Zimmer: Teddy Bridgewater needs to refine mechanics

[Boon]

Most of his deep misses are overthrows, the vast majority. Arm strength isn't his issue, or mechanics, it's confidence. He thinks too much. And it doesn't help that since he has the worst protection in the league, judging from his top spot on the pressured quarterbacks list, they're always calling these rinky dink plays. Even with a track team at wr they can't get open, it's mind boggling. My take is a broken record, the offense and routes are predictable. Plain and simple

[mosscarter]

it's not mechanics or arm strength are you kidding me? all of his deep throws are lob passes and just because they are overthrown doesn't mean he has arm strength. bridgewater's poor mechanics won't be fixed. it is like the golf swing ever try even making a minor change and being consistent with it? its virtually impossible; i know because this past summer i learned to hit a draw off the tee after 20 years of slices. but, at this point i can only do it consistently maybe 1 out of 3 drives. it isn't necessarily his mechanics that scare me it is how terribly weak his arm is. they don't call plays down the field because he doesn't have the arm strength to pull them off. when he does throw down the field he just lobs it. that side arm motion will never exist for the long term, but what confuses me is that he only throws side arm some of the time. not all of the time. mike wallace has gotten open for every other team he's been with and you mean to tell me suddenly he can't get open with us? he is still one of the fastest wr's in the nfl. johnson, wallace, patterson, and even wright couldn't do a thing this year. but, the real reason is teddy bridgewater it isn't them. i love it when they say mike wallace can't get "separation" he might be the fastest player in the league. we have a major quarterback problem. randy moss wouldn't have had more than 2 td's receiving with teddy playing because he simply isn't capable of any downfield game whatsoever. and its not even close. we should have played tonight if he were able to throw for a single td against seattle. i'm sick and tired of people blindly defending his horrible play. he had 8 games of passing for under 200 yards that is beyond pathetic. we will never win with a qb that performs like that. this is a passing league and we have a terrible passer. 14 passing td's is laughable in today's nfl and no wonder we are the 31st ranked offense. the top tier qb's throw for 14 touchdowns in 3 or 4 games and it took teddy all 16.

[Raptorman]

Ah yes. This is a passing league. Sunday, two teams will square off in what will be a good game. Both of these teams have one thing in common. They both run 51% of the time. Doesn't matter which one wins, because I believe whoever wins will beat the AZ next week. AZ is a team the passes 55% of the time. My bet is that AZ won't make it to the Super Bowl. But we shall see.

[Boon]

We were the 13th ranked offense in 2013 with sub-100 and cassel throwing the ball, who are far worse than teddy, hint hint.....

[mosscarter]

the vast majority want peterson gone? explain this to me. and cassell has a far better arm than bridgewater.

[Boon]

the vast majority want peterson gone? explain this to me. and cassell has a far better arm than bridgewater.

Cassel is garbage.

And who the hell was talking about Peterson?

[PurpleKoolaid]

Another 'lets vent our frustrations on Teddy' thread? Dont you guys have enough threads for this?

[Mothman]

6) I'm not sure where this sudden conservative approach to "make the safe throw" came from but it wasn't present in college. It's either a coaching approach, receiver talent (or lack thereof) and/or smaller "windows" than he's used to and he hasn't adjusted. But gut is it's the latter but it may be a combination of the others. The hesitation is there and it wasn't (at least not to this degree) in college. There's also a fine line between "making a safe throw" and "making the right decision." Sometimes the safe throw is the right one. That, more than anything, I think is determined by your perception of him. If he throws to a covered receiver, you could say "That was an awful decision! That guy was clearly covered!" Or you could say, "He took a chance. That's what good quarterbacks do!" Or if he checks down: "Classic Teddy. Always checking down." OR "Nobody was open, so that was a great decision to get seven yards." It's in the eye of the beholder. I will again bring up several beat and bloggers that have said after watching tape of Teddy's games that he more often than not made the correct decision (protection fails and covered receivers).

It's not as if there aren't dissenting views about it that out there. For example, here's a recent one:

http://www.nfl.com/news/story/0ap300000 ... ve-in-2016

Even with the lack of weapons and suspect blocking, Bridgewater still needs to up his aggression. There were plenty of times his game tape showed open receivers only to see him bail on the play too early or get gun-shy about pulling the trigger. Bridgewater was the opposite of a gunslinger: overly conservative to the offense's detriment.

His stats bear out the penchant for conservatism. Bridgewater piled up 10 games with fewer than 200 yards passing in his second season, including Sunday's playoff tilt in which he completed only six passes of more than five yards downfield. The quarterback had just one three-game streak in 2015 in which he went over the 200-yard mark. It's the opposite of what we saw from him down the stretch of his rookie year, when he finished averaging 273 yards passing in his final four contests of 2014.

