The reports of the Dolphins being concerned about Tua Tagovailoa’s long-time durability apparently were nothing but smokescreens, as the team did pull the trigger, selecting him with the fifth overall pick in the draft on Thursday night.
Justin Herbert went to the Chargers, in the pick that followed Tagovailoa, so it will be interesting to see how these two develop long-term, similar to Jameis Winston and Marcus Mariota, who will forever be linked from the 2015 class.
But the Dolphins appear confident that they picked the right guy, which general manager Chris Grier making it clear that he wants Tagovailoa to be his franchise quarterback.
“We’re very comfortable,” Grier said, via the MMQB. “Really, it’s nothing different. We all know in this game, people get hurt. He’s had some injuries that people talk about, but the part that people miss is a couple of the surgeries he had, he was doing it to rush back sooner, to be with his teammates and play. Some people may have elected not to do it, and kind of ride it out. He handled adversity well and showed his mental toughness and his work ethic to come back from those things.
“Our doctors and trainers did an outstanding job, like they do on every player. With him specifically, they did nothing above and beyond of the same thing they do. They checked all the boxes and made sure we were all comfortable and feeling good about it. (Head coach) Brian (Flores), myself, ownership, we were very comfortable with it.”
Tagovailoa has an extremely high ceiling, but staying healthy will be an interesting challenge to watch in the coming years.
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