All Things Teddy-Freaking-Bridgewater

Tjump…. I read Trump at first. 

Funky reminded me I did some film analysis back in 2015 on Special Ted, so here's a taste of some of that, from his division clinching, 99 yard passing, lefty INT day at Lameblow.


I threatened to post all of it if her and her cult of apologists keep proselytizing about their prophet Special Ted.

I seem to remember the Vikings Journal crowd going apoplectic over that fumble...instantly blaming Peterson of course. And the left-handed pick? Good times.

Oh and you expected to fill the trophy case with an average QB lol? But what's lacking here again is context. Over 50% of Teddy's yards are coming via YAC. He ranked at the bottom of the league in air/YAC ratio in both 2014 and 2015.

Did you see the charts I posted earlier? The ones that had some stats that focused on levels of aggressiveness? He was consistently ranking near the bottom of the league. Maybe I'm making a big leap from his lack aggressiveness to lack of confidence, but I don't know what else it would be. Plus it's not just the numbers. I've watched and charted every single Teddy pass myself in 2014 and 2015. I used to breakdown every game and post the results. I would pick about 20 pass plays a game and point out all the open receivers Teddy missed downfield via the all-22 view. I posted an example just a couple posts ago. I did that for every game. I don't know what else to call it when a QB consistently pulls the ball down, or hits a checkdown when he clearly has a guy open 10-15 yards downfield right in front of him, like that Packers play where he has 2 guys wide open right in front of him lol. After all that film study, that's the conclusion I came to based on the evidence. He lacks confidence or he's blind. The statistics support that conclusion as well.

Well no, because I'm trading a higher INT ratio (not extremely high) under the assumption the QB can connect downfield more often. Yeah it's pointless if the QB is only going to go 1/12. At that point you need a new QB lol. Plus I think we're too focused on the 40+ yard range. The sample size is way too small, and that's pretty much hail mary distance. Even in the 30-39 yard range the sample size is quite small for most QB's. Not much better than 40+ in fact. I would consider the 20-29 or even just 20+ to be taking an aggressive shot. I think even the 10-19 yard range can be a good indicator for an aggressive but smart QB. Teddy is again near the bottom of the league in percentage of passes attempted between the 10-19 range, and despite being the 4th most accurate in 2014 and 12th most accurate in 2015. And then when it comes to anything less than 9 yards, he's at the top of the league. That's a lot of short passes and easily explains his overall high completion percentage.

Haha cuz Luck isn't. Unfortunately the only thing YPA tells you is the result of the play. If Teddy throws a checkdown to McKinnon who breaks 2 tackles and gains 7 yards. That's 7 YPA for Teddy. If Luck throws the ball on a rope to Wayne 7 yards downfield, that's 7 YPA for Luck. I'm going to want the QB who can pickup most of the yards through the air. I'm going to guess those kind of QB's tend to have more success lol. Luck averaged 6.72 air yards per completion in 2014. Teddy was at 5.70. Luck missed most of 2015, but Teddy was down to 4.90 despite having better receiving targets than he did in 2014. That would put him 32nd in the league, and again another sign of regression from his rookie year.

These QB/receiver arguments are chicken and the egg type arguments. How do we know which is bad when they depend on each other? Maybe Johnson/Wright/Jennings seem bad because Teddy was incapable of getting them the ball, or what I would argue, lacked the confidence to throw them the ball lol. Johnson hasn't played anywhere else, so it's probably safe to say he wasn't a very good receiver. Although in 2014 he had a string of games where he looked pretty good. He seemed to be Teddy's favorite target for awhile. Wright had a career high in receptions in his first year with Newton last year lol. Not that it was a better year than any year with Teddy. And Jennings was a pro bowl receiver when Aaron Rodgers was throwing him the ball.

