Two popular scapegoats for the Miami Dolphins’ woeful 2025 season have been quarterback Tua Tagovailoa and head coach Mike McDaniel, and rightfully so. Tagovailoa has thrown a league-high 10 interceptions across seven starts so far, while McDaniel is on track for his second consecutive losing season as Miami’s leader from the sidelines.
But one former star NFL signal-caller thinks that Tagovailoa is more to blame for the team’s struggles than its head coach. Former Carolina Panthers and New England Patriots quarterback Cam Newton shared his thoughts on Miami on ESPN.
“But the question is, I don’t blame Mike McDaniel more so than I blame Tua Tagovailoa,” he said. “Because Tua Tagovailoa has been on one dating back to the offseason. And now, we find ourselves in this type of situation. The play of Tua has not been what it’s supposed to be in your label franchise player. When you say certain things, you have to do your job and do your job well from Mike McDaniel. Well, is that an innuendo that he was talking about Tua? Because Tua has had multiple, multiple interception games.
“Multiple, multiple times that he hasn’t been doing what we paid him to do. He’s been doing the bare minimum. And it’s sad that good coaching can get guys paid above what the asking price should be. Well it’s unfortunate, like I said before, bad play can get coaches fired. And it’s unfortunate that two things can be true, whether from the Mike McDaniel being a good coach to Tua Tagovailoa really not upholding his end of the bargain. And it’s going to cost somebody, and it may cost them both.”
Tagovailoa might have hit a new low this season with his performance in Miami’s blowout loss to a lowly Cleveland Browns team on Sunday. Not only did Tagovailoa complete a season-low 52.2 percent of his passes, but he also failed to throw a single touchdown while racking up a whopping three interceptions in the process.
Amazingly, Sunday also marked the second game in a row where Tagovailoa has thrown a trio of interceptions. He didn’t play all that much better in Miami’s defeat at the hands of the Los Angeles Chargers earlier in the month, considering he threw just one touchdown.
McDaniel certainly shouldn’t be absolved of all blame for the Dolphins’ 1-6 start, as Miami simply hasn’t looked prepared to compete for much of this campaign. However, he ultimately can’t step on the field, and with how poorly Tagovailoa has been taking care of the ball all season, it’s justifiable for Newton to believe he’s the bigger scapegoat at this point.
Tagovailoa is desperate for a bounce-back game at this juncture, and he will try to play more like the great quarterback he’s been in seasons past when Miami takes on the Atlanta Falcons on Oct. 26. Fortunately for the quarterback, Atlanta lost its most recent game and has a mediocre record of just 3-3 this season, so the team stands out as a good squad for Tagovailoa to find his mojo against.
Here’s to hoping that Tagovailoa will make fans remember that he’s still highly talented with his showing on Oct. 26. It might seem like a long time ago since he’s ranked tops in the league in passing yards with the season he’s going through, but he accomplished such a feat in the 2023 campaign.
