And back for good in 2020, I suspect.

 

Yes...I think we finish the season with him as our quarterback.

 

Zero excitement about this game now.

 

If you're asking me if there is more buzz around a Dolphins game when Tua is starting rather than Fitzpatrick, then yes.

 

I don’t think Flores believes in Tua. I think Tua’s bogus “injury” is going to linger for the rest of the season.

 

You guys are way too down on Tua, a rookie who has started only 4 games, had one great game, had a total crap game, and two others so-so. Seriously, if that's all it takes to be down on a rookie I'm happy you're not the HC.

Anyway, I'll make a prediction that the prediction some of you are making that Fitz is our QB for the rest of the year will turn out to be wrong. Flores I'm pretty sure thinks Tua is our QB for the future, and it's hard to imagine sitting such a QB for the rest of the year if you think that way. We'll see.

 

That evaluation after 4 games is fascinating.

 

I fully expect Tua back against Cincinnati at home.

 

Not a good sign though, that he is already injured again.

 

He practiced all week.

 

Does Joe Burrow suck now? He ripped his knee into shreds what a bum!

Tua struggled on the road last week. He's not 100% healthy. They're playing the 0-10 Jets, even Fitzpatrick can't screw this up. I think.

 

Think about it from Flores's perspective. What are the pros and cons of playing Fitzpatrick versus Tua for the rest of 2020?

If Flores makes the playoffs in year two of this massive rebuild, he looks like a genius, and there's nobody who will criticize him for not playing Tua for longer during Tua's rookie season. Lots of rookie QBs don't play at all during their rookie seasons, and no one will make the argument, at least not right away, that it hurt Tua's development to sit for the rest of the year.

If on the other hand he starts Tua, he becomes less likely to make the playoffs (perhaps far less likely), and what does that get him? There is no feather in his cap to be earned from getting Tua six more games of experience during his rookie season. It's not like those six games make Tua's performance in 2021 likely to be far better than it would've been otherwise. Those six games are of questionable value for both the player and the team.

So what exactly does Flores get from playing Tua the rest of the year? Not much in my opinion. Six games of experience whose value for the player and for the team is arguable, versus a much greater likelihood of making the playoffs, whose value in terms of Flores's career is unquestionable.

 

Pros to playing Tua? He's the only QB on this team that could be considered a serious candidate for future franchise QB (certainly not Fitz), and you'd rather see what you have in Tua this year while we have a lot of picks next year instead of sitting him and not finding out till much later. Furthermore, who said game experience is bad? It's not a priori the case that you're better off sitting. Coach should know best for that one (hopefully).

As far as the chance of making the playoffs? It's not obvious it's higher with Fitz. Remember the key Fitz statistic: out of 12 years he has started 6 or more games only ONCE has he led his team to a winning record. Tua at least won one game (Arizona) that Fitz would have lost. So this assumption that Fitz increases playoff probability is hard to make unless you focus only on Tua's bad performance at Denver, in which case we should cherry pick Fitztragic games too. And before you decide to use Tua stats, note that none of them are reliable at this stage with the tiny sample size we have.

No I don't see how we'd be better off sitting Tua. We need to know what we have, game experience is a good thing (as long as the QB isn't getting systematically killed), and it's not clear making the playoffs is more likely with Fitz anyway.

 

When Fitz throws for 8 interceptions in three weeks, we will miss the playoffs

 

Just got through telling you that sample size with Tua is too small to make much of anything. But if you're going to ignore that, why not quote the statistic FAR more correlated with winning: Tua's passer rating = 100.1, Fitz's rating = 92.2.

Tua's rating has too large a confidence interval (it's too uncertain) due to having only 97 attempts, but Fitz's rating is with 215 and is quite a bit more reliable, and guess what? 92.2 = slightly below league average (which is 94.2 right now). And you think a QB with a slightly below average rating is more likely to help us make the playoffs and win? Yeah right.

 

I hope it‘s nothing, but that (injury) is my biggest concern with him.

 

Even though I believe Fitz is the better QB by a lot at this point, I also think you have to play Tua if hes healthy now to see what he can do.

 

Right, your analysis is based off of primarily one game, namely Tua's worst game. It's like you've forgotten the Arizona game. Did that not happen? Fitz gives them a better chance to win against Denver, but he would have lost the Arizona game. So where's this compelling argument that Fitz is better for winning? I don't see it.

