Backup QB Battle Ongoing and Why It's Bad for the Dolphins

Head coach Mike McDaniel said no decision has been made between Zach Wilson and Quinn Ewers

Miami Dolphins quarterback Zach Wilson (0) warms up before the game against the Buffalo Bills at Highmark Stadium in Week 3. | Gregory Fisher-Imagn Images

Head coach Mike McDaniel did not tell the media Friday who won the Miami Dolphins backup quarterback competition between veteran free agent pickup Zach Wilson and rookie seventh-round pick Quinn Ewers as he had said he would at the beginning of the week.

McDaniel said the competition all week was close enough that he wanted to see how practice went Friday before making a final decision, which the media and fans now will not discover until Sunday morning before the team gets set to face the Atlanta Falcons at Mercedes-Benz Stadium.

"Both guys have really risen to the challenge," McDaniel said. "So it was their best week of practice, by far and made it competitive enough that I'm going to have to turn up the creativity and the competitive situation realm on today's practice just to have another day, have more tape and give guys an opportunity to hold on to that job for the foreseeable future. So we have some stuff set up today, and we'll be evaluating it closely."

Wilson, signed to a guaranteed one-year, $6 million contract in the offseason, served as the No. 2 quarterback for the first six games of the regular season before that changed for the game against the Cleveland Browns last Sunday, a switch that wasn't made until the day before the game.

WHAT IT MEANS

There are two possible explanations as to why the Dolphins turned to Ewers last week and could turn to him permanently as the top backup to Tua Tagovailoa, and neither necessarily is all that positive for Miami.

If it's a case of Ewers outperforming Wilson in practice in their limited reps — because Tagovailoa gets all the first-team reps — then it's a really bad look for the Dolphins for having signed Wilson to that guaranteed contract because it would validate the concerns that came with him all along, namely that the slow processing he showed with the New York Jets made him a bad fit for the Dolphins offense.

And remember that McDaniel made it a point to say that Wilson was the guy he had targeted from the start of free agency to serve as Tua's backup after Skylar Thompson, Tim Boyle and Tyler "Snoop" Huntley all came up way short last season.

Tua has remained healthy so far in 2025 — in terms of not having to miss snaps at least — so the Dolphins haven't needed their backup quarterback yet, but it wouldn't be ideal that they'd have to turn to a rookie seventh-round pick instead of their veteran free agent acquisition.

THE EWERS ANGLE

Where moving Ewers ahead of Wilson makes sense — the bad optics of the Wilson signing aside — is that Ewers figures, or should figure, in the team's plans moving forward.

And maybe it makes sense for the Dolphins to find out his viability as a potential backup quarterback, or more, by giving him some playing time if the need arises the rest of the season.

This, of course, suggests the focus shifting from strictly winning games to player evaluation.

That would seem odd for a head coach who appears on his way out and probably is more hyper-focused on the present than the future — unless he's confident he'll back in 2026.

Again, if it's a case where McDaniel feels more confident in Ewers than Wilson at this precise moment, in part because Ewers is a better scheme fit, then shame on the Dolphins for having signed Wilson in the first place.

Either way, having an open competition for the backup quarterback spot never is a healthy sign heading into Week 8 of any regular season, but it's a pretty good indication of where things stand with the 2025 Miami Dolphins.