Tua Tagovailoa's spot on new Top 100 players list will motivate the Dolphins QB

Kansas City Chiefs' quarterback Patrick Mahomes was ranked as the league's best player by CBS Sports' Pete Prisco, which was no surprise at all. Prisco issued his yearly Top 100 players heading into the season. I guess it is easy to rank Mahomes No. 1 when all he did was lead the Chiefs to two consecutive Super Bowl titles.

Prisco going with Mahomes at the top is not a problem at all. The problem that a lot of people have with Prisco's list, however, is that he shows no respect to Miami Dolphins quarterback Tua Tagovailoa, who comes in at No. 65 on the list.

Dolphins QB Tua Tagovailoa has plenty of people doubting him this offseason

Prisco has Tagovailoa ranked as the 11th best quarterback in the league and has him behind such luminaries as Josh Allen, who is the No. 2 quarterback on his list and sixth best player overall. Joe Burrow, who was injured most of last season, is the No. 3 quarterback in the league according to Prisco.

C.J. Stroud, who has been in the league for one season, is ranked higher than Tagovailoa. So is Dallas' Dak Prescott, who apparently is so good that the Cowboys are lukewarm about extending his contract, which expires at the end of the 2024 season.

Prisco writes that Tagovailoa had an impressive campaign in 2023, but has to be better in big games going forward to ease away some of the questions that people have about him. Tagovailoa was not ranked at all going into the 2023 season.

This is all well and good, but Tagovailoa finished first in most passing categories last season and led the league in passing yardage, despite having a 1,000-yard rusher in his backfield in Raheem Mostart and an 800-yard back in then-rookie De'Von Achane.

All Tagovailoa did last season was complete 69.3 percent of his passes and have a better than 2-to-1 touchdown to interception ratio. He also had a passer rating of just over 101. He also led the Dolphins to the playoffs for the second consecutive season.

Miami brass must be thinking higher of Tagovailoa than Prisco does, as it appears as though Tagovailoa will, in short order, become the highest-paid player in the history of the National Football League. Tagovailoa is in negotiations with Dolphins general manager Chris Grier on an extension, which could flirt with $300 million over five years and average $60 million per season.

Trevor Lawrence, who is ranked as the 10th best quarterback on the list, just signed a $275 million contract, which Tagovailoa and the Dolphins are expected to surpass. The Lawrence deal, tied with that of Burrow, is considered the Gold Standard of quarterback contracts despite Lawrence being a mediocre quarterback. We expect Tagovailoa to top things.