Tua Tagovailoa is a man of many looks.
But the Miami Dolphins newest hairstyle is actually a callback to a long ago era.
Tuscaloosa Tua is back, with the former Alabama QB going back to his blonde look that he rocked as a young man in the SEC.
Tuscaloosa Tua Tagovailoa Goes Old School
So what prompted the change?
“My coaching career’s over, so I came back to playing football.”
A new look for Uce. 🤙 pic.twitter.com/0KGlrGHUdJ
— Miami Dolphins (@MiamiDolphins) October 30, 2024
Tagovailoa did indeed in Week 8. While is first game back was a gutting loss on the final play to the Arizona Cardinals, Tua looked like the Tua of old.
In fact, Tagovailoa’s performance was the best by a Dolphins quarterback in a loss since at least the start of the 2019 season.
That’s according to QB+, PFN’s new proprietary metric that measures quarterback efficiency.
Tagovailoa scored a 66.7 (out of 100), which graded out to a B. While that might not seem all that impressive, it was better than he or any other Dolphins QB had performed in a losing effort the last six seasons.
Future Miami Dolphins Coach?
Credit Tua for doing what it took to stay sharp during his five-week stint on injured reserve. As Tagovailoa suggested, he was a de facto coach during his time away, showing up as early as 5 a.m. to meet with offensive coordinator Frank Smith and go over the game plan for games he’d miss.
Tagovailoa would use that insight and his experience operating Mike McDaniel’s offense to coach up backups Snoop Huntley, Tim Boyle and Skylar Thompson during his IR stint.
“I have a different respect and understanding of what they do,” Tagovailoa said. “Guys sleep here. That’s crazy to me. Like go home to your wife, like even if it’s for 30 minutes, like that’s crazy.
“But guys do that, you know, they’re dedicated in that sense. I love that. But I don’t necessarily, you know, agree, but that’s for another day, right? I would say a lot of guys are up there at 2 [a.m.] and are there till like 10 [p.m.] and then some of them just still don’t sleep.
“‘OK, now we gotta do third downs after this Wednesday,’ like just being with those guys and, and seeing what they’ve been talking about in 2:30 meetings and 3 o’clock meetings, I’m like, ‘Jeez, it feels like it should be lunch at 7.’
“With the way their scheduling is and you just get a better grasp of what the communication is, what the talks are like and then how they also see the field, and then got to have some communication deals with the defense as well. But you have a different type of respect, I would say,, being with the coaches.”
So you’re not going to be a coach someday?, a reporter asked Tagovailoa to close out his Wednesday news conference
“Probably not,” he said with a chuckle. “Probably not.”