Are you not entertained…? Are you not entertained?!? If you were one of those who was suspicious of Tua’s great performance in the 1st preseason game then today should have alleviated many of your doubts. This is not the same Tua Tagovailoa coming off a hip injury with no offseason in a COVID year. This new and improved version of Tua is clearly in command of the playbook and has the belief of his teammates. In sports having confidence in yourself and your abilities is a must. But when your teammates believe that you can take them to the promised land, there is no telling what heights you can go to in collaboration with those faithful teammates. That’s the space that Tua is in right now and if you ask me, he’s just getting started.
Tua was even sharper today than he was last week, and that’s saying something. Early in the 2nd quarter when I looked up his stats and saw 11 completions out of 12 attempts with a touchdown and no picks my mouth hit the floor. I mean I knew the guy was balling but I didn’t realize that he was cooking in a kitchen with that much heat! The guy did all of his homework, aced the test, and answered the extra credit questions just for the hell of it. He took what the defense gave him and the defense gave him a lot, he had almost 200 yards in the bank come halftime.
Tua had great pocket awareness and short area mobility. He could tell when he was holding the ball too long and had to move to the side or step up to make the right throw to his outlet. He must have had a GPS locator on his outlet because he knew exactly where that route was all night. His throws were smooth and accurate for the most part. Tua did have a couple passes that he would probably like a mulligan on, but no one is perfect. It’s great when a player plays that well and still has a lot of things to work on. The bottom line is: if you’re a Dolfan you should be very excited right now, because we officially have a QB if we can protect him.
We finally got to see some extended Waddle action and it’s safe to say the guy is going to be a problem in the league if he can stay healthy. He was all over the field like yard marker paint. The Falcons DBs must have thought they were trapped in a Dr. Seuss book trying to keep up with him. Left side, right side, strong side, weak side, my side, and your side. Atlanta couldn’t do anything with him because they didn’t know if he was going to run the post down the field or motion to the backfield for a jet sweep. Waddle’s speed is so effortless, but he gave us a major scare today when his knee got leg whipped. I was relieved when he was able to come back into the game. He showed some toughness tonight too, because that shot he took was no joke.
The Dolphins defense looked formidable once again. They did a nice job of bending but not breaking in the early segments of the game when things were a little shaky and then the defense got into a dominant groove where all Atlanta could do was just give Miami back the ball. We finally got to see Jaelan Phillips on the field somewhat. Hopefully we will get to see him take some more snaps next game the get a proper assessment. He had some backfield penetration but wasn’t really impactful in this game. The Dolphins running attack looked a lot better tonight as well. To me it’s clear that Gaskin is our best running back. If the Dolphins can build on the progress they made today we might be watching the genesis of a special team. What a time to be alive as a Dolfan! Simply put, its definitely Tua Time!