Tua Tagovailoa will be on the field, healthy for Dolphins camp

Tua Tagovailoa has made a quick recovery from a devastating injury.

When Miami Dolphins training camp opens up, rookie quarterback and top draft pick in 2020 Tua Tagovailoa will be there.

And he won’t be wearing sweats and a hat.

Tagovailoa is cleared medically from a devastating hip injury he suffered last season at Alabama and won’t even have to be placed on the NFI (non-football injury) list to open training camp with the Dolphins.

Miami spent the fifth overall pick on Tagovailoa in the 2020 NFL Draft, but many expected they would have to be patient with him as he continued to rehab and recover from the injury that many thought to be career-threatening in 2019. Some even compared Tua’s injury last season to that of Bo Jackson, whose career was ended by a bad hip injury.

There’s certainly not any rush for Brian Flores to right the ship in Miami considering what he inherited, how the Dolphins have built draft capital and the fact that he’s now working with a rookie quarterback. With the way Miami played last year, however, especially knocking off the New England Patriots in a game that had playoff implications for Bill Belichick and company, there is perhaps cause for high expectations in South Beach.

Tagovailoa being 100 percent for training camp is some of the best news Miami Dolphins fans could have gotten amidst the craziness of everything else going on in the world right now.

Because of his injury history, Tua Tagovailoa’s ability on the field has been overlooked a slight bit by many NFL fans and analysts.

This is a guy who, when he came onto the field to help Alabama to a come-from-behind win in the National Title game as a true freshman, people were talking about him as a lock for the top pick in the NFL Draft as soon as he was eligible.

Even dealing with injuries in 2018, Tagovailoa was one of the most unstoppable players in college football, throwing 43 touchdown passes and rushing for another five.

Dealing with injuries again in 2019, Tagovailoa was still one of the most dominant pocket passers in college football.

In 32 total games at Alabama, Tagovailoa averaged three total touchdowns per game (87 passing, 9 rushing, 96 total).

That’s not an unprecedented figure, but Tua was constantly productive and consistently elevating the rest of the talent on Alabama’s roster.

We will see soon enough if he can do the same for the Miami Dolphins.