Tua Tagovailoa couldn’t reset the quarterback market because he’s Tua Tagovailoa

Tua Tagovailoa will remain a Miami Dolphin.

The fifth year quarterback was headed into the final season of his rookie contract, leaving him in line for free agency — or a franchise tag showdown — with the team that drafted him. Instead of dealing with that headache, the Dolphins locked down 2023’s passing yard leader…

For about $63 million less than the Jacksonville Jaguars gave Trevor Lawrence.

Tagovailoa and Miami came to an agreement Friday that will pay the Pro Bowl quarterback $212.4 million over four years with $167 million guaranteed. Those are big numbers for a player who has never won a playoff game from a franchise that hasn’t won one since Dave Wannstedt was an NFL head coach. It’s also fewer years and less money than similar quarterbacks have gotten recently.

Tua Tagovailoa is signing a four-year, $212.4 million extension, per @AthletesFirst. pic.twitter.com/bVgj0q3gsO

— Adam Schefter (@AdamSchefter) July 26, 2024

Most young quarterbacks with Pro Bowl credentials reset the quarterback price structure with their post-rookie contract extensions. Josh Allen’s $150 million guaranteed in a 2021 extension set a record at the time. Patrick Mahomes’ $450 million deal with the Kansas City Chiefs in 2020 still stands as the largest overall value ever handed out in a single contract.

This honor extends to promising quarterbacks who have been merely OK. Kyler Murray’s near-$160 million guaranteed in 2022 was a record for any quarterback who hadn’t been traded (third most behind Deshaun Watson, who had been accused of more than 20 accounts of sexual misconduct and what the NFL described as “predatory behavior” and Russell Wilson, which, oops on both counts). He’d had exactly one winning season to his credit at that point. Justin Herbert had never won a postseason game (and had failed pretty notably in his one appearance) but still signed a 2023 contract with more overall cash at the time than everyone but Mahomes and Joe Burrow.

The point is, promising young quarterbacks sign massive, five-year deals when their rookie contracts start to age regardless of postseason success. And yet, here’s where Tagovailoa’s contract money ranks among all NFL quarterbacks as the 2024 season looms.

Patrick Mahomes, $450 million
Joe Burrow, $275m
Trevor Lawrence, $275m
Justin Herbert, $262.5m
Lamar Jackson, $260m
Josh Allen, $258m
Jalen Hurts, $255m
Kyler Murray, $230.5m
Deshaun Watson, $230m
Tua Tagovailoa, $212.4m

He’ll likely slide out of the top 10 once Jordan Love comes to an extension with the Green Bay Packers. If you want to just look at guaranteed money, he’s in eighth place, behind Jared Goff.

But Tagovailoa’s annual salary slots him in third place behind Burrow and Lawrence at $53.1 million — an extra $100k annually more than Goff, which shows you the compromise here. Tagovailoa likely wanted the market resetting (or matching) deal Lawrence got. The Dolphins were willing to pay him like a found money veteran as long as they could mitigate the risk of a five-year deal. As a result, Tagovailoa got more than the Lions quarterback but took a year off the back end of his deal and got less guaranteed money in return.

This isn’t necessarily a bad thing. If Tagovailoa shines, he’ll be due for a market-resetting deal a year earlier, allowing him to cash in with a humongous five-season contract while he’s still in his late 20s. But the Dolphins clearly have at least a little doubt about whether he’ll get there, or else they would have tacked on that fifth year and boosted his guarantees over the $200 million threshold.

There’s logic to that. Hot starts have boosted the left-handed QB’s overall stats and given him an impressive 32-19 regular season record as a starter. Still, he’s been a bit of a mess as the season wears on. Per Pro Football Reference, here’s how Tagovailoa performs in each quarter of the season (well, quarter-plus for the back end now that we’ve got a 17-game schedule):

“Tua can’t play in the cold” is a tired narrative, but uh, yeah, he’s pretty bad late in the year. From Week 14 on, his passer rating drops more than 20 points from his regular season average and he throws nearly one interception per game. And while he has eight game-winning drives to his credit, he’s been inefficient when tasked with playing from behind against defenses keyed on stopping him.

If advanced stats are more your thing, here’s Tagovailoa’s rank when it comes to expected points added (EPA) and completion percentage over expected (CPOE) over Miami’s 9-3 start last fall:

via RBSDM.com and the author

And here’s where he landed in the Dolphins’ 2-4 finish:

via RBSDM.com and the author

These aren’t the numbers of a guy who can be the difference between a win and a loss in a tight situation. The Dolphins saw this, and it’s why Tagovailoa is only stupid rich instead of historically so. Signing an expensive, but below-market deal was a statement about Tagovailoa’s future.

Miami believes in him enough to give him a top three salary, but not enough to give him a top five contract. Which, given what we know about Tagovailoa’s game and Miami’s performance the last four years, feels about right.

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