Miami Dolphins: Why Aren't They Paying Tua?

Everyone knows QB Tua Tagovailoa will get a big payday with his next contract. What we don’t know is whether or not it will be with the Miami Dolphins. That said, the two sides will more than likely get a deal done. Where the hold up is, according to some sources, the Dolphins aren’t currently willing to offer Tagovailoa “market price”, a price closer to the deal QBs such as Jared Goff and Trevor Lawrence got.

So what’s the elephant in the room is, why not?

Tua had his best season last year, leading the league in passing yards, so it can’t be a matter of production. Despite the rest of the team getting hit with the injury bug, Tagovailoa played a full schedule so the concerns were eased there. If there’s a long-term concern about the guaranteed money due to his concussion history, then the NFL should be stepping in and investigating whether or not there really is a long-term concern about his health. There has to be a reason they aren’t ready to pay him what the rest of the league is paying their top stars.

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More than anything, the Dolphins are in a weird position. They believe Tua can be their franchise quarterback but they’re hesitating. With Lawrence and Goff getting paid, there’s a line in the sand. His deal would fall somewhere between those two and Jalen Hurts. Despite a loss, Trevor Lawrence hasn’t done enough to punch his ticket to the post-season, where Tua has. Jared Goff has been the spark and has post-season history, but he’s come up short as well. The outlier in these negotiations is Jalen Hurts, whose extension fell short of the other two but has led the Eagles to a Super Bowl, and there’s the problem.

Contracts for quarterbacks are blown way out of proportion. With how hard it is to actually find a franchise quarterback teams will lock one down with unrealistic contracts just to stay out of the quarterback market. How does a quarterback who has been to the Super Bowl earn less than the guys who can’t find the postseason wins?

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You also have to wonder, is Miami not paying him knowing they’ll have to pay more than just Tua Tagovailoa when it comes time? Miami has a long list of great young talent, they’ll more than likely need to pay their young stars too. Yet, that poses another question mark. If that were the case, they had plenty of young talent in guys like Christian Wilkins and Andrew Van Ginkel. Surely they let those two impact players walk to free up the money to pay guys like Tua, Tyreek, and maybe even Jevon Holland.

Maybe that’s the real problem. The Miami Dolphins have an embarrassment of riches when it comes to their young talent and they just can’t afford to pay them all. However, with a team that has spent so freely in the past, you have to wonder what’s written in the fine print of their hesitation on Tua Tagovailoa.