As far as I'm concerned, this isn't simply an "eye of the beholder" situation. There's an element of that but sometimes the safe throw isn't the right throw. Sometimes it's just the safe throw. Passing up an open TD, an open first down or a potential big gain to safely check the ball down or throw it away is excessively conservative.

[Mothman]

To expand on the notion that Bridgewater's stats bear out the penchant for conservatism... FiestaVike wrote above that he thought Bridgewater "played great, especially in the 2nd half of the season". I've been thinking about that. Let's assume the second half of the season consisted of the last 8 games (beginning with the game @ Oakland) and the playoff game. Bridgewater had an undeniably great game against the Bears in Minnesota. He excelled in every aspect of his performance that day and even had a great day statistically, with 4 TD passes and a TD run. Unfortunately, over the course of the other 8 games in that stretch, he threw just 4 TD passes to go with 3 INTs. The Vikes went 5-4 in the second half of the season, just 1-4 against playoff teams. In those 5 games against playoff teams (2 against GB, 2 against SEA and 1 against Arizona) the offense scored a total of 55 points. They averaged 11 points in those games!

These stats are obviously not indicative of an offense with a QB playing great (ie: considerably above average) football. They're indicative of an offense with an overly conservative QB and a struggling passing game. It's not struggling because of Bridgewater alone (as we've discussed throughly this season) but he is a key factor in those struggles.

It strikes me as the biggest elephant in the room because it's an obvious truth but it's difficult to get a lot of people to even acknowledge it.

[dead_poet]

To expand on the notion that Bridgewater's stats bear out the penchant for conservatism... FiestaVike wrote above that he thought Bridgewater "played great, especially in the 2nd half of the season". I've been thinking about that. Let's assume the second half of the season consisted of the last 8 games (beginning with the game @ Oakland) and the playoff game. Bridgewater had an undeniably great game against the Bears in Minnesota. He excelled in every aspect of his performance that day and even had a great day statistically, with 4 TD passes and a TD run. Unfortunately, over the course of the other 8 games in that stretch, he threw just 4 TD passes to go with 3 INTs. The Vikes went 5-4 in the second half of the season, just 1-4 against playoff teams. In those 5 games against playoff teams (2 against GB, 2 against SEA and 1 against Arizona) the offense scored a total of 55 points. They averaged 11 points in those games!

These stats are obviously not indicative of an offense with a QB playing great (ie: considerably above average) football. They're indicative of an offense with an overly conservative QB and a struggling passing game. It's not struggling because of Bridgewater alone (as we've discussed throughly this season) but he is a key factor in those struggles.

It strikes me as the biggest elephant in the room because it's an obvious truth but it's difficult to get a lot of people to even acknowledge it.

I think most people acknowledge Teddy needs to get better. The offense as a whole needs improvement top to bottom. I don't think that's an elephant at this point. If it is, it's one people see.

[Mothman]

I think most people acknowledge Teddy needs to get better. The offense as a whole needs improvement top to bottom. I don't think that's an elephant at this point. If it is, it's one people see.

Okay. I tried to make some more relevant points above so I see no reason to split hairs about that one. If most people see it, that's good. I do have my doubts about that though. It looks to me like there's clearly some denial going on.

[indianation65]

Zip and bullets get footballs into the receiver arms where there is "supposedly" no separation. We all know that term, "no separation," hence, take a sack, scramble, dump, whatever. Not every throw has to have loft. (The rub--every qb gets ball batted down. It happens.)

Addendum: I'm not saying to always do it, not to do it on double coverage, but zip it sometimes across the middle, flanking in the end zone, whatever. Sure, accuracy, downfield completions and of course poise, makes everyone see a qb as a top-10'er, but in the beginning, it will start to strike some fear in defenses if the qb can start completing some of the dangerous "no separation" passes.

Mechanics? Sure, start polishing the rifle. It's a part of the machine!

...wisdom

[mosscarter]

i think we will get the o-line fixed up before next season zimmer has said it is a priority. but, the bigger question be who will be our receivers? diggs and wright are decent (i think diggs will be really good eventually) but really small guys.

[dead_poet]

i think we will get the o-line fixed up before next season zimmer has said it is a priority. but, the bigger question be who will be our receivers? diggs and wright are decent (i think diggs will be really good eventually) but really small guys.

CJ by default. Maybe a FA and/or rookie as well. God forbid Patterson get an opportunity.

[losperros]

CJ by default. Maybe a FA and/or rookie as well. God forbid Patterson get an opportunity.

I'd like to see what Johnson and Diggs could do as the starters, especially if the other concerns about the passing game got fixed. If Bridgewater could improve some of his mechanics and get some decent blocking for a change, that would significantly help all the skill players.