Dolphins Notebook: X and the Top 100, Tua Thoughts, Sam Sounds, and More

After not getting the chance to play in a preseason game as a rookie, Tua Tagovailoa clearly has taken advantage of his opportunities so far this summer against the Chicago Bears and Atlanta Falcons.

The Miami Dolphins quarterback's performances have been really encouraging in terms of what it could mean for the 2021 regular season.

In fact, Tagovailoa has been busy checking off boxes of what any Dolphins fans would want to see at this time, though we also have to caution that nothing will present a test like the regular season.

That's down the line, though, and up to this point everything we've seen from Tua in the preseason should offer great optimism he indeed could be in line for a big jump in his second season.

But that's because of everything he's shown since the start of camp, and not because he lit up the Atlanta defense Saturday night because, quite frankly, that was a group of Falcons backups he was facing, a group that clearly didn't game-plan very much to defend what the Dolphins do best.

SI national NFL reporter Albert Breer discussed Tagovailoa's progress in his Monday Morning Quarterback Column, and it's difficult to find anything not on the mark about it.

While we’re on the second-year quarterbacks, I really like what I saw from Tua Tagovailoa on Saturday, and that’s after last year made me a skeptic of his, Breer wrote. The reason? In 2020, I thought the rockiness of his adjustment to the NFL, without the talent around him that he had at Bama, was glaring. He looked small. His arm ordinary. His athleticism seemed borderline. And maybe — just maybe — it was a matter of having an offense built for him. Or at least that was the hope I thought you could take away from how he played in going 16-of-23 for 183 yards and a touchdown in a half against the Falcons. What I saw was Tagovailoa is playing the kind of instinctive, explosive game that was his calling card at Alabama. And it felt to me that was coordinators George Godsey and Eric Studesville working to get the ball out of hands quicker, and play off more RPO and play-action looks, the kinds he thrived on in the SEC.

Now, that doesn’t necessarily mean it’ll translate cleanly into the regular season. The Falcons sat 23 players on Saturday night, so the Dolphins’ first offense was doing this against a lot of bubble players for Atlanta. And, of course, the Falcons weren’t game-planning for Tagovailoa and picking at his weaknesses. So Week 1 against the Patriots will be a much better gauge of where he is. But at least on Saturday, I thought Tua looked more like Alabama Tua than at any other point previous. Which is good.

Speaking of Godsey, he joined the other Dolphins assistant coaches in speaking to the media Monday, and during the course of his session he said three times what he has seen as the biggest improvement with Tagovailoa.

Communication.

“I’d say the biggest thing that we’ve noticed is the communication from quarterback to each position group," Godsey said. "We think that there’s got to be very fluid conversations within our unit, offensive line, quarterback, quarterback-tight end, quarterback-receiver and backs. We utilize the backs a bunch of different ways along with the tight ends. He’s made strides from that perspective and it’s not easy to do all the time and point out when you’re right or when you’re wrong and that’s what we asked him to do at the start of camp and he’s done a good job at it and that’s what has enhanced his play-to-play efficiency.”

XAVIEN HOWARD AND THE TOP 100

As we figured after the Dolphins were shut out of the top 60 players revealed on the NFL Network's Top 100 for 2021, Miami ended up with only one player on the list: cornerback Xavien Howard.

Howard came in at number 17 on the list, put together through a survey of NFL players, but more importantly as the second-highest-ranked cornerback behind only the Rams' Jalen Ramsey.

We certainly could quibble with that conclusion considering Howard got the most votes for NFL Defensive Player of the Year honors in 2020 among cornerbacks, though that came mostly as a result of Howard's 10 interceptions. It should be noted that Ramsey allowed a lower completion percentage when targeted last season and he was the other cornerback on the AP All-Pro first team alongside Howard, so it's not like putting him ahead of Howard on the Top 100 list is outrageous.

Maybe a bigger issue was the fact the Dolphins did have only that one representative coming off a year when they were 10-6. If you do the math, 100 players among 32 teams means the average for each team is about three players.

So why did the Dolphins end up with only one? Well, it certainly would speak well of the coaching job Brian Flores did in 2020 — and it absolutely should be clear by now that the man can coach.

If we're looking at the biggest Dolphins snubs, the places to go clearly would be linebacker Jerome Baker and defensive end Emmanuel Ogbah. Baker quietly had himself a great 2020 when he was one of only two players in the entire league with at least 100 tackles and seven sacks, while Ogbah had nine sacks.

Jason Sanders was the best kicker in the NFL last season, but no kicker made the Top 100 — not surprisingly.

SOUNDS OF SAM

It was a pretty neat coincidence that linebacker Sam Eguavoen ended up being mic'ed Saturday night when he had the game of his life — yes, it was in the preseason — with four sacks and a safety in the 37-17 victory.

"The thing is, I'm mic'd up so that's gonna be crazy if they put it out." - @SamEguavoen13#FinsUp x @Publix
Next 🆙 >> #MIAvsCIN on 8.29 pic.twitter.com/N4XFHGF5xi
— Miami Dolphins (@MiamiDolphins) August 22, 2021

Eguavoen said Saturday night he had never had four sacks in a game.

As we mentioned after the game, it was the most by an NFL player in a preseason game since at least 2017 and the most by a Dolphins player since 2002 when Adewale Ogunleye had four against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.

QUITE A NIGHT FOR QUEIROZ

While he didn't get four sacks, it also was a memorable night for Brazilian native Durval Queiroz Neto, who fulfilled his dream of playing in an NFL game.

Sure, it was only a preseason game, but that didn't matter. And, yes, Queiroz Neto had actually gotten in on one snap in 2019, though that was for one kneel-down at the end of a victory against the New Orleans Saints.

This was different. This was meaningful.

And Queiroz most definitely relished the occasion.

This is what he tweeted in his native Portuguese, translated to English via Google: "I never did it just for me. I've been training for 4 years without playing a game, 4 years that I didn't do what I lvoe the most in life ... and you can't imagine what it means for me to have entered that field. God promised and honored me...because that's how he works."

Nunca fiz isso só por mim. 🇧🇷
Faz 4 anos que tenho treinado sem jogar um jogo se quer, 4 anos que eu não fazia o que eu mais amo na vida… e vocês não imaginam o que isso significa para min ter entrado naquele campo.
Deus me prometeu e me honrou.. pois é assim que ele trabalha. pic.twitter.com/AzEQ3LCOae
— Durval Queiroz Neto (@durval_queiroz) August 22, 2021