So maybe Tua Tagovailoa isn’t the only one holding back the 2025 Dolphins. And maybe Quinn Ewers isn’t the answer for 2026, either.
Hours after media reports indicated that Tagovailoa would be gone from the roster for the 2026 season while head coach Mike McDaniel would remain, the Dolphins suffered one of their worst defeats of the year. Cincinnati dragged Miami up and down the field, scoring 35 consecutive points en route to an easy 45-21 victory.
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Tagovailoa, never the most consistent player in the NFL, has spiraled inexorably downward this season. He leads the league in interceptions with 15, he’s posting a career-low quarterback rating, and he’s regressed in virtually every statistical category.
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As a result, earlier this past week, McDaniel demoted Tagovailoa to third-string emergency quarterback and promoted Ewers, the rookie who led Texas to back-to-back CFP berths, to the starting role. That apparently didn’t go over well with Zach Wilson, Miami’s third quarterback, but McDaniel said he believed Ewers gave Miami the best chance to win.
Head coach Mike McDaniel rode with Quinn Ewers against the Bengals on Sunday and it didn’t go well for Miami. (Photo by Megan Briggs/Getty Images)
(Megan Briggs via Getty Images)
“I’m looking for conviction in quarterback play,” McDaniel said earlier this past week. “Given that he’s a rookie, I think he’ll play the position most convicted. … I needed more conviction from the quarterback.”
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Pretty much the entire Dolphins team needed to be convicted — and jailed — after Sunday’s game. For most of the first two quarters, Miami hung with Cincinnati, buoyed by Devon Achane’s 48-yard touchdown run. With 2:30 left in the first half, Miami held a 14-10 lead.
But then it got ugly fast, and for a long, long time. Joe Burrow led the Bengals to five consecutive touchdowns. Ewers and the Dolphins turned the ball over on three of the first four possessions of the second half, and the Bengals turned every one of them into seven points.
Ewers, a seventh-round draft selection, finished the day with a heavily garbage-time-inflated 260 yards passing on 20 of 30 attempts, with no touchdowns and two interceptions. It’s unfair to make any kind of judgment on his fitness for the job after only a few days of working with the starters in practice, but Ewers understandably has a long way to go in order to stake his claim on a starting job.
Sunday’s loss to the Bengals was yet another turn in Miami’s wild 2025 season. After starting the season 1-6, with that lone win coming against the even more hapless Jets, McDaniel’s tenure in Miami seemed measurable in minutes. But then the Dolphins ran off five wins in six games, including a 30-13 victory over the Bills that ranks as one of the year’s most improbable victories. Suddenly, the Dolphins were on the fringes of the playoff conversation, and McDaniel was back on solid ground.
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Tagovailoa continued to struggle, however, forcing McDaniel’s hand. And now the Dolphins themselves have a real problem. Tagovailoa is one of the highest-paid quarterbacks in the league, and still has three years remaining on a contract that pays him in excess of $53 million a year. The numbers are, as always, complex, but if the Dolphins were to cut Tagovailoa after this season, they’d suffer an astounding dead cap hit of $99 million. Many decisions, few clear answers for Miami ahead.