compete with Penix for the starting job<\/a>, Falcons general manager Ian Cunningham said earlier this month after signing Tagovailoa to a one-year, $1.2 million deal.<\/p>\n\u201cEverybody, not just those two, is coming in to compete,\u201d Cunningham said. \u201cThere are no starters right now. We are excited to have Tua, but we\u2019re excited to have all the players we were able to get (in free agency).\u201d<\/p>\n
The Falcons are paying Tagovailoa the league minimum because the Dolphins will be paying him more than $50 million this season to satisfy the guarantees of a massive 2024 contract extension he signed.<\/p>\n
Miami gave the Hawaii native a four-year deal worth a potential $212.4 million after a 2023 season in which he passed for a career-high 4,624 yards and 29 touchdowns and finished third in the league in EPA per dropback (0.15). However, Tagovailoa is 12-13 as a starter in the last two years, and he finished 30th in the league in EPA per dropback (minus-0.01) and threw a career-worst 15 interceptions last season. The Dolphins accrued $99 million in a dead cap hit by releasing Tagovailoa.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy play wasn\u2019t up to the standard of the way I\u2019ve been playing football,\u201d he said. \u201cJust got to play better football. There\u2019s no way to sugarcoat that.\u201d<\/p>\n
Tagovailoa made headlines in October after publicly voicing his frustrations about Dolphins teammates not showing up for players-only meetings. He later apologized for those comments, which then-Miami head coach Mike McDaniel called \u201cmisguided.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Falcons also plan to sign veteran free-agent quarterback Trevor Siemian, who is 15-18 in 33 career starts with the Broncos, Jets, Saints and Bears, according to ESPN\u2019s Jeremy Fowler, and running back Brian Robinson Jr., who has 2,729 yards and 17 touchdowns in four seasons spent in Washington and San Francisco, according to a team source.<\/p>\n
The potential of Atlanta\u2019s offense is one of the reasons Tagovailoa chose the team in free agency, he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou\u2019ve got a good line, you\u2019ve got Kyle Pitts, you\u2019ve got Bijan Robinson, you\u2019ve got Drake London. I\u2019m excited to be able to use those weapons in OTAs and be able to work with these guys,\u201d he said. \u201cI got to spend some time talking with (offensive coordinator Tommy Rees and head coach Kevin Stefanski) about the offense. They have shared some things that it won\u2019t be as adamant as the way we would motion in Miami. There is going to be a reason for everything we do.\u201d<\/p>\n
Tagovailoa has missed eight games in the last four seasons due to concussions and has suffered four documented concussions, one at the University of Alabama and three in the NFL. But he said Tuesday that he\u2019s comfortable with his current health.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe game of football will always entail physicality,\u201d he said. \u201cYou can never foreshadow what the future is going to look like in terms of your health, whether it\u2019s an ankle, a hand injury or a concussion. In terms of health, I went through all the protocols of what I needed to do for the Falcons, and everything came out good.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou either love it, or you don\u2019t. You either love the game, or you don\u2019t. You know the challenges that are ahead in terms of playing the sport with injuries.\u201d<\/p>\n
Tagovailoa declined to predict what his future with the Falcons might hold beyond the 2026 season.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe best thing for me right now is making the best of this opportunity that I have with the team in terms of the relationships I make with these guys,\u201d he said. \u201cI get to freaking play football. This is what I dreamed of my entire life. I am going to be present. I\u2019m going to be in the moment. I\u2019m going to be where my feet are.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"New Atlanta Falcons quarterback Tua Tagovailoa hopes he can provide a veteran voice to help Michael Penix Jr.,…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":679143,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[43],"tags":[6328,1318,9003,1317,1315,1316,1232,62,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-679142","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ncaa-football","8":"tag-atlanta-falcons","9":"tag-football","10":"tag-miami-dolphins","11":"tag-ncaa","12":"tag-ncaa-football","13":"tag-ncaafootball","14":"tag-nfl","15":"tag-sports","16":"tag-united-states","17":"tag-unitedstates","18":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/116286110236751655","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/679142","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=679142"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/679142\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/679143"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=679142"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=679142"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=679142"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}