Tua Tagovailoa: Relationship with Tyreek Hill is still a work in progress

At the end of last season, Dolphins wide receiver Tyreek Hill implied he wanted to leave the team. He later recanted those comments, but his teammates heard them. And Dolphins quarterback Tua Tagovailoa said today that Hill needs to work on improving his relationship with his teammates.

“I think there’s a lot more vulnerability with Tyreek,” Tagovailoa said. “He’s conversating a lot more with the guys, not just about football, but about things off the field, being vulnerable about some of the things people know about his personal life and things of that nature. I think that’s the first step toward him building true relationships and a real connection with a lot of the guys in there. Everyone knows what he can do on the field, everyone respects what he can do on the field, but I think he’s still trying to figure things out for himself as well, the man he wants to be — and he’s not too young. Everybody makes mistakes, it’s just, some people, they’re in the spotlight and their deals get pushed out more than some others. So you’ve just got to cut him some grace. That’s our teammate. We love him, but as a person I think if you get to know him you’ll love him too.”

Tagovailoa confirmed that he’s well aware of public comments Hill has made that were less than fully supportive, and he said the rest of the team knows what Hill has said as well.

“We’re still continuing to do that, but it’s not just with me, it’s with a lot of the guys,” Tagovailoa said. “I’m not the only one that heard that. You guys aren’t the only people that heard that. A lot of people that follow football, that follow the Miami Dolphins, that follow Tyreek, that are fans of his, everyone has seen that. So when you say something like that, you don’t just come back from that with, ‘Hey, my bad.’ You’ve got to work that relationship up, you’ve got to build everything up again. It’s still a work in progress, not just for me but for everybody. But like I said, he’s working on himself, he’s working on the things he says he wants to get better with and do better on. So that’s the first step to me so I commend him for doing that.”

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