The Totally Transcendent Teddy Thread

[perrynoid]

Bold prediction: having Cook on this team will improve Bradford's productivity on 3rd down.  While SB has his flaws, it will help to have a 3rd down back who can occasionally make people miss and get the first down, or maybe even score a TD.

[Heimdallr]

Just now, perrynoid said:

or maybe even score a TD.

Woooah, lets not get crazy here. Isn't it a penalty for a RB to score a TD? 

[JDBrocks]

2 minutes ago, Heimdallr said:

Woooah, lets not get crazy here. Isn't it a penalty for a RB to score a TD? 

At least in the passing game.

[perrynoid]

4 minutes ago, Heimdallr said:

Woooah, lets not get crazy here. Isn't it a penalty for a RB to score a TD? 

Ha ha you are right.  What I am saying is, watching games last year, the offensive players did not help Bradford out very much.  His stats would look better if RB's in particular broke a few more tackles.  Our run game was non-existent, and the OL just had too many significant injuries.  Additionally, he did not get to spend an off season learning the playbook and gaining chemistry with his teammates.  I am optimistic he will have a decent year this year, and hopefully help us win that elusive trophy we have been longing for.

[Krauser]

13 hours ago, Klomp said:

Unless you've seen the playbook, how can you say for certain that a pass to an RB is a checkdown? It's very possible it was his first read.

And even still, a pass behind the sticks doesn't necessarily mean the player is going to be tackled behind the sticks. Someone like Cook is arguably our most talented skill position player with the ball in his hands. Shouldn't they try to get the ball to the best player and trust him to make a play, or is that only for when it fits a certain narrative?

A "failed completion" is still much better than an interception. Not sure why the belief here is that more interceptions would be better.

Anyone who understands the game of football can tell the difference between a throw short of the sticks that's designed to pick up YAC (like a RB screen) vs a checkdown. The 3rd and 12 throw to Cook in Buffalo was a checkdown. Bradford looked downfield first. Cook had no blockers and caught the ball with no realistic chance of converting the 1st down. 

No one is asking Bradford to throw more interceptions. But the fact is that effective NFL QBs complete throws in tight windows downfield to sustain drives. Bradford played a few great games last year (especially weeks 2-5), but the rest of his season was unfortunately fairly ineffective despite the high completion percentage. The reason why he could lead an unproductive offense despite completing an NFL record high percentage of his passes was that he mostly threw short and settled for checkdowns. 

Going forward, I want the Vikings QB to be able to lead an effective, productive offense. Bradford turns 30 this year and has 6 seasons under his belt. At this point, he's a known commodity. He's got some great assets in terms of arm strength and accuracy (especially deep accuracy), but he hasn't been able to produce. Maybe he can do better if the OL improves to not-terrible, and a better running game helps keep the offense on schedule, but I'm skeptical. 

For the record, I made the same criticisms of Teddy in preseason in 2014 and 2015, for the same reason (settling for checkdowns). But Teddy was a young, still improving QB, and he did show considerable improvement in 2016 preseason. I was hopeful we were going to turn the page as an offense under Bridgewater last year. It was sad to see the team fall into the same (worse, even) pattern as Teddy's first 2 years, only under a full priced veteran QB who cost us a 1st round pick. 

[Purplexing]

8 hours ago, JDBrocks said:

@Purplexing, Why do you need justification on this matter? Why can't people on an internet forum just have opinions? It's pretty clear that there isn't a large enough sample size, and that the conditions under which both players have performed are so drastically different that it's impossible to make a cut and dried conclusion. Which leaves.... Opinions, speculation, preference, the eyeball test, etc. 

Here's a twist to bake your noodle: What if NIETHER guy is the QBOTF? This is not a binary question.

What ever stat you are looking for doesn't exist. Additionally, it seems as though you have already made up your mind that Bradford is the better QB, if I am following your post above.

Which stats have been posted that aren't credible? Why are they not credible? You certainly have a lot of opinions for a guy accusing others of conjecture/contriving/bias.

 

I've seen posters, months ago, say they believe one guy or the other is the QBOTF, and I want them to step forward with their justifications.  It's that simple.  Contrived reasons seem to be the only justifications I've previoulsy read.  So, this recent question gives people who are / were convinced of a specific QBOTF a chance to substantiate their opinion.  Stats or other reasons seem to be the logical first thing to check.

[SteelKing728]

Teddy Bridgewater, who is coming back from his horrific knee injury that caused him to miss all of last year with the Minnesota Vikings, is making his appearance in a new children’s book series. That book series, “Little Bear Teddy,” is written by Erika Cardona. Cardona in the past has been described as Bridgewater’s girlfriend, and in the bio on the book website, it says that she “decided to write these stories based on her best friend’s dream.”

