Tua Says The Market Is The Market

Imagine going to work in the morning; you sit down in your office to sip your overpriced coffee, and your boss barges in to ask you to conduct a press conference. You ask about what? He says I need you to field questions about the contract extensions we have not offered you.

Welcome to the strange world of NFL contract extension negotiations.

Seriously, how hard is it for NFL executives to decide whether or not to resign a starting QB? The first question is, did he match or beat the true expectations we had for him this past year? Throwout winning a Super Bowl because only one guy gets to wear that ring, but did he make us a better team and at least give us a shot at making it to a Super Bowl?

Here are a few questions the Miami Dolphins executives should be asking themselves about Tua Tagovailoa:
Did Tua throw for over 4,600 yards last season? Yes.
Did we draft his replacement? No.
Is there any other available QB's who could learn to run our offense by September? No.
Should we give him a contract extension? Yes.
Should we give him a minimum of 3 years in the new deal? Yes.
Should we guarantee at least 80% of the deal? Yes.
Should we give him around $45 to $50 million annually? Yes.

Time and again, NFL teams think they can out-negotiate quarterbacks' agents, but ultimately, that seems to never really happen, especially for a high-profile quarterback. If a team really wants to save a few bucks, it is generally better to sign a quarterback sooner rather than later. Case in point: the Dolphins could have signed Tua for considerably less before Jarod Goff pulled off his $53 million deal to stay in Detriot.

Now that Goff has reset the market, Tagovailoa, who most consider at least at Goff's level, will likely not agree to anything short of $53 million a year. If the Dolphins had acted a few months ago, they could have saved a few bucks, so instead of waiting for the market to reset itself again, the Dolphins should move on from the chared that they have any other options and sign Tua already.

Here's what Tua said earlier in the day:
"I'll tell you one thing. The market is the market," Tua Tagovailoa said. "If we didn't have a market, none of that would matter. It would just be an organizational thing. It didn't matter if that guy got paid that, because it's up to the organization. That's what I would say. The market is the market. That's it"

“For people that talk about business is different than personal, sure, I can agree to some extent,” Tagovailoa said. “But who you are as a person for what you do business and personal, is who you are for how you do everything. And if not, if you can be two different people at once, then by all means, you can do that. But to me, that's just not how I am.”