How Tua Reacted to X Comments

Tua Tagovailoa said he wasn't aware of former Miami Dolphins teammate Xavien Howard's "panic" comments, but he had a response for it Wednesday.

During his weekly media session, Tagovailoa rejected the idea he can't succeed if opponents take away his first read.

"I think if you look at the games where I have performed and done well," Tua said, "it's when I'm also getting off of my first read and progressing, or going through the progressions, kind of like what my feed is telling me, so playing in that sense."

Tagovailoa did not perform well in the 33-8 loss against the Indianapolis Colts, completing 14 of 23 passes for 114 yards with one touchdown and two interceptions for a passer rating of 51.7, the lowest of his career in a full game.

The next day, Howard made his comments about Tua.

"We knew he gets the ball out pretty quick," Howard said, per the Colts' team website. "And once we take away his first read, I feel like it's panic mode after that. And it showed (Sunday). We took away his first read, and he was trying to get rid of the ball real quick."

Howard also said that the team was purposely "clogging the middle," which led to the two interceptions.

"We knew it was a lot of...quick throws in the middle," Howard said. "So I told them to clog the middle and make sure they throw the ball outside. And we clogged the middle and made – I think we got two interceptions by clogging the middle."

Tagovailoa said Wednesday that he chatted with Howard after the game Sunday, but the conversation was about catching up.

"It was just saying 'hi' to an old friend," Tua said. "I mean, I got to see him after the game, got to talk to him a little bit during the game as well."

Regardless of the comments made by Howard, Tagovailoa and the Dolphins need to find an answer in Week 2 against the New England Patriots.

Tagovailoa on What How the Dolphins Will Bounce Back

Tagovailoa stated on Sunday following the loss that the team needed to come in and work.

On Wednesday, Tagovailoa revealed that he called a meeting with the offense following the loss and revealed the team was working through their "process" like he hoped to prepare for the Patriots.

"Well, I got the offense together, and we had a meeting about things that we wanted to do to hang our hats on this week, points of emphasis and how we want to go about it this week. So we got all of that communicated to those guys," he said.

Tagovailoa also said how "cool" it was to see the players he wanted to see in the film room preparing to right the ship.

"Yeah, no, I thought that was the cool thing, that was their process going into week one, win, lose," he said. ""Like you got to see a lot of the same guys, you know, back in the film room, back in the meeting rooms."

Tagovailoa is preaching fundamentals and getting back to what the Dolphins know best, and that is to ensure that having a good practice doesn't mean anything if they are not prepared.

"I think we did a really good job out there at practice, but at the end of the day, you can have the best practice, you can have the worst practice, regardless of those, it won't guarantee you a win," he said. "So we got to come prepared."

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