First-team work expected for new Vikings QB Bridgewater
Days after dropping down draft boards, Teddy Bridgewater appears poised to move up the depth chart.
Bridgewater, the former University of Louisville quarterback, will get some reps with the Minnesota Vikings' first team this offseason during "organized team activities," coach Mike Zimmer told reporters Friday. OTAs follow rookie camp in which Bridgewater impressed his new team.
"(Bridgewater) is throwing the ball good," Zimmer said, according to the Minneapolis Star Tribune. "I think he's got a good presence, a good command of the way he's taking things. It was good for him to be out here with the veteran quarterbacks a little bit last week for a few days."
The Vikings traded into the first round to take Bridgewater, who after his junior season at U of L was thought to be a potential No. 1 pick, at 32nd overall. Now he'll be on the field at times with star running back Adrian Peterson and other pieces of Minnesota's starting offense.
Zimmer said Bridgewater hasn't moved up from his No. 3 spot on the Vikings' depth chart — not yet, at least. He'll compete for playing time with 10-year NFL veteran Matt Cassel and Christian Ponder, who the Vikings selected 12th overall in the 2011 draft.
"I'm just eager to get better each and every day," Bridgewater said.
Predictably, Bridgewater has quickly grasped Minnesota's offense and its terminology.
"It's not like, 'Hey, I'm throwing an out now,'" Zimmer told the Star Tribune. "He would say the whole formation, the whole play, what it's on and go from there, just repeat it as he goes. That was impressive."
• Calvin Pryor explained early on why the hard-hitting safety doesn't wear a mouthpiece while playing. The former U of L safety wants the competition to hear him.
"With me being a rookie, that doesn't mean anything," Pryor, now with the New York Jets, told the New York Daily News. "I am who I am. I'm going to talk trash, I'm going to be myself, and people who don't like me just going to have to get used to it."
Pryor, not intimidated by the NFL so far, continued by saying he'd talk even while defending a well-known receiver — say, the Arizona Cardinals' Larry Fitzgerald.
"He's human right?" Pryor told the paper. "I have no problem at all. We're all football players."
Added coach Rex Ryan: "There's gonna be a lot of jerseys with Pryor's name on the back because I have a funny feeling he's going to become one of the more popular Jets."
• Former U of L defensive end Marcus Smith, who figures to fit in as an outside linebacker at the next level, admitted he's heard criticism aimed at the Philadelphia Eagles for selecting him in the first round of the NFL draft.
"I know a lot of fans want to figure out why the Eagles picked me," Smith told CSN Philadelphia. "I feel like I can become a great player and I feel like I can become the player Coach Kelly wants me to be.
"…It doesn't bother me. It just puts a chip on my shoulder. It makes me want to prove to people even more why they picked me."
Smith said he'd like to see playing time early in his rookie season. His main competition — but at the same time, a player he mentioned as a mentor early on — is veteran Trent Cole, who led the Eagles last season with eight sacks.
• Former U of L linebacker Preston Brown has already signed a contract with the Buffalo Bills, who took him in the third round. The team announced his signing Saturday before opening its three-day rookie camp.
"It seems exciting and what I've read so far there are a lot of blitzes and different packages in there that I've learned," Brown said last week when announced to Buffalo's media. "It seems fun because I know we blitzed a lot at Louisville and I'll have fun here doing that."
Terms of the Cincinnati native's NFL deal were not disclosed.
Jonathan Lintner can be reached at (502) 582-4199; follow him on Twitter @JonathanLintner.
