Quarterback Tua Tagovailoa will miss at least the Miami Dolphins’ next four games after going on injured reserve on Tuesday. But just because the former Alabama All-American won’t be throwing the passes for the NFL team over the next month doesn’t mean he’s had to step down from his leadership role with the team, Miami coach Mike McDaniel said on Wednesday.
“Obviously, I didn’t forecast this a week ago, such is the nature of NFL football,” McDaniel said. “But I see a true, true leader and teammate that is worried about the right stuff. What he’s worried about is doing everything that he can control for each day and then also very much invested with his teammates. …
“For a leader, a captain, the quarterback of this franchise, he is approaching it the way that true leaders and captains would in terms of, ‘Hey, this is not about me. We have a game. I’m getting healthy. We have a game on Sunday.’”
The Dolphins play the Seattle Seahawks on Sunday and will have Skylar Thompson at quarterback instead of Tagovailoa, who sustained a concussion in a 31-10 loss to the Buffalo Bills on Thursday.
On Monday, McDaniel said it was too early to know if Tagovailoa would be placed on injured reserve. An “accumulation of different information” is why the quarterback ended up there on Tuesday, McDaniel said.
“I think lost in a lot of this is this is something that (Dolphins general manager) Chris (Grier) and I have to collaborate on in terms of you have injuries,” McDaniel said. “Man, it’s clear if it’s ‘All right, you’re out for the year.’ Anything else, you have to weigh the information that you have on that day at that moment and weigh all of the different variables, so in the process, like every other player on this team, we do what we feel is best with the information and collaboration with medical experts.”
But Tagovailoa is not “every other player on this team.” He’s the quarterback and highest-paid player who also had two concussions during the 2022 season. The four-game requirement of injured reserve means Tagovailoa doesn’t have a short-term deadline hanging over his head, McDaniel said.
“I think the great thing about IR is for a month’s time, there’s no timelines,” McDaniel said. “I always say that, but I’m not sure that people quite understand. If you set a timeline based upon the information you have today, how much of whatever goes on is fulfilling the prophecy of that timeline? And is that the right thing? Especially with competitors and stuff, sometimes you can do more harm than good.
“I think, regardless, not worrying about anything as it relates to timelines is very empowering for him as a human being to recover from injury, and that’s steadfast the only motivating factor that you have when you’re dealing with players and their careers and their injuries.”
McDaniel said he didn’t know if Tagovailoa would accompany the team when it travels to play Seattle. But the coach said the QB was doing what he could, within the boundaries of IR and the NFL’s concussion protocol, to help his teammates be ready for Sunday.
“He’s very active within the building,” McDaniel said, “and I can firmly, I can guarantee that he is fully committed to the day and his team and is involving himself in every way that the rules allow and that the process allows, because the process is what you focus on. It’s not getting through it. And he’s very much focused on that because we’re all not trying to rush the process. As a matter of fact, we’re trying to do the process right, and that’s what our focus is.
“I have zero concerns about him. He is in it with his teammates, and sometimes that means being on the field, sometimes that means meetings, sometimes that means in the training room, sometimes that means in the locker room. But he is doing it as a leader and a captain.”
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Mark Inabinett is a sports reporter for Alabama Media Group. Follow him on Twitter at @AMarkG1.
