Tua Tagovailoa – November 25, 2020
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Wednesday, November 25, 2020
QB Tua Tagovailoa
(I’m wondering your opinion of how you think you’re doing getting through your progressions – maybe through to the third read, say – and what has to happen to improve on that?) – “I think the way I feel about my performance is there’s always things that I can continue to get better at and I think that’s day-in and day-out every day of the week. And how you do that is you continue to get the reps that you need in practice, more games under your belt and just being able to play in these tough games and whatnot. That’s really how you can get better at those things.”
(One of the most interesting things we thought you said after the game on Sunday was that when you were observing those final couple drives and seeing that receivers, if they might not be open that they’re open still. Since Sunday, obviously have you had conversations with some of your receivers just to – I know you talk to them every day – but since then just about kind of creating more space and knowing when you get the ball to them?) – “I would say to your question, what we try to do in our routes versus air is we just try to work on a lot of timing. I think the biggest thing for me is I need to be better at if it’s not there, trying to extend plays and our guys trying to get open and try to find holes to where we can get better with our scramble drills, if that makes sense.”
(I’m curious, when you were at Alabama, obviously you had a lot of speedy receivers who kind of would streak open at times and now you have a lot of bigger receivers who may be more jump-ball specialists? How does that kind of transition for you having different type of receivers and having to adjust to that?) – “Exactly what you said at the end. I think that’s what it is. It’s all about adjusting. We have a fast guy – I think all of our guys are fast. The thing is, we really have one really, really fast guy and that’s Jakeem and I think for me, it’s just finding who I’m throwing to, knowing the timing with those guys, understanding who’s running that route and things like that. It’s really just all about adjusting. That’s why we have practice and I’ve got to continue to be better on giving these guys opportunities to have good run after catches.”
(You probably experienced this past week what we, who have been covering Head Coach Brian Flores for the last couple years have known, that he is an in-the-moment win-the-game type of coach. I’m curious, when you first met him, you built the relationship with him six, seven, eight months ago or whenever it was – what were your first initial thoughts about him as a coach and I guess how have they evolved in the time since?) – “Coach Flores is a very passionate – he’s very passionate as a coach and he’s very disciplined as a person with the things he does. I would say as a team, the more success we have, in a way the guys start to kind of lay back a little; but that has never been the case while I’ve been here with ‘Flo’ (Head Coach Brian Flores). We never change anything and the recipe to success is how we go out and practice every day. With his philosophy, you’ve got to work hard to go out and be successful.”
(You often point to QB Ryan Fitzpatrick’s tutelage as a big help to your game and since you’re playing a team you’ve already seen this year and how the tape where he went out and played against this defense you’re going to see on Sunday, how does that kind of help benefit your preparation this week?) – “I would say it helps tremendously. ‘Fitz’ (Ryan Fitzpatrick) has been out there and he’s seen this defense. He’s played against them. I’ve only had about like three snaps against them the last game we played, and just hearing his thoughts on where he would go with the ball, how to manipulate guys in the back end and also where we want to attack these guys; but I think a big deal with this, too, is I have to take ownership on being disciplined with seeing things for myself as far as the film, looks that they give and whatnot. To me, it goes back to discipline, kind of like what Coach Saban (University of Alabama Head Coach Nick Saban) actually said: ‘you either suffer from the pain of discipline or you suffer from the pain of defeat.’”
(One of the things that has been talked about quite a bit in the past several days is sort of a concern about if you pull a quarterback, you could be messing with his confidence and we asked Head Coach Brian Flores about that the other day and he said, “hey, Tua’s a confident guy, I’m not worried about that at all.” You know yourself better than anybody, so where is your confidence level now and are you avoiding any temptation to look over your shoulder during a game?) – “I would say my confidence level as a person, it never varies. It stays the same to me. And like I said, with whatever happened in the Broncos game, it was really for the benefit of the team. And the conversations that we kind of had, too, in a way leading up to it, are in-house and I don’t know – it just can’t be explained, if that makes sense. But for me, there’s no looking behind me or to the left or to the right. It’s what I can do to help our guys be successful and we have another week, another opportunity to do that.”
(Going back to the tight windows and not being able to take the completions out there like QB Ryan Fitzpatrick had told you, are you kind of afraid to make some mistakes out here? Is that something that’s kind of playing a factor into maybe some of your timidness as a passer?) – “I would say to that question, it’s not me playing like I’m scared or anything. It’s me trusting what I see. If I don’t see the guy open, I’m not going to throw it and that’s really how it’s been in the games and also in practice, too. It’s one of those things where you’ve just got to practice. You see it, you practice, get throws with guys in tight coverages and tight windows and then you kind of dictate how you felt through that and if you didn’t like it, then it won’t happen in the game. So that’s kind of how I see it.”
