Teddy Bridgewater’s return to Minnesota falls short on ‘panicked’ play call

It was Teddy Bridgewater’s homecoming. His return to the team that drafted him and expected Bridgewater to be its franchise quarterback.

Instead, it turned into the Carolina Panthers’ most disappointing loss of the season. Not because of the expectations that followed Bridgewater or the team as a whole.

But it was the way the Panthers lost the game. The way that it slipped out of their hands at the end.

With 2:10 remaining in the game, the Panthers got the ball at the Vikings’ 9-yard line courtesy of a muffed punt by Minnesota returner Chad Beebe.

After running the ball twice, and forcing the Vikings to use their timeouts, Bridgewater threw a pass intended for a wide open DJ Moore in the middle of the end zone, but it fell incomplete and stopped the clock. There was no defender even in the vicinity of Moore.

The wide receiver left the field with an ankle injury after the play. The extent of his injury is not yet known.

But Bridgewater clearly showed frustration with the way that final play came in. The Panthers were out of timeouts, and he did not have enough time to figure out what defense the Vikings were in. About 13 seconds remained on the play clock by the time he was able to communicate the play to the huddle. Only six remained when he actually got set to run the play. Otherwise, Bridgewater said, he likely would have checked to a run play.

“I think we just got to be better from top to bottom from the sideline to executing on the field. It was one of those deals where I feel like we might have panicked a little bit, trying to figure out what play call to call in that situation,” Bridgewater said. “Honestly, we called a great play. We didn’t have enough time to execute, but it was a play where we wanted to shift Robby (Anderson), to get a good man/zone read to see what defense they’re in. Because we were against the clock, we just had to rush into it.”

Bridgewater says he tried to get the ball to Moore, who was able to get somewhat open, but it wasn’t the “right look.” He acknowledged that the play needed to happen anyway, but felt they would have been more successful had the decision on what play to run come from offensive coordinator Joe Brady just a couple seconds earlier.

“I think if we would have gotten the play call in or we would have been able to make the decision sooner on what call to make,” Bridgewater said. “I think we see the look, we check to a run play and, hopefully, we score, make the clock go down.”

The quarterback was also injured on the drive, his arm got “sideswiped or something,” but he was OK after the game just a week after missing a start due to a right knee injury.

The Vikings, of course, turned the 1:51 remaining on the clock into a game-winning, 75-yard drive, despite having no timeouts. The Panthers got the ball back and kicker Joey Slye missed a 54-yard attempt. Slye put the responsibility on himself, but the game shouldn’t have gotten to that point.

For Bridgewater, the return to Minnesota ended up being among his worst performances of the season.

He finished the game 19-of-36 passing for 267 yards, one touchdown and a red-zone interception that came when Anderson and running back Mike Davis found themselves in the exact same area of the field. Instead of finding either player, the ball was picked off by linebacker Eric Kendricks.

Bridgewater completed a season-low 52.8% of his passes. The offense went 0 for 3 in the red zone and walked away with just three red-zone points — a 21-yard Joey Slye field goal. In total, only 13 of the 27 points scored in the one-point loss came from the offensive side of the ball.

“We couldn’t score the ball, we couldn’t score on offense,” head coach Matt Rhule said. “We missed a field goal, we threw a pick in the red zone.”

All of that, and the offense didn’t even give up a single sack (only three QB hits), and Anderson got highly involved once again, scoring his first touchdown since Week 1.

Bridgewater pointed to the offense needing to be more aggressive throughout the game and continue the “killer instinct.” But there were points that should have been on the board, including a blocked field goal in the third quarter.

When asked about the emotions of the day, playing against the team that drafted him 32nd overall in 2014, Bridgewater said he was just in Minnesota to play a football game. But it was the offense that failed the Panthers in Week 12 and a return trip for Bridgewater that just didn’t come together.