The Minnesota Vikings’ worst fears were confirmed on Tuesday night, as quarterback Teddy Bridgewater’s MRI revealed a dislocated left knee and a torn ACL, ending his 2016 season less than two weeks before it was supposed to begin.
Advertisement
Zimmer called off practice after 25 minutes, and the rest of the team walked off the field while Bridgewater was being attended to.
Professional sports sees awful injuries to all types of players, but in the National Football League it seems to affect certain positions more than other and quarterback is one of those positions.
Losing Bridgewater would be a huge blow for Minnesota, which went 11-5 and won the NFC North last season with him starting all 16 games, and looked to be the division favorite against this year. The visible and audible frustration from Teddy’s teammates is a reflection of the team’s optimism going into the upcoming season. Taylor Heinicke, last year’s No. 3 quarterback, has been out all preseason with an injury, and undrafted rookie Joel Stave has struggled mightily at times during practices.
According to injury doctor Will Carroll, appearing on Minnesota radio station ESPN 1500, the Minnesota Vikings training staff may have saved Teddy Bridgewater’s life yesterday with their quick response to his brutal knee injury.
Vikings coach Mike Zimmer said he briefly spoke with Bridgewater after the injury and said he told the 23-year-old, “Hang in there”. Our best wishes are certainly with him.
“Our No. 1 concern is the welfare for our players”, Zimmer said.
The Vikings, who play the Los Angeles Rams Thursday night at U.S. Bank Stadium, will open the regular season September 11 at Tennessee.
“I can”t predict injuries, I just can”t do that. We all feel awful if it is significant, real significant, for Teddy, but this is about the team.
In the meantime, general manager Rick Spielman has been busy checking into other quarterbacks who might help the suddenly short-handed team. It was a tough day, the sun came up the next day, the world kept spinning. “I feel like we’ll still be able to be a balanced offense and we’re just going to go from there”. We’re going to try to figure out as coaches the very best way we can beat the team we are playing that week.
Advertisement
Some of the Detroit Lions’ players themselves took to Twitter and expressed their support for Bridgewater and the hopes for a speedy recovery.
