Until November 2nd at 4 pm Eastern Time, every Miami Dolphins fan from around the world will be holding their breath. 

Who will it be, Tua Tagovailoa or Deshaun Watson?

Every team considers moving players leading up to the league-wide trade deadline that finally arrives this coming Tuesday. However, no move has been as ballyhooed as the prospect of the Miami Dolphins acquiring Watson. 

There are so, so many layers to this potential trade. And so many reasons why the entire thing reeks in the eyes of many Dolphins fans…

Has Watson really only waived his no-trade clause for the Miami Dolphins?

Does Dolphins owner Stephen Ross, who is 81 years old and wants to win now, really want to trade for someone being accused of sexual assault by more than 20 women to try and fix the QB position? What’s the moral ruling here?

And regarding Watson’s legal issues, will he ever even play again in the NFL? If not, are the Dolphins comfortable with holding onto Tua?

There are too many questions to answer in one column, but make no mistake… Watson trade notwithstanding, Miami is in a state of emergency. 

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This is DEFCON-4-level stuff we’re talking about. Picture this:

You’re a 1-6 team. You own the 29th ranked scoring offense in the league, and the 31st ranked scoring defense. You have a litany of underperforming and/or regressing young players on your team who were supposed to comprise the foundation of an eventual dynasty. And on top of all this, you thought you had legit playoff potential before the season started.

…Playoffs? We were talking about playoffs??

Unfortunately, we were. Us Dolphins fans, we mean well, but we make the same mistake over and over again in trusting this franchise to one day get it turned around. Perhaps Tua is the savior we’ve all hoped he could be. Or perhaps Watson ends up as a Dolphin after getting his legal issues cleared and leads Miami to a championship. Either is possible.

That doesn’t mean, however, that it’s easy to be a Dolphins fan. It’s not.

But I digress. 

After Tuesday, we’ll all know whether Miami is staking at least its 2021 future on the left arm of Tua or its future far beyond 2021 on the beleaguered Deshaun Watson. But the decision over which quarterback to move forward with has much larger ramifications beyond who’s under center.

If Tua stays, what does that mean for head coach Brian Flores and Chris Grier? Barry Jackson of the Miami Herald reported earlier that Grier has no concerns about his job security despite the season’s lackluster start. And Jeff Darlington of NFL Network has likened Flores’ relationship to Tua to John Elway’s relationship to Tim Tebow several years ago.

Elway couldn’t get Tebow out of Denver fast enough, and that was after Tebow won the Broncos a playoff game. Does that mean that if Tua is on the roster next Wednesday, this town is only big enough for one of them to be a part of the organization in 2022?

If Miami trades for Watson, that would seem to suggest that Flores and Grier are safe for the foreseeable future. As mentioned above, Grier already feels safe. And as for Flores, his five-year contract is abnormal compared to the usual four-year deal head coaches normally receive. I may be extrapolating, but in year three, with a ten-win season already under his belt, I get the sense that Ross will be patient with Flores, especially if Watson becomes a part of the future.

And this is where I can’t help but dump my thoughts onto the page.

Why make a trade for a player who we can’t be certain will play in 2021, let alone ever again? And that’s without asking any moral questions, of which there are several.

Why make this trade now, with the team sitting at 1-6 and nowhere near looking like a competent product? The team has holes and issues elsewhere that would appear to need fixing first. I’m talking linebacker, wide receiver, offensive line, running back. 

It all reeks of desperation on the part of Flores and Grier, even if Grier is reportedly safe. It stinks. 

And most crucially, why give up hope on a second-year quarterback who despite what some in the national media will tell you, has shown serious promise to be a franchise QB? I get that Stephen Ross might just be trying to throw the kitchen sink at the most important position on the field to finally build a championship team, but look at what you have! Tua still hasn’t even gotten a full season’s worth of starts to his name.

Tua is far from perfect, but this season he’s looked the part. The last two weeks, as embarrassing as those losses were, were not at all his fault. Turnovers are bad and must be coached out of his game, but there’s so much good to be taken away from what we’ve seen in year two:

Accuracy, his calling card. Anticipation, mobility, the ability to navigate in the pocket and evade pressure. And the undeniable intangible factor that Tua possesses:

He has the highest 4th quarter passer rating EVER among QB’s with at least 90 pass attempts between 1994 and now (this from Chris Kouffman). That’s bonkers. 

How do you not want to build on that? Because of some lazy national narrative surrounding a young quarterback who’s had a downright bizarre start to his NFL career? 

There is a very legitimate fear that Tua could go elsewhere and blossom into a very good NFL quarterback. So let’s not let that fear be realized; let’s kick the tires and give Tua some time to see what we’ve got here. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: Ryan Tannehill was given seven YEARS to prove himself — are we so bitter that we can’t give Tua even a full season?

And there’s the character factor between Watson and Tua. I won’t speculate on Watson because he’s innocent until proven guilty, but I’ll tell you this:

If you follow Tua and understand even one iota about him, you get a sense of the type of person he is. The national narratives about him are mind-boggling to me because he’s impossible not to root for once you hear the way people talk about him. 

Right now, Watson is the better NFL quarterback. Clearly. But Tua doesn’t have 20-plus sexual assault allegations clinging to his name and could just be scratching the surface of his NFL potential.

If I’m the Miami Dolphins, I know what I’m doing before this Tuesday: I’m not making any sort of trade involving Tua Tagovailoa.

What the Dolphins do is anyone’s guess. But the way the momentum has swung most recently AWAY from the Watson trade happening (because of reports about Stephen Ross’s concern over Watson’s nebulous legal situation), it almost feels like right when Dolphins fans will feel safe with Tua the team will send him packing and bring Watson to town. 

Or maybe we’re all just jaded from years of abuse — perhaps the Dolphins really are okay with Tua and simply like to keep all of their options wide open, which is terrible for optics and hard on a young quarterback but defensible purely football-wise. 

Only time will tell, and this franchise’s fate for the next ten-plus years could very well be hanging in the balance. Grier, Flores, Watson, and Tua are all directly affected by the trade deadline decision, and as the General Manager, Head Coach, possible QB, and current QB, they’ll be the ones determining the team’s course, at least for the rest of the 2021 season.

This is a state of emergency, and Tuesday afternoon will mark the end of it one way or another.

 

(Thanks for reading! Follow me on Twitter @EvanMorris72 for more content, and Fins Up as always. Stay strong Dolphins fans!)