It seems the $275 million extension that Jacksonville Jaguars quarterback Trevor Lawrence signed might be part of every discussion when the team struggles. This will be deemed true if every loss the Jags face renders a similar reaction to the 17-20 Week 1 loss to the Miami Dolphins in South Beach.

The critics among the Duval Devout and NFL media are screaming and complaining about head coach Doug Pederson and Offensive Coordinator Press Taylor “taking the ball out of Trevor’s hands”. There’s something to be said for a player that’s at the top of the salary cap at Lawrence’s price tag merely handing the ball off to a teammate rather than acting as a focal point of the offense.

But if the argument is merely about the economics in the coaches’ decisions and strategy, is moving a game plan away from a $275 million player the true transgression?

What if the idea of running the football and “taking the ball out of Trevor’s hands” was designed to keep around $387 million dollars in Miami Dolphins assets off of the football field in the 4th quarter?  It was a key component of the game pointed out last week.

Keeping the Miami Dolphins air attack featuring Tyreek Hill (who had an 80 touchdown bomb that swung the game Miami’s way), Jaylen Waddle (who had five catches and 109 yards featuring a 63-yard play), and their quarterback Tua Tagovailoa (who had 338 yards passing with over half of those yards going to Hill and Waddle on two plays) off of the field was the focus for Jacksonville through their week of preparation.

If the Jaguars continued to have success moving the ball in the final three drives after the late-3rd-quarter Travis Etienne fumble occurred and scored points to win the game, would anyone have even brought up “the ball being out of Trevor’s hands”?

However, the Jags did lose the football game and rightly so fans want to know why. It’s hard to criticize the defense holding the NFL’s most explosive offense last year to 23 points in an outing featuring a new defensive scheme.

Perhaps the issue was by the time the 4th quarter of the contest rolled around, the Dolphins coaching staff had noticed that Jacksonville was looking to run the ball and the clock to close the game out. They may also have noticed that 17-year NFL veteran Calais Campbell was making his force felt literally from play one when he sacked Lawrence with his first snap in a Dolphins uniform.

If fans want to criticize predictable playcalling in that particular series as an issue when a gameplan that was working was sniffed out, that’s one thing. If critics believe that Jacksonville’s coaches should have thrown a pass in to utilize tight end Evan Engram or wide receiver Gabe Davis who led the Jags in receiving yards that day — fair enough. But bringing up Trevor or his contract as a reason for this loss just lacks vision for what Jacksonville was trying to do — and did successfully — for the first 43 minutes of this game.