Securing The Bag

By Mike Rifkin

Friday was a good day for a couple of NFL Quarterbacks. Tua Tagovailoa of the Dolphins and Jordan Love of the Packers both signed lucrative contract extensions. These two contracts land these two as two of the four highest paid Quarterbacks in the NFL based on AAV (average annual value). To quote Uncle Ben from Spiderman : “ With great power, comes great responsibility.” And with big contracts comes big expectations. 

Tagovailoa and the Dolphins agreed to a four year 212 Million Dollar contract with 167 million guaranteed. Tua is a lightning rod for fans across the league, you have some who say he’s only good because he has Jaylen Waddle, Tyreek Hill and Mike McDaniel. Others will say Tua doesn’t scare them like a Patrick Mahomes or Josh Allen. But, what if I said both things can be true. Tua benefits from the weapons he has (as does every quarterback in the NFL), but he’s also not a Mahomes or Allen : Tua doesn’t have their arm strength, but he is extremely accurate with the football.  For the first time in his career Tua played in every game last season and had career highs in completion percentage, yards and touchdowns. Tua was in the MVP conversation as well until the last two weeks of the regular season, where the Dolphins got crushed by the Ravens and lost to the Bills, making them a wild card team as opposed to winning the AFC East and had to go to Kansas City instead of hosting a playoff game. The question for Tua will always be can he stay healthy, if he can that’s a boost for the Dolphins if not it’s a big problem. 

Jordan Love and the Packers agreed to a four year contract worth 220 Million Dollars with 155 million guaranteed and a record 75 million dollar signing bonus. Love was top ten in Yards, Touchdowns and QBR. Love had big shoes to fill, as he was the heir to Aaron Rodgers, and if Love struggled fans would wonder if the Packers made a mistake by taking Love in the first round in the 2020 draft. At one point during the season, the Packers had lost five of six games and then Jordan Love went off. In a three game stretch against the Chargers, Lions and Chiefs Love threw for 857 yards and combined for eight touchdowns and zero interceptions. Love’s best game though might’ve come in the NFC Wild Card game where he went into Dallas and threw for 272 yards, three touchdowns and zero interceptions against one of the league’s best defenses. Jordan Love had a lot of questions to answer last season and he passed with flying colors. 

Both Tua and Love now are at the top of the highest paid Quarterback list. Now that they’ve both been paid the expectations for both have changed, you have to win. Both guys led their teams to the playoffs last season. In Love’s case he won a playoff game, something Tua has yet to do. Both guys have organizations that firmly believe in them, now they have to go out and prove their organizations right.