The Minnesota Vikings drafted their latest quarterback of the future, Louisville’s Teddy Bridgewater, at the ass end of the first round last Thursday.
There was some speculation that the Cleveland Browns were going to select Bridgewater after they moved up from No. 26 to No. 22. Instead, they took John Football.
The way Bridgewater tells it, he made that happen by telling his agent he didn’t want to play in Cleveland.
“I actually told my agent that’s not the place where I wanted to be,” Bridgewater told Dan Patrick.
Except his whole plan backfired. He ended up getting drafted by the only organization in the NFL that’s worse than the Cleveland Browns — the Minnesota Vikings.
Teddy probably thought he was free and clear and would get picked by one of the better teams in the league. Here’s who picked after the Browns at No. 22 — Kansas City, Cincinnati, San Diego, Philadelphia, Arizona, Carolina, New England, San Francisco, Denver and Seattle (before trading the pick to Minnesota).
But no! Thwarted by the Vikings and condemned to being a loser from here to eternity!
Whether the Browns wanted Bridgewater or not — they have denied that they were even interested — there’s good reason no team picked him before No. 32. Bridewater had a pretty awful pro day back in March, which hurt his stock tremendously.
Now people are wondering if he can play in cold weather. Teddy actually wore a glove at Louisville, which is one thing. Another thing that personnel types point out is Bridewater has smaller hands than most quarterbacks. They think he’ll have trouble gripping the ball when it’s really cold.
That remains to be seen. What doesn’t is that the Florida native didn’t perform as well when the temperature was below 50 as he did when it was above.
His completion percentage dropped eight points, from 71-63 percent. His touchdown to interception rate was also worse. Bridewater threw 48 TDs and 13 INTs above 50 and 20 TDs and 9 INTs below.
Oh, and he’s never started a game when the temperature was below freezing.
But the Queens play in a dome!
Not for the next two years they don’t. They’ll be playing at TCF Bank Stadium, which is the home of the Gophers and an open air stadium, while the Hormel Chili Dome is built.
So way to go and good luck, Ted!