5 things to know about Tua Tagovailoa, the No. 5 overall pick in the 2020 NFL Draft
Tua Tagovailoa is a quarterback out of Alabama with a lot of upside ... if teams can look past his multiple injuries, including his significant hip injury.
According to the Miami Herald, the Dolphins’ medical examiners were satisfied with Tagovailoa’s progress in his recovery from a hip injury he suffered during Alabama’s game against Mississippi State in November.
Here are five things to know about Tagovailoa, who was selected with the No. 5 pick of the 2020 NFL Draft by the Miami Dolphins on Thursday night:
1. He was originally right-handed. Tagovailoa’s father, Galu, turned his son into a left-handed thrower because ... well, Galu didn’t want to be lonely in his left-handedness. “I just always wanted someone to be a lefty with me,” his father told AL.com in an interview. “It just became fluent and he just grew into it. That’s the crazy part about it. I never thought I could make him adapt to that. As we constantly kept putting the ball on his left hand, eventually he grew into throwing the ball with his left.”
2. He’s been training for the NFL since he was 2 years old. That’s right, Galu, who was a lineman at Santa Rosa Junior College in 1989, started training his son when he was still in diapers. “We would go to the beach to train,” Galu told ESPN.
3. Tagovailoa and Las Vegas Raiders quarterback Marcus Mariota, the No. 2 overall pick in the 2015 draft, went to the same school in Hawaii. In fact, Mariota is Tagovailoa’s mentor and was able to see the young quarterback lead Alabama to a national championship in January 2018 when the Crimson Tide beat the Georgia Bulldogs 26-23 in overtime. “Tua is a stud,” Mariota told ESPN. “He’s the next guy coming up. Proud of him.”
4. Tagovailoa held the all-time high school passing yards record in Hawaii ... at least for a while. At Saint Louis School in Honolulu, he threw for 8,158 yards and 84 touchdowns. He added 1,727 rushing yards and 27 touchdowns for 111 career scores, according to Hawaii Prep World. Dillon Gabriel of Mililani has since passed Tagovailoa.
5. Tagovailoa was a Heisman Trophy finalist in 2018, but was beaten out by Oklahoma quarterback Kyler Murray, who was drafted by the Arizona Cardinals with the No. 1 overall pick in 2019. Along with Murray and Tagovailoa, Dwayne Haskins of Ohio State, now the Washington Redskins QB, also was a finalist.
This story was originally published April 23, 2020 at 5:58 PM with the headline "5 things to know about Tua Tagovailoa, the No. 5 overall pick in the 2020 NFL Draft."