Releasing Josh Rosen Was a Mistake
The biggest shock in the final cutdowns for the Miami Dolphins was when they released quarterback Josh Rosen. Rosen is entering his third NFL season and it was going to be his second with the Dolphins after being acquired in a trade from the Arizona Cardinals. Rosen had his chance to start last year in 3 games but didn’t play very well. The problem with young quarterbacks is teams don’t show enough patience in developing them and the Dolphins made that mistake here in this case with Rosen.
Yes, the Dolphins drafted Tua Tagovailoa with the 5th pick in the draft in May and after starting out slow he ended training camp strong. Rosen on the other hand started training camp off playing well, he ended camp on a down note. With this being an odd offseason due to the COVID-19 pandemic in our country, Rosen really had no chance to get on the field and go through mini camps, preseason games, etc. Plus he was learning his third new offense in three seasons since being drafted into the NFL. None of this was playing in Rosen’s favor, but Rosen is still young at 23 years old and given time could have developed into a backup and someone could have offered a high draft pick for him since Tagovailoa is the future of this team at quarterback.
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The problem the Dolphins could have next year is who is going to back up Tagovailoa? It’s possible Ryan Fitzpatrick could come back and back up Tagovailoa, but next year he will be 38 years old and who knows if he would want to do that. Rosen’s contract was pretty reasonable for this year and next year for a total of $4 million dollars total which is cheap by NFL standards. The Dolphins could have let this play out for at least another year and see if he would have improved.
A lot has been made of what the Dolphins gave up to get Rosen in a trade a year ago. Frankly, that’s nothing compared to what has been offered for other quarterbacks. In 2012, the Washington Football Team traded 3 first-round picks to move up and get Robert Griffin III. That move set the franchise back as he was injured and not a very good player. The Buffalo Bills in 1998 gave up a 1st and 4th round draft picks to acquire Rob Johnson and he was terrible. It’s not like the Dolphins offered a king’s ransom for Rosen when they acquired him.
I would have loved to have seen Rosen kept on the roster to develop, but the Dolphins had other ideas. I just hope this move doesn’t come back to bite them and he hooks on with a team and has some success down the road. I’m not a huge Rosen fan and I know Tagovailoa is the future and the better quarterback, but in the NFL you can never have enough quarterbacks. With Fitzpatrick entering the end of his career, it would have been nice to have two young quarterbacks in Rosen and Tagovailoa on the roster developing together just like when the Sand Diego Chargers had Drew Brees and Philip Rivers for a few seasons until they let one go. You don’t see that often, but that could have been the case in Miami. Some quarterbacks need a little more time than others and maybe that is the case with Rosen.
No chance a team was giving a high draft pick up for the stat line that Rosen has produced in 2 plus years – its really, really poor. This is a fantasy article based on hope, and a projection for the player that doesn’t fit his current evaluations. ‘He has a great arm’ does not mean that he’ll be a great player. The annual cuts we see in the NFL are littered with great athletes, outstanding SPARQ players that never get their heads around the game. Unfortunately, its looking more and more like the mental processing of the game is simply too much for Rosen to handle at the speed of play in the Pro level. Its no shame, as hundreds of likeable, well-meaning, dedicated, physically talented players haven’t been able to make that jump before.
In truth, its on Josh. In this case the staff saw the rookie, Tua, take the next step and escalate his reads and reactions. Josh, the 2 year pro, couldn’t, even in the simplified offense that Gailey runs.
The fact that we are now worried about who Tua’s backup is can be addressed in the draft, cheaper than the contract Rosen even carries now. And what a mighty fine problem that is to have….
Tua couldn’t beat out journeyman Fitzpatrick for the starting job. This team is a joke.