In 2019, the Miami Dolphins finished 5-11. They weren’t just bad; they were positioning themselves for the Alabama quarterback from the 2020 draft who could fix everything. The strategy even had an unofficial name: Tank4Tua, and it worked. The Dolphins got Tua Tagovailoa 5th overall in 2020, and by 2024, they were ready to give him $212.4 million to stay.

But just two years after that four-year extension, Miami released him with the largest dead cap charge in NFL history: $99.2 million, and he signed with the Atlanta Falcons.

By Week 8 of last season, Tagovailoa had already thrown ten interceptions in seven games. Three of those came in Week 6, and another three in Week 7. The fanbase had already started calling him “Turndaballova” on social media. It was then that Tua admitted he couldn’t see his receivers on the field.

“I can’t turn the ball over and expect to win the game,” Tagovailoa said. “I think with that, some of it has to do with being able to see guys with their guys also up front and our guys. I’m not the tallest guy in the back there either, so being able to see and then sometimes when that happens, you don’t want to just throw it blindly.”

Every offseason has brought a new story about turning the corner for the Miami Dolphins. And every season has ended worse than the one before it. Miami went 11-6 in 2023. Then they went 8-9 in 2024. Last season’s 7-10 disaster was on a class apart. With everything that unfolded in 2025, I wondered if the Dolphins could actually make something work this year. But that kind of a collapse isn’t something you come back from right away.

Prelude to the end

After a 28-6 home loss to the Baltimore Ravens in Week 9 – Miami’s second straight home defeat – the crowd at Hard Rock Stadium booed its own team. The fanbase had lost its trust to such an extent that the then-head coach, Mike McDaniel, had to address it postgame.

“It s—, that s—, all of that does,” McDaniel said. “Fans enjoy winning, and so, our expectation is that we have to do the work and do the right things for our fans to enjoy the experience.”

Former Dolphins guard Richie Incognito was among the first public voices calling for owner Stephen Ross to clear house. Two months later, McDaniel was fired, despite having told the media he wasn’t going anywhere. He left behind a 35-33 record and two playoff exits in four seasons.

The teardown that followed was brutal. Veteran wide receiver Tyreek Hill, who lost to a season-ending injury, was not retained. Jaylen Waddle went to the Denver Broncos for three picks. Minkah Fitzpatrick was traded to the New York Jets for a seventh-round pick. Bradley Chubb was cut for cap room and signed with the Bills the very next day.

The $99 million bill

Miami designated Tua Tagovailoa’s release as a post-June 1 cut, which let them split the damage across two years. The Dolphins now hold $55.4 million in dead money for 2026 and $43.8 million for 2027. That’s a quarterback in Georgia still costing Miami nearly $100 million across two seasons.

Whatever the Falcons pay him offsets what the Dolphins owe in guaranteed money, but Atlanta only gave him a $1.21 million, one-year deal, and left the rest for Miami to bear. New general manager Jon-Eric Sullivan was very measured when he made Tua’s release official.

“As we move forward, we will be focused on infusing competition across the roster and establishing a strong foundation for this team as we work towards building a sustained winner,” Sullivan said.

But there’s a catch. These are things a GM says when the match has already made the decisions for him. Tua’s dead cap for 2026 was the biggest the team faced – nearly 18.4% of the team’s total cap space, but that was only part of a much bigger problem.

The Dolphins face a dead cap north of $179 million in 2026. Sullivan walked into free agency with one hand tied behind his back, and Tua’s $43.8 million that carries into 2027 (along with $12.88 million for Bradley Chubb) means the nightmare doesn’t end this season.

To give the franchise a direction for the season, the Dolphins brought in Malik Willis – the former Green Bay Packers backup quarterback – to South Florida. They then handed him a 3-year, $67 million deal, with a $22.5 million signing bonus and $45 million guaranteed.

Was that too much money for a perennial backup? Well, that’s a debate, but I’ll get to that later. The real issue is that Miami had no choice but to gamble on Willis. Jon-Eric Sullivan and new head coach Jeff Hafley needed an affordable playmaker they could trust, and Willis fit the bill. Additionally, the rest of the offseason moves around Willis are also a testament to the kind of wreckage Tua & Co. left behind in their wake.

Year zero loading?

The 2026 offseason tells us exactly what Sullivan was – and wasn’t – able to build. He brought in 20 players. That’s a sizable boost by any measure, sure, but nineteen of those players are on one-year deals. They got Wide receivers, cornerbacks, safeties, tight ends, a punter, a long snapper, and even two kickers – every single one acting as a temporary fix. The lone exception is the quarterback.

The most notable non-Willis addition at receiver is Tutu Atwell, signed for a base value of $1.4 million with $1.26 million guaranteed. The former Los Angeles Rams wideout had six catches for 192 yards and a touchdown last season. But he’s not one of the explosive playmakers Willis will need this season. Atwell is a placeholder with upside, signed for almost nothing because almost nothing is what the budget allowed.

Interestingly, Devon Achane’s extension is the one move apart from Willis this offseason that shows the team’s long-term goals. The Pro Bowl running back had rushed for a career-high 1,350 yards on 238 carries in 2025, leading the league with 5.7 yards per carry. His case for a big payday was undeniable.

On May 13, he signed a 4-year, $64 million extension with $32 million guaranteed, making him the third-highest paid running back in the league behind Saquon Barkley and Christian McCaffrey. Back in April, when there was a lot of trade interest swirling around him, Sullivan had made it clear in his pre-draft presser that Achane was off the table.

