot of the mistakes.

Hopefully, this is just a small hiccup in what can still be a successful season for the Miami Dolphins. As long as they can learn from their mistakes, Tagovailoa can learn from his benching and the offensive line can play better, Miami still has a great chance of outperforming preseason expectations, even with this stinker on their record.

QB Grade: F