Adrian Peterson

Bruce Irvin on Teddy Bridgewater: 'He was so scared'

Published Dec. 7, 2015 10:09 a.m. ET

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The Seattle Seahawks throttled the Minnesota Vikings on Sunday, using a suffocating performance against Adrian Peterson and four sacks of quarterback Teddy Bridgewater to shut out the Minnesota offense.

Bridgewater, a second-year starter, threw for just 118 yards on 28 attempts. The Seahawks hit him seven times, and all those shots might have took a toll on the young quarterback’s psyche.

“He was so scared,” said linebacker Bruce Irvin, via Mike Silver of NFL.com. “Teddy’s a really good quarterback, and he’s going to do some big things in this league. But we had him (rattled).”

Once Peterson (18 yards rushing) was taken away in the first half, the Seahawks feasted on the Vikings offensive line. Rookie Frank Clark had two sacks on Bridgewater, while Irvin and defensive end Michael Bennett provided the other two.

Sunday continued a troubling trend for the Vikings, who are as one-dimensional on offense as any team in football. When Peterson doesn’t rush for at least 98 yards this season, the Vikings are averaging just 11.8 points per game. Minnesota is also 1-4 in those five games.

Bridgewater’s development as a quarterback looks to be stunted. Not only are the Vikings leaning heavily on Peterson to move the offense, but when Bridgewater is asked to throw, his offensive line is rarely up to the task. The result has been 34 sacks and dozens of other hits on Minnesota’s tough but slender quarterback.

Several times on Sunday, Bridgewater took a vicious hit and was slow getting up. He never stays down, but all those hits add up in one way or another. It’s clear Bridgewater is becoming quicker to check down, likely because he knows his offensive line can’t keep pass-rushers off him for long. Either the ball comes out, or he’s going to take another nasty hit.

In a sense, Bridgewater is playing scared.

Could anyone blame him? He’s been asked to bail the Vikings out of impossible situations behind one of the NFL’s worst offensive lines. Against Seattle’s furious front seven on Sunday, Bridgewater was set up for failure. And plenty of pain.

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