Will Teddy Bridgewater sink or swim at the Vikings in Week 12?
By Dean Jones
What Teddy Bridgewater must do to succeed
Providing that Teddy Bridgewater isn’t limited in any way with an MCL sprain that forced him to miss last weekend’s shutout win against the Lions, there is an opportunity for the quarterback to make significant inroads on a suspect defense in Minnesota.
The Carolina Panthers will be counting on their signal-caller to hit the ground running. Getting off to a fast start is going to be key in this one and if they can do this, it will put additional pressure on opposing quarterback Kirk Cousins to make a difference.
Bridgewater is an accurate passer and one only has to look at the success Andy Dalton had in Week 11 to see what sort of impact he can make. The Cowboys got the ball out quickly to negate Minnesota’s pass rush with great effect, which probably won’t have gone unnoticed by Carolina’s offensive coordinator Joe Brady when coming up with a gameplan this week.
Rookie cornerback Jeff Gladney looks like a tremendous prospect, but the Vikings aren’t getting much in the way of production from elsewhere on the unit. Mike Hughes and Holton Hill are long-term absentees who were hardly playing well before their trip to IR, And although first-year player Cameron Dantzler started well, things have tailed off since.
This leaves the Panthers with a real opportunity to put their star receiver trio of Robby Anderson, D.J. Moore, Curtis Samuel to good use. Brady will call the plays, but Bridgewater will be tasked with getting them the football efficiently.