Tua: 'Today Felt Like a First Day'
LAKE FOREST, Illinois — This week is bringing new experiences for quarterback Tua Tagovailoa, and so far so good.
The Miami Dolphins starter described his thoughts after the first of two joint practices with the Chicago Bears on Wednesday, both in terms of the benefits from those workouts as well as looking ahead to his first NFL preseason game Saturday at Soldier Field.
“Well, it’s a first," Tua said in a corner of the Walter Payton Center, the Bears' inside practice facility at Halas Hall. "This is my first joint practice. The rookie class last year, this is a lot of our first joint practices. I’m looking forward to it. I think it’s cool. Last year was a little weird for everyone but competing with your guys and not being introduced to what a game-like scenario would feel like, and just kind of being into a game, that first year — although I didn’t play — was kind of different.”
Tagovailoa had himself a solid day overall against the Bears defense Wednesday, though he was right on target on his first couple of throws and looked ahead for a monster practice until the team on the other side had something to say about it.
“Yeah. I think this defense is really good up front," Tagovailoa said. "When you’re hitting your back foot on your throws, they’re right there and kind of in your face area. But that forces us, as quarterbacks, to kind of move the way we need to, and it simulates game-like pocket presence for us. I thought it was really good today. We’ll take a look at the film. We’ll try to correct a lot of the things that we didn’t do well today and we’ll come out tomorrow and hopefully it’s a better one.”
Tua spread the ball around to his receivers Wednesday, with Mack Hollins, Jakeem Grant and former Alabama teammate Jaylen Waddle all getting their shots downfield.
There were no touchdown passes, outside of passing drills without linemen that began near the end zone, and Tua was not intercepted.
It was, all in all, another good step in his development as he heads toward his second regular season.
“I think today felt like a first day type of practice," Tua said. "It’s a new environment, new guys, new faces. It was just good to be able to go out there with all of the guys and work out the timing with them against how these DBs play, and then where to find the areas in their zone that we can kind of get going.”
Tua took advantage of the joint practice to meet Bears rookie quarterback Justin Fields, who like himself was a first-round pick with high expectations.
As this point, Tua obviously is further ahead because of his NFL experience.
Tua was asked Wednesday just how much further ahead he is than at this time last year.
“Big picture question," Tua said with a smile. "I think it’s hard to look at the big picture when you’re just dialed in on what we’ve got to do to accomplish what we want right now. So for me, it’s really just going back to the film room, going back to the drawing board and kind of sitting down with our coaches, sitting down with the offense and the team and kind of talking through what we saw today and kind of get better from there so tomorrow is a lot smoother and we’re dialed in a lot more tomorrow.”
