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Tua Tagovailoa is excited for what his future with the Miami Dolphins holds after signing a lengthy extension to remain the team’s starting signal caller. That hasn’t always been the case, though.
The passer detailed his experience with former head coach Brian Flores, which lasted the first two seasons of his professional career. It seems his time with the coach nearly broke him mentally.
Tagovailoa was selected with the fifth overall pick in the 2020 NFL Draft following a storied tenure at Alabama. While many expected big things from the quarterback, he claims that Flores wasn’t one of them.
Instead, Tagovailoa says that his head coach constantly berated him verbally, failing to lend any confidence in his future as a player.
“If you woke up every morning and I told you that you suck at what you did, that you don’t belong, that you shouldn’t be here, that you haven’t earned this… How would it make you feel?
“You hear it more and more, and you start to actually believe it… It’s basically been two years of training that out of me.”
“If you woke up every morning and I told you that you suck at what you did, that you don’t belong, that you shouldn’t be here, that you haven’t earned this…
and then someone come and tells you, ‘You are the best fit for this…How you that make you feel?”
– @Tua describes the… pic.twitter.com/bBHI6IsVlj
— Dan Le Batard Show with Stugotz (@LeBatardShow) August 19, 2024
Brian Flores was fired after the 2021 season, finishing his Miami tenure with a 24-25 overall record. Mike McDaniel replaced him as head coach, and since, Tua Tagovailoa has thrived.
In two seasons with McDaniel at the helm, the quarterback has thrown for more than 8,000 yards. He led the league in passing last year while pacing the NFL in QB Rating the season prior.
McDaniel expressed his confidence in Tagovailoa moving forward with a four-year extension. What a difference a coaching change can make!