The Atlanta Falcons have announced that Tua Tagovailoa will be their Week 1 starter when the team takes the field against the Pittsburgh Steelers for their season opener. The announcement ends months of speculation as to whether it would be Tagovailoa or Michael Penix Jr. under centre when the team kicks off their regular season.
The former Dolphins QB was signed to a 1 year, $1.3M contract in the offseason after he was released by Miami. With Penix still working his way up to game speed after tearing his ACL in November in 2025, Tua was assumed to have the inside track for the starter’s role out of the gates. However, shaky preseason and training camp play from the veteran signal caller led to renewed debate amongst the Falcons fanbase as to which QB gave them the best chance to win.
Over the course of his 6 year NFL career, Tagovailoa has tantalized fans with elite level skill, that’s been largely disrupted as a result of injuries and schematic clashes with coaches. The 28 year old led the league in passing yards (4,624) in 2023, and then followed that up by leading the league in completion percentage (72.9%) in 2024.
Unfortunately, Tagovailoa has dealt with a myriad of concussion, and neck injuries throughout his career, culminating in a 2025 campaign in which he almost threw as many interceptions (15) as TDs (20). With Miami looking for a full organizational reset this summer, the former Alabama standout was released from the team despite costing the organization a record $99.2M dead cap hit.
After getting the start in his team’s first preseason game, Tagovailoa played just one drive, going 3 for 5 for 22 yards passing, and briefly putting the football on the ground before recovering the fumble. He followed this up with a 7 for 8 performance for 95 yards in the Falcons 3rd preseason game, but has looked largely uninspiring in practice according to local reports.
Tagovailoa will have no shortage of weapons at his disposal with Drake London, Kyle Pitts, and Bijan Robinson all serving as high end pass catching options. However he’ll have a relatively short leash under new head coach Kevin Stefanski who will be looking to guide Atlanta back to the playoffs for the first time since 2017.
Photo: Georgia National Guard. This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license.