Tua Tagovailoa has issued a .
Just a few days after he criticized his teammates following a 29–27 loss to the Chargers on Sunday, the Dolphins quarterback apologized for the debacle in a press conference on Wednesday.
"I made a mistake and I'm owning up to that right now," a contrite Tagovailoa told reporters. "I've talked to guys on the team about it, talked to the leaders about it, and they know my heart. They know that the intent was right, but no matter the intent—the intent can be right, but when things get misconstrued or however the media wants to portray it, that leaves a void of silence and a lot of questions for the guys on our team.
"Now, being 1–5, we talk a lot about, 'We gotta get this going. We gotta get this going.' Come in, excited to go to work. Forget about the noise. And I feel like I just added on to that for our guys. For myself, I gotta look at myself as the leader. Protecting the team. I don't feel like I did that to the best of my abilities. I felt like I let the emotions of the game get to me after the game, and that's something I can learn from as a leader on this team.
"And what happens in-house, should be protected. And none of that should have gotten out. So I want to publicly apologize about that, want to move forward and now I want to focus on the Cleveland Browns."
Watch a video of the full apology below:
A good statement from the QB1. Notably, he went on to say, somewhat tentatively, that he no longer views overall team culture as an issue at this moment.
"It starts with the leadership"
This saga began last weekend, when Miami came painfully close to a victory vs. Los Angeles but couldn't get it done. Speaking at his presser shortly after the game, a frustrated Tagovailoa then publicly criticized some of his teammates for their lack of accountability when it came to fixing the unit's woes.
"I think it starts with the leadership in helping articulate that for the guys and what we're expecting out of the guys," Tagovailoa said. "We have guys showing up to players-only meetings late, guys not showing up to players-only meetings, there's a lot that goes into that. Do we have to make this mandatory? Do we not have to make this mandatory? It's a lot of things of that nature that we got to get cleaned up."
Things then devolved from there. Ex-NFL players chided the quarterback for throwing his teammates under the bus. ESPN's Ryan Clark implored him to look inward. Even coach Mike McDaniel, though he was more gentle about it, wasn't pleased with the public airing of dirty laundry.
But Tagovailoa appears to have heard the message loud and clear. With the apology now out of the way, the Dolphins can work on putting this in the rearview and instead focus on getting some w's on the road ahead.
Dolphins' Jaelan Phillips doesn't believe Tagovailoa is at fault
While Tagovailoa received significant blowback for his comments after the loss to the Chargers, teammate Jaelan Phillips showed support for quarterback after he apologized Wednesday, noting that the blame shouldn't necessarily fall on Tagovailoa.
"I'm not really concerned with what Tua has to say," Phillips said. "I know Tua's heart. If he did say anything, it was under good intentions. I don't think he's trying to call anyone out in particular other than we're holding each other and we're trying to hold ourselves accountable."
"Anybody who's mad at calling people out for being late, really it's kind of like 'if the shoe fits' type situation," Phillips continued. "You can't really be mad at something that's their fault in the first place. I don't like Tua is super wrong for what he said. I think there are certain things we can keep in house, but I trust Tua's judgement."