In a case of life imitating daytime talk radio, Bridgewater now has a children’s book named after him, as envisioned by Dan LeBatard over a year ago. Of course, it’s not entitled “Teddy Bridgewater,” as far as we know does not involve a stuffed animal saving a town from a flood, and does not include a pig best friend named Kevin Pittsnogle.

http://thebiglead.com/2017/08/16/teddy-bridgewater-is-the-inspiration-for-a-real-new-childrens-book-named-little-bear-teddy/

I bet Sam Bradford doesn't have a book written about him!! Lulz

[swede700]

 

Quote

 

On one fine day in March, Chip called up the Rams.

A trade was commenced, the green Iggles had Sam.

Oh, the places you'll throw. The fans surely won't boo.

Even if the steep cost was Nick Foles and a two.

 

 

http://www.phillyvoice.com/oh-places-youll-throw-childrens-book-about-sam-bradford/

[swede700]

Or, if you want me to be more serious...

https://www.amazon.com/Playing-Purpose-Inside-Quarterbacks-Bradford/dp/1616262893

[SteelKing728]

Haha, that first one was great! I'll never doubt Sam in that aspect again!

On a slightly different note: (credit NFL general)

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B5d9o34zyHM1M2lRckhnbk1OUlk/view?usp=sharing

This is where Ted and Sam rank on deep ball statistics. Sam is barely above Teddy but both are near the bottom.

What do we make of this, Vikings fans?

[Krauser]

Where are those numbers from? 

They've got Bridgewater's 2014 numbers wrong:

• Spreadsheet 2014: 177/291 for 2221, 8 / 11, 78.0
• Actual 2014: 259/402 for 2919, 14 / 12, 85.2

Ranking a list of QBs by passer rating is a bad idea anyway (it's not a great stat), but Teddy's career PR is 87.0, which puts him in the middle of this list (between Luck and Stafford), not 84.5, which has him ranked near the bottom and tied with Flacco and Bradford. 

Bridgewater's intermediate (10-25 yards, not just 20) passing stats have been stellar, but his deep passing (25+) has been mediocre to terrible. He does better on film reviews (Cian Fahey, PFF, the Deep Ball Project) than raw stats that don't take into account drops, etc. 

He was really good throwing downfield in preseason last year before the injury. I think he could still become a good enough deep passer if he recovers fully and can get back on track with his development. 

[CriminalMind]

i think we need to accept the high probability that neither TB or SB are actual legit QBOTF types. Most likely SB is who is always was and TB is who he never will be. Unfortuantely we'll continue to waste having this greaf defense since we're likely to have a bottom 7 offense.

we've/we're wasted the time when the good defense was mostly cheap and we might likely waste the good defense now that they are becoming relatively fair cost, making improvement to offense even harder.

i'll continue to hope that SB looks better with a run game & actual 1st team OL in front of him. 

[Cearbhall]

It is easy to accept the high probability that neither TB or SB are legit QBOTF types. I was never sold on TB being a QBOTF type. He was coming along nicely and there were high hopes before he injured himself but we were never sold. With the injury, there were questions about whether he would ever play again.

We knew the moment they traded for SB that he was an extreme longshot to be a QBOTF.

Still the Vikings should be able to have an offense a lot better than bottom seven in the league with either QB. SB is average. The Vikings offensive line is what is holding them back from being average to above average as an offense. With an average to above average offensive line both SB and TB would look a lot better.

[gopherwrestler]

On 8/17/2017 at 1:50 PM, SteelKing728 said:

Teddy Bridgewater, who is coming back from his horrific knee injury that caused him to miss all of last year with the Minnesota Vikings, is making his appearance in a new children’s book series. That book series, “Little Bear Teddy,” is written by Erika Cardona. Cardona in the past has been described as Bridgewater’s girlfriend, and in the bio on the book website, it says that she “decided to write these stories based on her best friend’s dream.”

In a case of life imitating daytime talk radio, Bridgewater now has a children’s book named after him, as envisioned by Dan LeBatard over a year ago. Of course, it’s not entitled “Teddy Bridgewater,” as far as we know does not involve a stuffed animal saving a town from a flood, and does not include a pig best friend named Kevin Pittsnogle.

http://thebiglead.com/2017/08/16/teddy-bridgewater-is-the-inspiration-for-a-real-new-childrens-book-named-little-bear-teddy/

I bet Sam Bradford doesn't have a book written about him!! Lulz

Completely stole this idea from the Dan LeBatard show.

[gopherwrestler]

Not huge news or anything, imagine if he was somehow cleared to play the last preseason game