Bridgewater hides frustration after tough loss to Dolphins

EDEN PRAIRIE, Minn. – Teddy Bridgewater really does get upset at times. He admitted it Wednesday.
Bridgewater, the Vikings rookie quarterback, is known for his coolness. Fiery coach Mike Zimmer quipped he’s “like the anti-me.”
Bridgewater, though, said he got upset about Minnesota’s 37-35 loss last Sunday at Miami. He just made sure he hid it.
“I kept it in,” Bridgewater said. “I try not to show it. I just try to remain composed throughout the course of the game. You know the camera is always on you at this position. For me, I just grab a towel, squeeze it, take my anger out on the towel, and just don’t let it show.”
There wasn’t a lot for Bridgewater to get angry about that he did. He completed 19 of 26 passes for 259 yards with two touchdowns and an interception.
Bridgewater could have had three touchdowns had a controversial pass to tight end Chase Ford late in the second quarter not been ruled out at the Dolphins’ 1-yard line. The interception in the third quarter wasn’t his fault, the ball bouncing off running back Matt Asiata’s hands.
Bridgewater had plenty of reason to be displeased with Minnesota’s defense, which gave up a season-high 493 yards. He wasn’t specific about where his anger was directed about a game in which the Vikings lost leads of 14-0, 17-7 and 35-28 in the fourth quarter.
“I was pretty upset this weekend,” Bridgewater said. “This past weekend, it’s one of those deals where we just let a game get away. We work hard. We compete every day in practice. We just have to continue to finish games and we’ll continue to just work towards that.”
Entering Sunday’s regular-season finale against Chicago at TCF Bank Stadium, Bridgewater needs 290 yards passing to become the first Vikings rookie quarterback to throw for 3,000 in a season. He’s completed 242 of 377 passes for 64.2 percent with 2,710 yards, 13 touchdowns and 11 interceptions.
While there are questions about whether Bridgewater can become a top-flight NFL quarterback, one is whether he can develop into a more vocal leader who is willing to get in the face of teammates. Despite being known as a nice guy, Bridgewater insisted he’s “very comfortable” doing that when needed.
“We have a great group of veterans here and they told us young guys when we first arrived here that, “Hey, everyone has a voice on this team. If you see one guy not doing it right, you get on them,’ ” Bridgewater said. “It was (defensive end) Brian Robison that actually said that.
“It just gave me a comfort zone, that if anything ever comes up, I can just get on a guy, tell a guy, ‘Hey, you should have done this or done that,’ whether on the playing field or off the playing field.’ ”
Still, Bridgewater said he hasn’t felt the need to do that very often. If it happened last Sunday, Zimmer didn’t notice.
“He’s very calm all the time,” Zimmer said. “He’s very even-tempered. I’m trying to think if I’ve ever seen him upset that you can visually see, and I have not seen it.”
Zimmer said earlier this month “this franchise is Teddy’s” once he “decides to be the leader of the football team.” Zimmer has not specifically called for Bridgewater to be more fiery, but did acknowledge Wednesday that perhaps the personalities of the two eventually will move “a little closer” to one another.
“Maybe I’ll settle down and he’ll get going,” Zimmer said. “I don’t know. I just want Teddy to be him and I’m always going to be me. That’s one thing that the players, whether they like it or not, they know I’m going to be me. They know that Teddy is going to be Teddy, good, bad or indifferent.”
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