Tua Tagovailoa said he’s “willing to play the odds” as he returns to practice this week with the Dolphins hoping for him to be ready to play on Sunday against the Cardinals after missing Miami’s last four games due to a concussion.
The Dolphins QB had suffered a scary concussion, the third of his NFL career, in Week 2 — prompting football pundits and fans alike to openly question whether Tagovailoa should return to football.
Tagovailoa was cleared by medical experts to return to the field and he told reporters on Monday that he had been free of any concussion symptoms the day after the Sept. 12 Thursday night game against the Bills.
Now returning to the field, he said that he needs to “be smart” going forward with his style of play.
“Just got to be smart,” Tagovailoa said. “My entire time playing football, I’ve been a competitor and that is or was sort of my edge when I would run from high school, even in college I would do the same thing. But it’s a professional setting; this is the professional level, the best of the best, you just cant be doing that. So definitely got to stay more available for the team, for the organization, for our guys.”
A number of former players called on Tagovailoa to retire after the latest concussion, but the QB said that he “wasn’t paying attention to any” of the outside noise and that stepping away from football was never a conversation he had with his family.
He told reporters that he had “some” conversations with his wife about coming back but nothing beyond that.
Tagovailoa’s history with concussions in the NFL occurred in 2022 when he was diagnosed with two concussions and a third instance that same year led to the NFL changing its policy on how concussions are reported.
While there is a risk associated with playing after having a concussion, Tagovailoa didn’t seem to be dissuaded by it.
“I think the brain is – there’s just a gray area when it comes to that,” he said. “If you do know that you’re going to get long-term disease from it, or if you’re not, I just think there’s a lot of gray with it. For me, this is what I love to do. This is what makes me happy and I’m going to do it, that’s it.”
And while he expressed appreciation for those that have expressed concern for him, Tagovailoa isn’t bothered by the risk, at one point saying that there’s plenty of risk in things that you do every day.
“Well, how much risk do we take when we get up in the morning to go drive to work?” Tagovailoa said. “Get into a car crash, I don’t know. Everything I think takes risk. So to answer that question, every time we all suit up, we’re all taking a risk that we could potentially get hurt, whether it’s a concussion, a broken bone, anything. You get up off of the bed the wrong way, you potentially could risk you spraining your ankle. There’s just risk in any and everything and I’m willing to play the odds, that’s it.”
