Tua Tagovailoa’s fantasy impact on the Dolphins
Matt Harmon and Dalton Del Don react to the news out of Miami where the Dolphins have named Tua Tagovailoa the starter after the upcoming bye week. How will his emergence affect Myles Gaskin, Devonte Parker, and Preston Williams?
Video Transcript
MATT HARMON: What do you think this does to the offense from just a strictly fantasy point of view?
DALTON DEL DON: It's a definitely surprising decision, one that makes you think they had it all planned all along with the bye. Because--
MATT HARMON: Yes.
DALTON DEL DON: --not only is Miami just in the playoff discussion, their point differential's like tied for nearly third best in the conference with the Chiefs. I mean, plus 47, they-- they look good. And Fitzpatrick has played like a borderline top 10 QB. Even like the advance CPAE stats would suggest that.
But I mean, I hear you that's its forward thinking, Tua is the future. Pretty cool him soaking it in and sitting at midfield after getting his first action. It's really surprising to me. I personally would just kept Fitzpatrick and rolled this way.
Tua is a question mark now for DeVante Parker owners. Gesicki has been a big disappointment either way. But yeah, Parker, if I have a Parker manager, I'm upset that Tua's now replacing Fitz, no doubt.
MATT HARMON: Yeah, I think I agree with you, right? Like, this was my analysis coming into the year was that these two big tall, not separation based wide receivers on the outside, Preston Williams, DeVante Parker, like they would be great. And Preston Williams, after a slow start, has sort of kind of to heated up from a touchdown perspective at least. Parker has been pretty solid throughout.
Those guys are perfect fits for Ryan Fitzpatrick. And let's just be honest, like Ryan Fitzpatrick, whether he makes your team better, whatever, he makes your offense better from a fantasy perspective. There's pretty much no question about that. Like when he's on fire, your offense is on fire, your pass catchers are producing in fantasy.
Like no doubt about it, he's a-- he's great for fantasy football. I think Rich Hribar came on the podcast and called it the "Fitzpatrick Warhorse." and like that is basically what it is, man. He puts-- he puts it out there from a fantasy perspective.
I don't know that Tua's going to be that type of quarterback. I think Tua's more of an anticipatory, accurate, over the middle guy. That could be good news for a player like Mike Gesicki, who's been playing a ton of slot in this offense right now. I know some of the other tight ends have popped up just randomly scoring touchdowns, like Shaheen and Durham Smythe, all of that.
I do just think it's worth wondering what sort of effect Tua's going to have on those two perimeter wide receivers. I'm with you on that. It is interesting too, like not only-- you mentioned it, like their point differential's great. They're in a playoff hunt. Like they're not far behind Buffalo now that Buffalo's dropped two games in the AFC East.
Like Miami is ahead of the Patriots in the AFC East. They're 3-3. They're like right behind Buffalo.
They could very conceivably, if the Bills continue to hit some snags, like I don't-- I mean, the Bills playing on Sunday just totally different entity than the Bills playing on these random COVID adjusted games. The Dolphins could still conceivably win their division. They obviously see Tua as a guy that can help them do that.
MATT HARMON: Yeah, the Dolphins have the number five pass defense in DVOA, really crazy there. And that was with Byron Jones missing a couple of games. Fitzpatrick, you bring up just a great point about style. Maybe he hasn't been quite the gunslinger as past, but his real life faults, like Winston, actually are advantages for fantasy terms.
And it's definitely going to hurt probably players like Parker, and maybe even Myles Gaskin, who is getting the targets and all the volume there. You wouldn't want any change if you had Myles Gaskin now. But you bring up a great point about Gesicki now. He has not been-- it's not been going well for him, and a change could benefit him for sure.
But that's an interesting piece of news that I didn't really see coming at all, because, you know, Miami, man, they're dangerous. They went into New England at the end of last year in a playoff type atmosphere and won. And they got an interesting thing going.
