Tua Tagovailoa isn’t holding back his disdain for Brian Flores any longer.
The Dolphins quarterback opened up about his former coach in an interview on the “Dan Le Batard Show” on Monday, calling him a “terrible person.”
“If you woke up every morning and I told you, you sucked at what you did, that you don’t belong doing what you do, that you shouldn’t be here, that this guy should be here, you haven’t earned this right,” Tagovailoa said. “Then you have someone else come in and say, ‘Dude, you’re the best fit for this, you are accurate, you’re the best whatever, you are this, you are that.’ How would it make you feel listening to one or the other? You see what I am saying?”
Flores, who comes from the Bill Belichick coaching tree, was the Dolphins’ head coach from 2019-’21, and the team drafted Tagovailoa before his second season with the No. 5 pick in the 2020 NFL Draft.
Flores, 43, was generally seen as overachieving in Miami, going 24-25 in three seasons.
Tagovailoa, 26, struggled at times in his first two seasons and Flores benched him on several occasions for veteran Ryan Fitzpatrick.
In his two seasons under Flores, the former Alabama star threw for 4,467 yards, 27 touchdowns and 15 interceptions in 23 games.
“You hear it, regardless of what it is the good or the bad,” Tagovailoa said. “You hear it more and more you start to actually believe that. I don’t care who you are. You can be the president of the United States, you have a terrible person telling you things you don’t want to hear or things you shouldn’t be hearing, you are going to start to believe that about yourself. That’s sort of what ended up happening. It’s been two years of training that out of, not just me, but of guys that have been here since my rookie year.”
Flores was somewhat shockingly fired after the 2021 season and replaced by Mike McDaniel.
McDaniel, who had previously been on the 49ers’ staff, gives off a players-coach vibe and has certainly brought out Tagovailoa’s potential in one of the league’s most explosive offenses.
Tagovailoa has thrown for 8,172 yards, 54 touchdowns and 22 interceptions in their two seasons together — the addition of Tyreek Hill has certainly helped, too — which both ended with wild-card losses.
Flores, who sued the NFL for discrimination after his Dolphins ouster, was the Steelers’ linebackers coach last season and was hired as the Vikings’ defensive coordinator this offseason.