Tua Tagovailoa – September 21, 2022
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Wednesday, September 21, 2022
QB Tua Tagovailoa
(On his t-shirt) – “’I wish it were hotter.’ That’s a phrase that Mike (McDaniel) likes to say. More so reverse psychology, if you will. It gets really hot out here and so just say it, believe it.”
(What was your reaction to winning AFC Offensive Player of the Week? Was it expected after the game?) – “It was cool. That’s my first one, but I’ve said this in many other interviews that individual success is only done within team success. If we never won that game, if the defense never did what they did, if our offense didn’t go out and put points on the board; none of that would have been possible. So I amend that to our team.”
(You got that award, but were you also getting a lot of congratulatory messages from friends and family after that game?) – “Yeah, I got a lot of messages after the game. But yeah, just normal congratulations.”
(There’s a bunch of stats through the first few weeks of the season to show how you’ve proved how you’re a better player. Through two weeks, what is something that maybe the average person hasn’t seen that you think you’re executing at a higher level than years past?) – “Well, I think it’s hard to look back at the things that I did last year or the year prior because of what the offense entails for us. You got to be locked into every play. You’ve got to understand the landmarks, motion points. There’s a lot to the offense, so it’s kind of hard for me to evaluate myself from years prior. But that’s not something that I would say I necessarily do on my own as well. I don’t just go back and look at all the years that I’ve played and all the games that I’ve played in and then compare it to this year. They’re all three different systems and they all work differently. So I’ve got to hone in on what every play asks of me and go out there and execute.”
(Is there a particular part of your game that you feel that much more comfortable about right now?) – “Well, I think I feel comfortable distributing the ball to our playmakers. Just getting the ball into the hands of our playmakers and letting them go to work.”
(I’m doing something on home-field advantage and I’m wondering from your perspective and your experience, what makes home-field advantage – the venue, the crowd, the actual team that plays in that venue? What makes home-field advantage?) – “Well, I would say the crowd for one and then I would say the atmosphere, like our first game. I would say that was probably the most people that I’ve seen in our stadium and it got really loud for the opposing team’s offense and that’s probably the loudest that I’ve heard since I got here with the Miami Dolphins fans at Hard Rock (Stadium). I think that plays a big key with how they operate within their offense, but, yeah, I would say there’s not much more to it than just that.”
(We talked with Head Coach Mike McDaniel about stacking good days in light of success. What’s your approach to that?) – “Yeah, I would say the same thing, just one day at a time. Got to continue to go out there and take what we’ve learned from the meetings out there to the field and get it corrected when we watch film.”
(Why are you and Head Coach Mike McDaniel seemingly a perfect fit?) – “Why are we a perfect fit? That’s a unique question. I mean…”
(Or what about him allows you to be the best version of yourself and play the best football that you have of your career?) – “Yeah, I think what Mike does with our offense is he complements everyone’s talent. He complements everyone’s ability within the offense. For instance, if I’m good with RPO’s, he’ll find some way to get the RPO implemented. If I’m good with something else or if someone’s good running a certain route, we’ll find ways to get him the ball within that route a few different ways. So things like that.”
(There was obviously a lot of talk about broken coverages at the end of Sunday’s game, but I’m wondering from you and this offense’s perspective, were there things that y’all did to maybe set the defense up to bust their coverages or what have people missed about that fourth quarter?) – “Yeah, I’m not too sure if what we did offensively with motions screwed them up, but then again, we have no control over what they do on the other side. All we can do is go through our reads, go through our progressions and then get the open guys the ball.”
(How much of a measuring stick is Buffalo for you guys?) – “We understand that they’re a really good team. That’s no secret. Everyone knows that they’re really good team. They’re tough defensively, they’re explosive offensively. So I wouldn’t say that we have a measuring stick for how good that these guys are because when you look at it, their opening game, they beat the Super Bowl champions of last year. And they didn’t just beat them; it was by a lot. And the next team they played, a really good team; they beat them by a lot. So for us, we’re just looking at playing the way we play and playing the way we’ve played for the past two weeks and we’ll go out there, they’ll get our best and we’ll get theirs.”
(You mentioned motion a second ago. I think you guys lead the league in pre-snap motion. Can you explain what that does for you as a quarterback getting it to WR Tyreek Hill or WR Jaylen Waddle?) – “Well, we get to see what kind of defensive front they run. If they do adjust their fronts with our motions with our tight ends and then with our jet motions with Tyreek (Hill), Jaylen (Waddle), and all our other guys in the back end, we get to see how they move within their coverages and it’s going to be a real good challenge for us this week because of how sound Buffalo plays defensively with those.”
(If I could quickly follow up, have you seen example maybe in this game or the first game of how a defense has reacted on that motion that has affected the play?) – “I would say in one instance where Chase (Edmonds) ran the ball in the fourth quarter to get us down into the red area. I don’t know maybe it was like the 10-yard line or the 5-yard line – somewhere down there – we’ve been we’ve been running a certain play where I keep the ball and just dish it out to guys and that motion helped get guys to move out of their gaps and Chase was able to run and get a tremendous amount of yards. So I would say that’s kind of how we look at plays complementing other plays.”
(Obviously the comeback was fun because you won the game, but is there an emphasis this week on starting fast so that you don’t have to play come back?) – “Yeah, we talk about adversity as an opportunity, but I think that was a little too much adversity. I don’t think we want that much adversity. (laughter) But for sure, we definitely want to start a lot faster. We want to get into the game and just stay on top of what we got to do.”
(We know that WR Tyreek Hill obviously thinks your coach has lot of confidence. The fourth-and-7 call coming back from three touchdowns down, when did you have a sense that this guy was going to go for it, that this wasn’t – you know first year coach sometimes get scared – he wasn’t…?) – “I mean, you never know with Mike. I’m just like, are we going for it? Are we not? He’ll just say, ‘hey, just stay in there, we’re kind of waiting to see where they mark it’ or just things like that. But I think Mike has the utmost confidence in our offense, that if he does call a play, we’re going to go out there and we’re going to execute it to the best of our ability. And yeah, he just has trust in us.”
(I just wanted to ask you your impressions of Josh Allen?) – “Beast. I mean, he’s a beast. I don’t know what else to say about him. I mean the guy runs the ball when he needs to, extends plays with his legs. He can get the ball down the field and he gets the ball to his playmakers. That’s the biggest thing. But beast. The guy’s a beast.”
