During the Miami Dolphins' prolific year of offense in 2023, they had three drives with at least 14 plays. On Sunday, they matched that total in a single afternoon. During a 34-19 win against the Las Vegas Raiders, the Dolphins put together a pair of 14-play drives along with a 16-play drive that was the longest for the team since Mike McDaniel was hired in 2022. It wasn't an aberration either. In the six games Tua Tagovailoa has started this season, Miami has put together 16 drives with at least 10 plays. In the absence of big plays from Tyreek Hill, Jaylen Waddle, and De'Von Achane, the Dolphins have found a new identity as a team willing to methodically grind away at its opponents. "When you have some offensive production, or sustained offensive production, specifically with last year ... you’re going to get offseason attention and people are going to have a different plan for you," McDaniel said Monday. "You have to adjust to what is being presented to you and people have different plans of actions. "Once people put two-high conservative and/or two-man coverages against your offense -- until you’re able to take advantage of that through the quarterback extending plays or throwing shorter to space and staying efficient and maximizing those gains with YAC -- until you prove that you’re able to execute and have games like that where you don’t punt the ball, you’re going to get that type of defense." Will the Dolphins' recent success with lengthy, mistake-free drives force defenses to rethink their approach to stopping Tua Tagovailoa and co.? It remains to be seen. But McDaniel is hopeful that Miami is learning lessons that will pay dividends down the stretch. In 2023, the Dolphins offense faded in the final weeks of the season. After averaging 31.5 points and 414.1 yards in the first 15 weeks, Miami managed just 18.3 points and 341.7 yards per game in the last three. A 26-7 loss to the Kansas City Chiefs in the playoffs followed. "Something that we’ve been talking about since the start of the offseason in conjunction with forecasting how do we win elimination games? How do you win down the stretch of the season?" McDaniel said. "Something that has been on the forefront of our guys’ minds in terms of we're finding different ways to execute and move the ball down the field and score points, and I think that’s an important part of the process when you’re talking about a winning formula for big games and elimination games in particular, which is what we’re trying to grow to."
The big plays are great and entertaining to watch but it's just not sustainable every game all season. We burned out before the final stretch of the season two years in a row. One or two big plays a game would still be nice to see though.
It appears this offense is starting to get in sync. If the critical turnovers are eliminated I can see them scoring 24-31 every game and that puts us on average in the top tier of teams.
So Tua goes from leading the league in passing with not only with one of the highest YPA in the game but theee fastest release time in the game the math on those two numbers last two years have been unprecedented, pure talent it takes to accomplish that. then he got fat. Literally and that wasn’t gonna be enough to win a ring. so he loses 20 lbs and now is putting up some efficiency numbers with 3 and 4th down conversion numbers that is leading the league with the highest completion percentage in the league. Amazing what losing 20 lbs can do for you as a pro athlete, as projected that added quickness and nobility has made him into what he lacked since entering, the game manager. game manager means to me is the ability to convert down and distance relative to game situation. He’s now doing this at the highest level. Pretty unique qb who now realizes he must use his legs to win. it’s about time Tua damn it.Thank you.
That high completion percentage is partly due to shorter passing attempts. Tua was #1 in Y/A in 2022 and #2 in Y/A in 2023. This year he's #11. And Y/A has a higher correlation (0.55) to win% than completion% (0.44) so it's actually a more important statistic. Tua's doing well — his 101.5 rating is basically the same as last year — but at least so far one can't really claim he's a more productive QB (statistically) than when he was heavier, especially since he ended up starting all 17 games last year.
