After one year in the NFL, Ryan Tannehill has started almost as many games as he did in college.
Dolphins offensive coordinator Mike Sherman thinks the 16 games of experience his quarterback, who started 19 games for Sherman when both were at Texas A&M, gained during his rookie year will pay off with significant improvement in his second NFL season. Sherman went so far as to say that Tannehill will show more improvement than any other quarterbacks from the 2012 draft class.
“This young man will be the most improved quarterback in the National Football League from year one to year two this year – I promise you that,” Sherman told the Dolphins website. “He’s working extremely hard.”
Some might suggest that showing more improvement than Andrew Luck, Robert Griffin III and Russell Wilson isn’t all that impressive since all three of them played at a very high level in their initial NFL seasons. They all made the playoffs while Tannehill and the Dolphins were left out of the postseason after finishing with a 7-9 record. Even if that’s true, though, improved play from Tannehill would be one of the quickest ways to turn that record into a winning one.
It should help that the Dolphins have added a slew of new weapons for Tannehill to work with. With Tannehill’s command of the offense presumably at a higher level after his first year in the pros, having Mike Wallace, Brandon Gibson and Dustin Keller should lead to bigger payoffs than he was able to manage with last year’s crop of receivers. Put that together with the standout debuts for the other 2012 rookies and it’s hard to argue with Sherman’s assessment of the year to come.