BY ADAM GREENE<\/p>\n
While we throw around the word \u201cbattle\u201d a lot discussing these training camp competitions, sometimes there\u2019s not much \u201cbattle\u201d to them. Reality has to take hold at some point and a head coach needs to make a decision that will help his team in the future, while maybe sacrificing games in the present.<\/p>\n
Such is the case with our next match up\u2026<\/p>\n
RYAN<\/strong> FITZPATRICK vs TUA TAGOVAILOA <\/strong> The Dolphins opened up last season with the simple plan to tank their season in hopes of landing Tua Tagovailoa in April\u2019s NFL Draft. To do that, they had a fire sale of past high draft picks and star players, picking up multiple first round selections in the process with which to build the new team around their rookie quarterback.<\/p>\n Only something happened that no one expected. Miami was bad, but not as bad as they tried to be. More than that, the head coach they hired, Brian Flores, was not only the right man for the job, but did one of the best coaching jobs in the league. The Dolphins had a 1-15 roster, but Flores willed them to five wins, which should have sank any hopes they had of landing the draft\u2019s top quarterback.<\/p>\n But something else crazy happened too. \u201cTanking for Tua\u201d didn\u2019t have to result in the draft\u2019s first round pick because Tagovailoa was jumped in the draft order after an historic season from Joe Burrow, who not only pocketed the Heisman Trophy, but hoisted the National Championship hardware as well.<\/p>\n As the poet Robert Burns once wrote, \u201cthe best laid schemes o\u2019 mice an\u2019 men gang aft agley.\u201d In this case, the Dolphins plans didn\u2019t gang agley at all. With Burrow going No. 1 to the Cincinnati Bengals their guy, the man they\u2019d wanted from the start, fell right to them at selection No. 5. They had failed in tanking, sure, but they\u2019d landed Tua anyway.<\/p>\n So then why is Tagovailoa, the potential franchise quarterback, in a battle at all? Because the guy Miami already has on the roster, Ryan Fitzpatrick, will be impossible for the rookie to fairly beat out in training camp. As good as Tua is, it\u2019s just not going to happen.<\/p>\n Fitzpatrick is arguably the best back up quarterback in the league. He\u2019s so good, in fact, that he\u2019s cost wobbly starters jobs for years. He\u2019s a smart guy, can pick up any system quickly and talented. There\u2019s a reason he\u2019s kept a job in the league for the last 16 years. He\u2019s started 139 games and thrown for 32,886 yards and 210 touchdowns.<\/p>\n With this weird offseason and no rookie camp, mini camps, OTAs or preseason games, there\u2019s just no way Tagovailoa will be able to legitimately knock Fitzpatrick out of the QB1 slot in any fair competition.<\/p>\n So I say don\u2019t make it fair. Flores is in no danger of getting fired this season. His job is secure, so a couple of meaningless victories with Fitzpatrick gain him nothing. But putting Tagovailoa out there, gaining experience and winning over the locker room, will pay dividends in the future. And if Flores is as good a coach as he seemed to be last year, that future could be closer than most people think.<\/p>\n Follow our BetOnline Twitter accoun<\/a>t for the latest sports news and betting odds, and stay tuned on the Instagram feed<\/a> for more good information too.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" BY ADAM GREENE While we throw around the word \u201cbattle\u201d a lot discussing these training camp competitions, sometimes there\u2019s not…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":13,"featured_media":12913,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[129,1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12908","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-nfl","category-uncategorized"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.betonline.ag\/news-room\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12908","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.betonline.ag\/news-room\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.betonline.ag\/news-room\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.betonline.ag\/news-room\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/13"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.betonline.ag\/news-room\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12908"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.betonline.ag\/news-room\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12908\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12912,"href":"https:\/\/www.betonline.ag\/news-room\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12908\/revisions\/12912"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.betonline.ag\/news-room\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12913"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.betonline.ag\/news-room\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12908"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.betonline.ag\/news-room\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12908"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.betonline.ag\/news-room\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12908"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nMIAMI<\/em><\/strong> DOLPHINS<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n