Remember Brees? Hey, Remember Culpepper, Too!
The cries of “Remember Brees” grow louder and louder
An ever-increasing number of journalists in the blog-o-sphere are warning the Miami Dolphins to ‘remember the Drew Brees debacle’ this offseason. You bet the Dolphins need to consider how they handled Brees to avoid making the same mistake again with Tua. But, if the Dolphins brain trust really wants to make the right decision they must also remember Daunte Culpepper too!
The ‘legend’ of Miami not signing Brees has grown over the years to epic proportions. In contrast, the failure of signing Culpepper has taken a back seat. This shouldn’t be the case because both poor medical evaluations and the decisions that followed are inextricably linked together. The mistakes and lessons learned must be used in tandem.
And, if you’re splitting hairs, because they are mobile QBs recovering from a lower-body injury the mistake of signing Culpepper hits a bit closer to home when it comes to Tua.
Tua was given a “good” bill of health
Ian Rapoport reported that the results of the CT scan that Tua Tagovailoa underwent were “as positive as possible”. This doesn’t sound like a definitive medical claim or a sure bet with the best sports betting software sites.
Jimmy Bouron wrote about the complexity of this injury in November:
“When the hip dislocates and it fractures off a piece of the cup, part of the hip joint it also disrupts the blood supply to the end of the femur, which is the lower leg part of the hip joint. This specific scenario is called avascular necrosis or AVN and this was the reason Bo could no longer play. The good news is many believe that Tua’s injury was addressed immediately. This means it is less likely that there was any disruption in the blood supply to the femur. However, AVN can’t be immediately diagnosed because it takes 3 to 6 months to develop. So there’s no guarantee Tua doesn’t have AVN!“
Who knows? Not even the doctors really do… and that’s the problem.
While Tua had the best medical treatment on the planet, there is still a chance AVN can pop up post-draft. Also no matter how good doctors are, you are never the same after surgery. Add to this all Tua’s other surgeries and the increased odds of re-injuring them. And finally, Tua is a football player and like all football players, new injuries are coming to join the old ones. All these factors combined create a massive risk in the huge investment it will take to get Tua.
Miami must use their 5th Overall pick to get Tua, so they are trading their best chip this year for him. If Tua flops due to poor play or re-injury, they will have all but wasted the Season 2019.
After two decades of failure, can Miami afford the extra risk?
The clearest lesson learned from the Saban Era is…
The greatest lesson learned from the Bress and Culpepper mishap is medical evaluations are a gamble. Nick Saban was told to go with Culpepper over Brees. The Miami Dolphins medical team was wrong on both accounts. Players with an injury history lower their odds of success… and the odds that a player will succeed in the NFL is low to start with. While some can point to outliers like Frank Gore, NFL history is bursting at the seams with players not so fortunate. No matter how you slice it, the safer bet is rolling the dice on players without a history of serious injuries.
Without question, missing on Brees sucked. Having Brees slip through the Dolphins fingers was an epic miss. In the end, though, nothing was truly lost but the opportunity. This is why the Culpepper decision was worse. Miami built a whole season on Culpepper and the regime crumbled when he broke down. They missed on the player and lost a ton too. Miami could have lived to fight another day and found their QB down the line. Instead, they sacrificed critical assets, a season, and the regime adding insult to injury and compounding the bad decision.
The two sides of Phins ‘missing’ on Tua
If Miami doesn’t pick Tua and it’s Brees 2.0 at least Miami will have the assets to make amends by finding another quality quarterback. Not the best option, but a workable one. In contrast, should Miami draft Tua, or even worse trade up for him, and he flops, they’ll be hard-pressed to recover.
I’m not saying don’t draft Tua or forget about the Brees fiasco. Rather, let’s keep the Culpepper mishap on equal footing in the evaluation. Chris Grier can be wrong and recover if he doesn’t draft Tua. But if Grier does draft Tua it’s greatness or bust for this regime. Go Phins!!!
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MJ,
I read that Ross & Grier attended 4 Alabama games this past season, and 1 Oregon Ducks game (Herbert). I hear what you are saying. However, I think this team is in love with Tua and they will take him at #5. By all means we should NOT trade up and draft capital to take him any sooner. He will red shirt this year and continue to heal up and gain strength, plus learn from Fitzpatrick. I too am concerned and have my fingers crossed. Tua was touted as the best QB to come out since Andrew Luck! He would have been the Heisman Trophy had he not been injured. I guess we will see in April.
“However, I think this team is in love with Tua and they will take him at #5.” I think you are right Steve and Tua and Phins are star crossed… just hope it doesn’t end up snake bitten.
My opinion has been not to draft Tua with the 5th pick and probably not with the 18th pick either. With so many needs to fill on this team, it is not worth the risk of striking out if Tua turns out to continue being injury prone. The first pick should be used on a prospect with lower risk like LB/S Simmons out of Clemson or CB Okudah out of Ohio State. I would even use the 5th on OT Andrew Thomas out of Georgia.
Using the 26th on Tua is still risky but I could stand for that. But in reality, we need to stay away from him.
“The first pick should be used on a prospect with lower risk like LB/S Simmons out of Clemson or CB Okudah out of Ohio State.” I’m with you here, Fritz. I’m seeing other OTs being ranked ahead of Thomas now… need to get my inner Steve on an watch more of these players play.
Actually he would have started playing for Saban, so just maybe it would have been the beginning of something really special instead of what played out! Fact is nobody knows, but it couldn’t have been any worse then how things did turn out
I agree, Warren. Brees would have done okay with Saban. But, he couldn’t draft worth a damn. I think Payton was the right coach for him. Still, it might have triggered a good series of events… as you said, “Fact is nobody knows, but it couldn’t have been any worse then how things did turn out.” So true.
The list of draft mistakes is a long one spanning several GM’s. Picking up Tua in the second round would be great. We need to parlay those first round picks into many more picks. We need to jettison Jones and Howard for picks too.
If we pick up a free agent or two on defense, find a running back and have a good draft, we can win with Fitzpatrick. A QB depth pick only makes sense if you trade Rosen, which is doubtful.
Let’s pick up a QB in the future after we have a good nucleus of players that can win.
Can’t disagree with a word you said. I could see taking Tua with the 3rd 1st… but, even still, it makes me skittish.