Hill: Drops are because of lack of reps with Tagovailoa

MIAMI GARDENS, Fla. (AP) — Tyreek Hill has not shied away from accountability during one of the least productive seasons of his nine-year career.

After a poor performance in Miami’s 29-17 win over the San Francisco 49ers on Sunday, Hill was candid about the reason for a puzzling decline in his connection with quarterback Tua Tagovailoa this season.

“I feel like at the end of the day, I need those valuable reps with Tua,” Hill said. “Those vet (veteran) rest days are starting to show.”

It’s common for NFL teams to give veteran players days off during the week, especially toward the end of the season when injuries seem to pile up.

Hill has missed three practices over the past month for either rest or personal reasons, including this past Wednesday for what the team called rest/wrist. He has played through a wrist injury all season and was questionable entering Sunday’s game.

“There’s always pros and cons with any sort of rest,” coach Mike McDaniel said. “Shoot, I want every player to play 100% of the practice snaps at full tilt every week. You have an imperfect formula of trying to figure out how to rest guys and what does best for their body.

“I think the adjustment to getting more reps with Tua, that’s an easy one. You know what I’ll do? I’ll say, hey, get more reps, and then they’ll do it. But it’s the communication aspect, and you hate for guys to feel like they’re not properly tooled in any sort of situation. So you just adjust off that and make sure we get better from it, not worse.”

Hill caught just 3 of 7 targets for 29 yards and a touchdown and had several drops, including one on third down that went through his hands on Miami’s opening drive.

“I completely blame myself for not getting my head around and not seeing the ball,” Hill said, “because if I see a ball, we’re talking cross-court, 70-yard touchdown.”

Tagovailoa and Hill also couldn’t connect on two potential touchdowns. The first was tipped by a San Francisco defensive back just outside of Hill’s grasp, the other was a drop that Hill again attributed to a lack of reps.

“One thing I learned from Coach (Andy) Reid whenever I was in Kansas City,” Hill said, “I was blessed to be able to play under such a great head coach, is you can’t just show up on Sunday. You’ve got to be able to prepare yourself Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, even Saturday. Then when it’s Sunday, it’s easy.”

Hill is on pace for his least-productive season since 2019 with Kansas City, when he had 58 receptions, 860 yards and seven touchdowns.

He currently has a team-high 834 yards receiving, six touchdowns and 70 catches — six receptions fewer than running back De’Von Achane and tight end Jonnu Smith, who lead the team. Hill also entered Sunday averaging just 57.5 yards per game, his fewest since averaging 37.1 yards his rookie season.

That’s a stark decline from last year, when Hill had 1,799 yards, 13 receiving touchdowns and 112.4 yards per game, which all led the NFL.

Hill didn’t have Tagovailoa throwing him the ball for four games earlier this season, when the quarterback went on injured reserve with a concussion. Hill saw a huge drop in his production during that span, with just 35 yards per game as the Dolphins averaged a league-worst 12 points.

Tagovailoa agreed after Sunday’s game that he and Hill need more reps together.

“That’s the secret sauce to me being able to connect with all these guys,” Tagovailoa said. “You guys see Jonnu (Smith) here, that’s the secret sauce. If we miss a throw, if we’re off on a throw in the team practice we’ll get together in whatever time we have … and we’ll get those reps made up. Telling him what I see and then him also telling me how he feels with running it. That has a lot to do with reps for sure.”

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