Miami Dolphins Backup QB Change and What It Means

The Skylar Thompson experiment is over.

His days as the backup quarterback for the Miami Dolphins are over.

Head coach Mike McDaniel didn’t say it directly Monday afternoon, but he could have said it in a short sentence, telling reporters at the Baptist Health Training Complex that Tyler “Snoop” Huntley will serve as Tua Tagovailoa’s backup quarterback in the upcoming game. against the New York Jets at Hard Rock Stadium.

Huntley was activated from injured reserve last Thursday, hours before the Thanksgiving night game at Green Bay. after missing more than a month due to a shoulder injury.

“I wanted to see Snoop do his surgery and stuff,” McDaniel said, “but our plan is to have him get Tua up this week.”

The change comes eight days after Thompson played two snaps in a 34-15 victory over the New England Patriots; It was a long look that resulted in a fumbled pass by rookie Jaylen Wright that turned into a fumble return for a touchdown that caused McDaniel to punt Tagovailoa again. into the game.

Although he did not specifically blame Thompson for the accident – and replays do not clearly show who was at fault – McDaniel stated that he was unhappy with the way the play was run. He also said he still trusts Thompson, which is something everyone should expect him to say.

But his actions spoke louder than his words.

Regardless of whether that was the impetus behind the move or whether McDaniel liked Huntley’s performance in three starts in relief of Thompson after he was injured in the first start in relief of Tagovailoa, Huntley surpassed Thompson on the depth chart .

The sad truth is that Huntley hasn’t exactly been ignited during his tenure as quarterback this season, and the offense has struggled poorly with Tagovailoa on injured reserve.

In Huntley’s three starts, the Dolphins averaged 12.3 points, including 15 against New England in Week 5, when Miami rushed for 188 yards.

Huntley completed less than 60 percent of his passes (even though he was mostly a short passer) and had an ugly 73.9 passer rating.

In other words, it wasn’t impressive.

But it still gives McDaniel more confidence than Thompson.

This says it all.

At this point, the question probably needs to be asked: Why would the Dolphins bother having Thompson on the 53-man roster when it’s clear he won’t step back on the field unless it’s an emergency?

Although Thompson had recovered enough from his rib injury to be a full participant in practice all week, the writing was already on the wall for Thompson when Huntley started the Week 7 game at Indianapolis.

Again, it cannot be said that Huntley activated the offense while in the game.

No, the Dolphins’ offense was terrible without Tua; To a degree we haven’t seen at other spots in the NFL, such as Green Bay, where Malik Willis had to start several games after Jordan Love suffered an ankle injury.

And yes, the offense is designed around what Tagovailoa does best, and there’s no way to create the timing needed to make him work the same way without practice reps, but it still says there needs to be some functionality for the offense here. With Tua on IR, it didn’t look like the worst offense in the NFL.

This is either due to McDaniel not making the necessary adjustments to accommodate his backups, but more so the organization’s failure to properly address the backup quarterback position in the offseason.

The Dolphins were content with Thompson and running back Mike White, giving Thompson the No. 2 role after a summer in which neither player looked particularly impressive.

Meanwhile, there were several solid veteran options available at the start of free agency, including Joe Flacco, Marcus Mariota, and Jimmy Garoppolo.

It will be up to the Dolphins to do better in this regard next season and provide a better replacement for Tagovailoa.

There could be any number of candidates at this point. But we know it won’t be Skylar Thompson. Or at least it shouldn’t be.