“He is not available for trade,” Sullivan had said. “Things are going good. We’ve had some positive conversations over the last couple days. Trending in the right direction. He’s obviously very important to what we’re doing.”

Now, the draft told the same story as the free agency board. Miami hosted at least six quarterback prospects before the first round, and drafted none of them. They took an offensive tackle at 12, a cornerback at 27, and scattered receivers across rounds three and five – Caleb Douglas and Chris Bell in the third, Kevin Coleman Jr. in the fifth. The board, quite honestly, reads like an infrastructure built around a quarterback Miami had already committed to before draft weekend started.

So, Achane in the backfield, and the rest on one-year contracts – that’s the blueprint Sullivan created while managing a $179 million dead cap. The plan, if we call it that, is to build a spine, fortify its surroundings somehow, and pray that the spine holds. And the transition from this makeshift rebuild to the man being asked to lead it brings us to the part of this story that demands the most scrutiny.

The new QB1

Malik Willis’ career splits make the case for both sides of this argument at the same time. With the Tennessee Titans from 2022 to 2023, he went 35-of-66 across three starts for 350 yards, zero touchdowns, and three picks. Those are the numbers of a project quarterback who didn’t get much spotlight and looked lost at the NFL level.

And then there were the Packers. In two seasons as Jordan Love’s backup, Willis went 70-of-89 for 972 yards, six touchdowns, and zero interceptions – adding 261 rushing yards and three more scores on the ground. His final game of the 2025 season, a 41-24 loss to the Ravens in Week 17, was his best. He went 18-of-21 before leaving with a shoulder injury in the fourth quarter in that game, logging one passing touchdown, nine carries for 60 yards, and two rushing scores. But he’d achieved his goal. When head coach Mike LaFleur was asked about him at the season’s end, his bold claim said it all.

“He can make any throw on the planet,” LaFleur had said. “I’d put him up against anybody.”

Jon-Eric Sullivan heard that, brought Willis to Miami, and handed him $45 million guaranteed.

Behind Willis on Miami’s depth chart sits Quinn Ewers, a 2025 seventh-round pick who made three starts last season and finished 1-2. He threw three touchdowns, three picks, and posted an 85.5 passer rating across 83 attempts. If Willis struggles, Miami’s contingency is a 23-year-old backup who has started fewer NFL games than Willis himself.

I think the LaFleur endorsement is the most important thing in this entire debate – and the most dangerous thing to lean on. Those Green Bay numbers came as a backup, against defenses with nearly a season’s worth of film on Jordan Love, not on Willis. His stats were clean partly because no defensive coordinator had built a game plan around stopping him specifically. Every team in the league gets a full week to do exactly that, week after week, for 17 games. Across four NFL seasons, Willis has yet to survive that.

Now, when you start him in 2026, do you get the Tennessee version or the one from Green Bay? His guaranteed $45 million says Sullivan & Co. believes the Green Bay version of their quarterback is permanent, and can run their vision for 18 weeks… maybe even beyond.

That’s the bet Miami is banking its season on – along with comfortable familiarity.

One bloodline, one bet

Jeff Hafley spent two seasons as the Packers’ defensive coordinator before Miami hired him as head coach. GM Jon-Eric Sullivan spent 21 years in that same building – football operations assistant in ‘04, VP of player personnel by ‘22. New Defensive coordinator Sean Duggan also followed Hafley from Green Bay, and new pass-game coordinator Ryan Downard has been in the Packers’ system since 2018.

That’s the coaching tree that uprooted itself from Green Bay and planted itself in South Florida. And apart from Willis, safety Zayne Anderson also came to Miami after playing for the Packers from 2023 through 2025.

Dan Marino – franchise legend and current special advisor – sat on the panel that hired Sullivan and Hafley. He’s been attached to every Miami rebuild that hasn’t finished the job. But this time, Dallas Cowboys’ legendary quarterback and Monday Night Football commentator Troy Aikman also came in as a consultant to help them with the general manager and head coach search.

The continuity argument is rather strong, too. Sullivan knows the system. Hafley ran a strong defense in Green Bay. Willis is the quarterback that the system produced. There is logic to it. But the Green Bay system Sullivan spent two decades building didn’t finish either.

The Packers had a strong start to the season, going 9-3-1 heading into Week 15 against the Denver Broncos. But newly acquired star defensive end Micah Parsons tore his ACL in that game at Mile High, and the record only went downhill from there, finishing 2025 with a 9-8-1 record.
They made the playoffs, but blew an 18-point lead in the second half to the Chicago Bears in the Wild Card round – the second straight year they collapsed late. Hafley’s defense gave up 25 points in that fourth quarter alone.

Sullivan was inside that building for both collapses. Hafley was running the defense for both of them. I don’t think the issue is whether these are bad football minds – they’re not. The issue is that neither of them has rebuilt a broken roster, managed this level of cap damage, or coached through a full season with a quarterback on a short track record.

Green Bay’s failures happened with Jordan Love, a full cap, and a functional roster. Miami has none of those things. Instead, they spent $99 million escaping a quarterback who couldn’t see the field and replaced him with one who’s never started a full season. They then surrounded him with 19 players on one-year deals, and backed him up with a seventh-round pick with three career starts. The teardown was necessary. What comes next depends entirely on whether a front office that learned everyone in one building can solve problems that the building never had.

South Florida isn’t waiting to find out if the new quarterback blueprint works – they’re already paying for what happened the last time someone bet it would.