MIAMI GARDENS, Fla. — A few days after hearing Tua Tagovailoa suggest that he’s “a terrible person,” ex-Miami Dolphins coach Brian Flores held a news conference in which he was reflective about ways he has grown and can continue to grow.
“Part of coaching is correcting,” Flores said last week. “I’m always gonna correct. I’m always going to have a high standard. Look, I’ve done a lot of reflecting on this situation. Reflecting on the situation, communication.
“I think there’s things that I could do better, for sure. And I’ve grown in that way. I’ve tried to apply the things that I could do better, the things that I’ve learned over the last two, three years.”
But one of those changes apparently doesn’t include admitting to Tagovailoa directly that he mistreated the Dolphins quarterback in their two years together.
Tua Tagovailoa: No Call From Brian Flores
Tagovailoa told reporters here Monday that he has not heard from Flores directly in the last week.
No call. No text.
And Tagovailoa was in no mood to discuss Flores’ comments hundreds of miles away.
Tua did say two interesting things during his Monday news conference, however.
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When asked to explain Flores’ decision to bench Ryan Fitzpatrick six productive games into Tua’s rookie season, Tagovailoa replied:
“It’s a great question. I’m not gonna answer that truthfully right now, but I think I know why. But, you know, I won’t speculate or give anyone any speculations on that. Whatever you wanna create to think that. But other than that, I think that’ll just stay here with the organization.”
As for whether it’s more important for NFL starting quarterbacks to receive a different level of support from their coaches than players at other positions, Tua replied:
“Yeah, 100%. This is a quarterback-driven league. I 100% think that without a good quarterback, I don’t think you can do much in this league. Sure, you can have a good defense. There’s really good offenses in this league. You gotta put up points, and you’ve got to find ways to do that. So I definitely believe that for sure.”