The Minnesota Vikings season is over game wise but the offseason has already produced great news involving a current player and a former Vikings legend.
Friday January 30th the NFL announced that Vikings quarterback, Teddy Bridgewater was named Pepsi rookie of the year which is voted on by the fans.
Teddy as we know was drafted 32nd in the 2014 NFL draft and early on looked like he would be on the bench watching veteran, Matt Cassel run the team. The unfortunate injury happened to Cassel and Teddy’s debut came in week 4 at home vs the Atlanta Falcons.
Teddy showed the NFL fans why most so called experts claimed Teddy was the most pro ready quarterback.
Bridgewater was named Pepsi rookie of the week twice this season with home performances in Week 4 vs Atlanta and then in Week 13 vs Carolina.
Teddy’s quarterback rating of 85.2 broke the Vikings rookie record amongst many other he shattered. In Weeks 13-17 Teddy was 1st in completion percent with a 72.1, 2nd in passer rating with a 103.0 and 2nd in yards per attempt with 8.79 amongst all NFL quarterbacks.
Bridgewater’s 85.2 passer rating was 7th best in NFL history amongst all rookie quarterbacks and his 64.4 percent completion was 3rd all-time as well.
The month of December Teddy was first in the NFL with an 9.18 average yard pass attempt, 2nd in completion with a 72.3, 4th in passer rating with a 99.8 and finally 6th in the league with 1092 yards.
Bridgewater was named to the PFWA All-Rookie team which he now becomes the first Vikings quarterback in team history to have this honor and he is the 10th Vikings since 2007
Saturday January 31st Vikings legend, Mick Tingelhoff finally was elected in to the Hall of Fame and will join 7 others in Canton, Ohio on August 8th this year for the big induction.
The other 7 were Jerome Bettis, Tim Brown, Charles Haley, Bill Polian, Junior Seau, Will Shields and Ron Wolf.
Mick will be the 13th Viking player in team history for this honor. Tingelhoff was this year’s Senior Committee nominee.
Tingelhoff started with the Vikings back in 1962 as an undrafted free agent. Mick started all 240 regular season and 19 playoff games during his 17 year career with Minnesota. He never missed a start from 1962-1978. He was part of 10 Vikings divisional teams and 4 Super Bowl teams.
Mick was All-Pro 7 consecutive seasons (19764-1970) and was a Pro Bowl selection six consecutive years (1964-1969). He was the Vikings center and also served as the long snapper.
Tingelhoff snapped the ball to Hall of Fame quarterback, Fran Tarkenton and blocked for 4 running backs that made the Pro Bowl. They were Tommy Mason, Bill Brown, Dave Osborn and Chuck Foreman.
Mick becomes the third Vikings in the past 4 years to get the call to Canton. The other two are Cris Carter (2013) and Chris Doleman (2012). He is also the 7th in the past 10 years. The others are Carter (2013), Doleman (2012), John Randle (2010), Randall McDaniel (2009), Gary Zimmerman (2008), Carl Eller (2004) and Ron Yary (2001)
I say congrats to Teddy and Mick for these accomplishments. It is just one more reason I love the Vikings.
Thanks for reading
Todd Walkingstick
