*Q)There are some people, whether it’s media, fans or whatever, who have made their case that they’ve seen enough of Ryan Tannehill. I want to know why you maybe don’t feel that way . . .
Adam Gase – Dolphins Head Coach: What qualifications are we talking about with the people saying that? None, so I don’t really care what anybody else thinks.
Q)I want to ask you in a different way. Why do you still believe that QB Ryan Tannehill is…
Gase: Because we’ve made a lot of strides since we started in 2016. He had some good seasons before I got here, I know that. We did some different stuff that year. We leaned on the running game and worked off the play-action stuff. He does a great job with the zone-read stuff. When you have an athletic guy that can move around as much as he can and then his arm strength has been something that I’ve never been around before, where we hit the pass like we hit against Tennessee where he throws it 50-plus yards in the air and the guy never breaks stride.
He has some rare qualities that you can’t find in a lot of guys physically. The more that he keeps playing, he keeps learning game to game. That’s something to me that puts him in position to where where’s our ceiling at? I don’t think we’re close to it. I think we just keep getting better (and) keep finding ways to maximize his skillset because it becomes a problem for the defense. It’s hard to defend him when you don’t know what he’s going to do. Is he going to do zone read? Is he going to sprint out? Is he going to run a naked (bootleg)? Is he going to go play action? Is it drop back? Are we running the ball? There’s a lot of things they’ve got to defend.”
Q)So why wasn’t it better when QB Ryan Tannehill wasn’t hurt?
Gase: It was. The first three games, we played pretty good.
Q)And then the next two . . .
Gase: Yeah, that happens. That happens sometimes in the NFL. Quarterbacks … when you play New England, that’s not easy. There’s a reason they win a lot of games every year.
Q)[Unclear question]
Gase: The first three games he played pretty good. You’re asking me that question and you don’t even know what you’re talking about. It’s hard for me to defend anything when you don’t know what you’re talking about. You don’t. I’ve watched the film. I sit there. We evaluate the scheme we’re asking him to do and he does a good job on it.
Q)I know what results are and I know that…
Gase: That’s fine. That’s how you look at things. Everything is results to you. We’re going through a process because that’s what it is. That’s what the season is. It’s about trying to get guys to trend upward. We were headed in the right direction. We hit a speed bump with New England. Then (at) Cincinnati, he was playing well and then we lose our left tackle and we make two bad decisions.
*This is from Adam Gase’s Thursday press conference in Miami.