Also, while it's true Tua has been lucky, luck counts. Ultimately it happens to everyone, just so in bunches at the outset of Tua's career. Meanwhile, Fitz's mistakes are legendary to the point they have a NAME for them: Fitztragic. So Fitz isn't winning any battle of "not making mistakes" or "not throwing INT's" either. Problem with Fitz is his mistakes so often LOSE games for you. Tua hasn't yet had a mistake like Fitz has that LOST a game. Luck or not, that counts.

 

It's not a dropped INT when the ball whizzes untouched through a defenders hands and completed to a receiver.

Problem is the other team actually catches Fitzpatrick's passes.

 

Well that we can agree on. If Tua fails we're once again in a 3-4 year cycle to get the next guy = typical Dolphins. Just don't think that's the case anymore. This is the first time in 2 decades the Dolphins did what I wanted at QB. Doesn't mean it's clear Tua is the answer, but at least they got the guy I wanted. We'll see, I also hope I'm right lol.

 

I dont disagree that it's too early to make a determination that he absolutely cant play, but you really seem to be justifying a lot of poor play as well.

I couldnt agree less with the idea that luck counts in evaluating a player. If I'm looking to draft someone I dont go "He makes bad decisions consistently, but they tend to work out somehow through sheer luck, I need this guy!"

I'm not saying that is Tua at this point, I just want to make it clear that luck has no place in talent evaluation.

 

It counts because there's no way of quantifying "luck" in an objective way. We can all see obvious cases on film, though it's also obvious many disagree on what's "obvious". But in the end as sample size increases all that tends to wash away (average out) and the stats really do become fairly predictive of win% (e.g., passer rating, which includes "luck" plays like a WR doing almost all the work to get a TD, or a freak INT or so, or an INT that wasn't, etc.).

That's why luck counts. Over time that stuff averages out. We just don't have sufficient sample size for Tua to use stats-based analysis, but we will if the posters here predicting Tua is done are incorrect (another reason to hope they're wrong lol).

 

You just made my point.

You dont have enough data to analyze him properly, therefore we need to be looking at the decisions he has made and not the end result.

 

There were plenty of dropped Fitzpatrick interceptions

 

I did that and said from the outset we can't use Tua stats yet. It's only when others used stats that I pointed out "luck" counts because you can't operationally define "luck". It counts. But yes, right now you go with what you see, and I think we can agree Fitz would not have won that Arizona game even if he might have won the Denver game. Can't ignore Arizona in this evaluation. So where's the compelling case that Fitz is increasing the probability of winning?

 

Good point lol

 

I dont agree that Fitz necessarily wouldnt have. You cant point to any individual plays because the play calls would be entirely different.

Is your insinuation that its impossible for Fitzpatrick to score that many points? Not just unlikely but impossible?

 

Well sure we don't know with certainty, but I've never seen Fitz play a game like Tua's Arizona game. I mean if we're playing Devil's advocate, how do we really know that Tua wouldn't have suddenly lit it up against Denver had he not been pulled (I'm not saying I believe this at all.. just making a point)? That kind of thinking doesn't go far.

No, being realistic, Fitz would have lost against Arizona and we'd probably be 3-1 regardless of Tua or Fitz in our last 4.

 

That's my point, that you were making a claim that cant be known to be accurate.


My other main issue though is the luck idea. Doesnt it actually work against your position?

If you accept that:

A) He has been lucky
&
B) Luck evens out

Then you sort of have to accept that his current good luck play is unsustainable. It doesnt seem like a good narrative for your position to say luck counts.

 

But that's also true for all the arguments everyone else is making about which QB would be better going forward. Not really singling out my argument at that point.

For the INT's that weren't that probably is true. Tua throwing passes that "look" like high probability INT's will probably catch up to him. But who's to say Tua isn't going to improve to the point that the baseline level of ability increases and the probability of throwing INT's decreases? At least with Tua you can expect improvement. Not with Fitz. The effect of averaging out could easily be swamped by improvement in the ability of the QB.

 

I've already said that I believe going back to Tua is the right thing to do. I just dont believe he is -currently- the better QB to win on a weekly basis if that was the lone factor, it just isnt.

 

I know you’re talking about his future but I haven’t seen anything out of Tua yet that makes me think he’s a franchise QB. I hope he develops and I’m dead wrong.