Tyreek Hill on the one thing that can stop the Dolphins. And the Tua QB tier question

By often playing two safeties deep and generating pressure on Tua Tagovailoa, the Buffalo Bills generally stymied the Dolphins’ offense after Miami scored touchdowns on its first two drives on Sunday.

But in the wake of the Dolphins’ 48-20 loss at Buffalo, star receiver Tyreek Hill made this clear on Thursday:

“Nobody in this league can stop us except for ourselves,” Hill said. “If we come out and don’t execute presnap, we get penalties presnap, we are going to put ourselves behind the eight ball. Teams can run through shell, play man to man and do whatever they want to, but I feel we have a good enough unit to make plays. We have the dynamic playmakers to do anything we need to do.”

Hill said the loud crowd in Buffalo impacted the effectiveness of the Dolphins’ pre-snap motions.

“It was definitely a factor,” Hill said. “The Buffalo Bills, Bills Mafia, brought that 12th man energy. [There are] ways we can counter it [by creating] situations at practice. I feel we’ve been doing that throughout training camp. Even now, we have crowd noises at practice. It’s been very effective.”

The Dolphins used crowd noise at practice on Thursday, even though Miami plays at home on Sunday. Some Giants fans likely will be in attendance at Sunday’s game.

Hill said there’s one area where he must do more: “As a leader, I’ve got to be better for this team. I’ve got to be vocally better. As a young team, going to a tough environment [such as Buffalo], it can be hard for young guys.”

He spoke of the need to share his “knowledge, giving them all the confidence that I can” in those types of hostile environments.

Asked how Dolphins players are dealing with their first loss of the season, Hill cracked: “There are going to be some people in the building with a tight [body part] but they’ll be all right.”

INJURY UPDATE

Linebacker Jaelan Phillips (oblique) and center Connor Williams (groin) remained limited at Dolphins practice on Thursday. Also practicing on a limited basis: guard Lester Cotton (ankle) and two players who are on day 2 of a 21-day window to be activated: cornerback Nik Needham (Achilles) and guard Rob Jones (knee).

But safety DeShon Elliott and receiver Braxton Berrios practiced fully after being limited Wednesday.

Left tackle Terron Armstead remains out; he’s the only player on the 53-man roster who missed practice Thursday.

Giants Pro Bowl running back Saquon Barkley, who has been sidelined the past two games with an ankle injury, practiced again on a limited basis Thursday. Giants coach Brian Daboll has been non-committal about whether he’ll play Sunday.

TUA TIER

Few on network TV have been a bigger supporter of Tua Tagovailoa than former NFL quarterback Dan Orlovsky. So Orlovsky seemed to take no pleasure in making this assertion on ESPN on Monday:

“I’m telling you; there are different levels to this,” Orlovsky said. “I love Tua. I love him. I don’t think anybody has championed Tua as much as I have since he came into the NFL. He’s a high end player. [Buffalo’s] Josh Allen is in a different conversation. [Kansas City’s] Pat Mahomes is in a different conversation. Lamar [Jackson] is a different conversation. We can’t run from what just happened head to head.”

Nobody would argue that Mahomes sits atop the top tier of quarterbacks, likely in a class all his own.

As for the Allen and Jackson comparisons, one could make an argument either way about where Tagovailoa belongs, based primarily on how far you want to go back in the careers of Allen, Jackson and Tagovailoa.

If you want to assess their careers in their entirety (including Tagovailoa’s two uneven seasons playing under Brian Flores), then Orlovsky’s assertion is indisputable.

But if you want to look at only their work since the start of 2022 (with Jackson and Tagovailoa both missing games last season), here’s how their numbers would compare:

▪ Passer rating: Tagovailoa 107.7, Allen 98.5, Jackson 94.2.

▪ Yards per pass attempt: Tagovailoa 9.0, Allen 7.6; Jackson 7.0.

▪ Passing yards: Allen 5331 (20 starts), Tagovailoa 4854 (17 starts), Jackson 3036 (in 16 starts).

▪ Team record with them starting in regular season: Allen 16-4, Tagovailoa 11-6, Jackson 11-5.

▪ Rushing yards: Allen 140 for 868 (6.1 per carry), Jackson 153 for 984 (6.4 per carry), Tagovailoa 34 for 85 (2.5 per carry).

So if numbers since the start of 2021 should carry overriding weight in this debate, then Tagovailoa is clearly in Allen’s and Jackson’s class statistically, unless you place overriding importance on the supreme rushing skills of Allen and Jackson.

But Tagovailoa likely will need to sustain this level of production over a full season and perhaps win a playoff game to be universally included in the tier just below Mahomes.