MIAMI GARDENS, Fla. — Tua Tagovailoa doesn’t need to say a word to make his point.
The Miami Dolphins‘ offense has been ragged during much of the first two days of practice, and there’s no secret why: Tua’s contract-related hold-in.
Impact of Tua Tagovailoa Hold-In on Miami Dolphins
Tagovailoa isn’t practicing much this training camp. On Thursday, he didn’t practice at all.
A day after limiting his participation to individual and 7-on-7 passes, Tua didn’t even strap on a helmet in Day 2 of training camp.
While backup Mike White and Skylar Thompson have been good early in camp in stretches, there’s no denying the offense hasn’t been the same without him — which can only help Tua in his ongoing contract squabble with the team.
For now, the Dolphins can live with the disruption. The regular season is still more than six weeks off. But Mike McDaniel certainly doesn’t want this dynamic to consume the entire preseason.
At some point, Tagovailoa needs snaps with the first-team offense, or Miami will risk an ugly start to the season that has a ton of winnable games in September and October.
So is there a point in which the Dolphins absolutely need Tagovailoa back on the field?
“I don’t know,” said right tackle Austin Jackson. “I’m not really allowed to speak on that. I wish I could.
“But s—, we miss Tua. But we have guys that are doing a great job, you know, stepping up — Mike White, Skylar, got confidence in them. But hell yeah, we want Tua back.”
Jackson did say nice things about White and Thompson during his media availability, saying he saw “a lot of confident throws. I saw a lot of throws with no hitches. A lot of confident reads. I saw a lot of good stuff out there.”
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But even White is quick to point out that Tagovailoa can throw with anticipation, timing, and accuracy that very few can.
“What’s so impressive is how quickly he sees it,” White said of Tagovailoa’s feel for receivers getting open. “It’s like he sees it before it happens. it’s very, very impressive, and it’s so fun to be around.”
White is the perfect backup for this moment. He knows that this is Tua’s team, and that it’s his job to help Miami’s QB1 in any way he can.
“I think as a friend, you try your best to kind of take his mind off of it,” White said. “We played a ton of golf [this offseason], and I’d rather stress about a 20-foot putt or duffing a chip than a multi, multimillion-dollar contract. You know what I mean?
“We can do him a service and owe it to him to just treat him the same and, and not, ‘Hey, How’s it going? You gonna sign? You gonna sign?’
“I’m sure he would love to tell us when it’s gonna happen, you know what I mean? Everybody would love to get it done. And so you just gotta just, just be a guy. Our lives are so consumed with football. So it’s like whenever you do get that chance to decompress and get off the field It’s like, just chop it over about something else.”