Ferd Lewis: Trent Dilfer parlays tutoring Tua Tagovailoa into Polynesian Bowl coaching spot

When Tua Tagovailoa’s family asked former Super Bowl-winning quarterback Trent Dilfer to prepare their son for the NFL Draft earlier this year, Dilfer did not mince words.

He told them the exhaustive, “Rocky IV”-like regimen he had in mind would be “hard, dirty, painful and not very glamorous.”

It turns out they were so pleased with what Dilfer did in helping their son to become the fifth overall pick in the April draft by Miami that they recommended that the Polynesian Bowl bring him in to be a head coach for the Jan. 23, 2021 game at Aloha Stadium.

Dilfer will head Team Makai and another former Super Bowl winner, Doug Williams, will head Team Mauka, in the annual high school all-star game, it was announced today.

“It (being invited to coach) was a great surprise, a great honor, I never thought I’d be a candidate,” Dilfer said. “I was so excited when Galu (Tagovailoa) and Jones,” told me.

But he probably shouldn’t have been too surprised. “He had that connection with Tua and runs the Elite 11 (quarterback) camp, so our board thought he would be a great fit,” said Kevin Kaplan, the game’s director.

What Dilfer, a 14-year NFL veteran who took the Baltimore Ravens to a Super Bowl victory, said he undertook with Tua two months after the Alabama quarterback had suffered a gruesome hip injury last fall was a 10-week total “rebuild.” One intended to answer all the questions NFL teams had following the surgeries.

When Dilfer presented the “Rocky IV” parallel to the Tagovailoas, he said was trying to create a mind-set that, like Rocky preparing for Ivan Drago in spartan conditions in the Ukraine, “We’re hiding out to do hard, painful training and we’re not gonna be on social media. But, if you trust me in this, good things will happen.”

Out of sight in a tight bubble of sorts in Nashville, Tenn., where Dilfer coaches at the Lipscomb Academy, Tua lifted weights, ran drills, broke down film and diagrammed plays with a former NFL head coach and ate a specially prepared diet.

“It was exhausting, lonely, boring — and he dove into it,” Dilfer said. “From six in the morning to six at night,” sandwiched around online school work, Dilfer said he and his assistants concentrated not only on rehabbing the hip but strengthening the ankles that had previously been injured and building up the rest of his body and mind.

It was as a 16-year-old at Saint Louis School that Tua had first crossed paths with Dilfer at an Elite 11 camp, taking to heart several suggestions. But their one-on-one relationship this winter, Dilfer said, was the most rewarding part of the 10-week experience.

Now, Dilfer will watch from a distance the progression of his former pupil. “I think (Tua) getting to sit back and see “Fitz” (Ryan Fitzpatrick, the Miami Dolphins’ starting quarterback) handle success and failure appropriately in the locker room as well as a new (offensive) system, I think all these things are great opportunities for him,” Dilfer said. “And, I think that when he does play, whenever that is, he is going to play well early.”

An association that worked for Tagovailoa is one the Polynesian Bowl wants to share with a wider circle of players in its game. Can there be a much better recommendation?

Reach Ferd Lewis at flewis@staradvertiser.com or 529-4820.