Ryan Tannehill ready to lead Dolphins offense and take the next step

Written by Matthew Cannata | Twitter: @PhinManiacs
Ryan Tannehill can’t wait to lead the new Miami Dolphins on offense against the New England Patriots on Sunday. Furthermore, Tannehill understands that his third year is the time where the excuses need to stop and the time when he needs to stop making the silly mistakes that he sometimes makes from game to game.

“I’m at the point in my career now where progression has to be made fast and you have to be consistent,” Tannehill told the Miami Dolphins website. “There’s no more rookie mistakes or second-year mistakes. We’re at the point we’ve got to make the plays. When it comes down to it in the fourth quarter, on third down, you have to be able to make the play, find a way and that’s football. You’re going to have those tough situations where somebody is going to have to step up and make the play. I want that to be me. I want that to be the guys with me on offense. If we do that, we’ll win a lot of games.”

“I’m excited about the plan we have,” Tannehill said. “I’ve said it over and over again, the guys that we have, just how we’re going to attack, not only this week but the following weeks. It’s finally here. We’ve been playing against each other for over a month now. A long offseason that we’ve been training for this and it’s finally time to go. So the excitement level is high.”

Joe Philbin is just as excited for the new offense but more importantly, he’s also excited to see what strides Tannehill has made since last season.

“I think he’s continued to show progress,” Philbin said in a conference call with New England media. “The things that we look for in a quarterback here in Miami are number one, a decision maker, number two, an accurate passer, and number three, making plays at critical times in the game. I think those are really the three core principles of quarterback play that we stress down here. The good news is that you can see improvement in all of those areas. I think he’s worked hard getting adjusted to the new offense. I think he’s picked it up well. He’s got a good command of it. So again, it’s Week 1, now it’s time to put all of that hard work and energy to the test.”

No one knows what the offense will look like on Sunday and no one knows how Tannehill will do in his third year. The jury is out on both and we will start to get answers on Sunday!

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