We could bring 2015 Mike Wallace into the equation. 2015 was by far his worst season statistically. Not the 2 seasons before when Tannehill was throwing him the ball or the 2 seasons afterward when Flacco was throwing him the ball. Teddy was the only one who seemed to have trouble finding or hitting Wallace downfield. Which is weird because Peterson had a pretty good year in 2015 so you'd think the defense would have been crowding the line which should've create more space downfield, and yet that's his worst year as far as throwing the ball downfield goes.

Teddy missed some guys here or there, but he also made a lot of good decisions and throws.

That quote was worded funny. Reign picked about 20 plays each game to highlight, but all weren't great, of course. But that's similar to most QBs.

I have NFL Game Pass. Maybe we can chat someday about you using it.

Watchu talkin bout Willis? That quote was perfect. I picked 20 plays every game where Teddy sucked. Wasn't difficult. Could have picked more but I had to draw the line somewhere.

And I just don't have the data on Cousins yet to do any "deep dives". And I haven't been in the mood to do any film analysis. It's the offseason. He's only been here a year and we're automatically stuck with him for 2 more anyway. I wasn't dunking on Teddy yet after his rookie year either. I know that wasn't Cousins rookie year, but it's his first year with the Vikings, so I'll give him that benefit. As with Teddy after his first year, I'm now on the fence with Cousins, and I'll go as he goes. If it's more of the same, I'm going to start dunking on him as I did Teddy. There's one thing I'm looking for, and that's improvement. That's it. That's all I care about. That's how I judge all players. Show me the improvement or GTFO.

And I judge the stupid Vikings by how proactive they are when things look like they're not working out. They have this knack of waiting 3 years to see if the current project busts before bringing in the next project. How bout we bring in the next project right now so we're not always behind 2 years? So dumb.

As far as Cousins goes, the Teddy crowd just seems to have this desperate need to pin me down as some Cousins apologist just because I'm not dunking on him yet lol. I haven't been praising him either. My support is entirely based on how well someone is playing.

I don't understand fans who fall in love with personalities. Personalities don't fill trophy cases, and no matter how big of a fan you become of someone, you're never getting invited over to their house for a beer and burgers lol. You're just fan girling. They're not going to be your buddy. Shut-up, Marcus Sherels is my little buddy but he's awesome. Otherwise I personally don't give 2 licks about any player off the field or what their personality might be. I only care about what value they bring to the Vikings and whether or not I think they can help us fill the trophy case. Marcus was still one of the best punt returners in the league so we're going to pay for letting him go. And he totally would have invited me over if I weren't so shy.

Believe it or not, most players aren't here because they adore the Vikings stupid fan base and want to see them happy, no they do it because the Vikings happen to be the team signing their paycheck. 95% of them aren't even from Minnesota. Accept Marcus, he is from Minnesota and is the only one who does it for all the right reasons. Rudolph is still a Bengals fan and would probably rather see them win a Super Bowl before the Vikings. Book it.

I'm a fan because I had to grow up and be indoctrinated into liking all the sorry ass teams in this god-forsaken loser state and I'm unable to change it no matter how irrational I know it to be. Well except when I stopped following the Twins and T-Wolves because the losing became so overwhelming. And I just never got into hockey because it's a boring sport. And now I'm running out of patients with the Vikings too because they let go of my little buddy and time is running out. That's why I have no tolerance for players who who show no signs of progress, so I won't be doing any apologizing for Cousins if he continues to be underwhelming. The honeymoon is over.

I'm already looking forward to what Sloter can do, but I have the feeling he'll be gone before we finally figure out Cousins isn't the answer because that's what this team does, waits too long to figure out someone sucks. And Sloter will end up replacing Rodgers over in Green Bay and he'll end up being the next Tom Brady. And if by some miracle Sloter does end up getting a shot here, then I'm sure he'll end up sucking. Cuz Vikings and Reignman!!! Then I'll have to that him too.

/end rant

Seems like double standards to me, Reignman can't stand Teddy-lovers but is a Sloter-lover himself... wait until VikingsBoss gets a load of this!