It’s been nine months and one day since Teddy Bridgewater blew out his knee in practice.
Last week, the Vikings released video of Bridgewater dropping back to pass as part of his rehab. Even with the promising footage, general manager Rick Spielman would only say that Bridgewater’s return to the NFL is “still the unknown” and the “entire organization is just hoping” that he’ll play again.
But on Tuesday, Spielman told Jim Rome that Bridgewater “should be able to go” when he’s ready.
“You just gotta take it day to day,” Spielman said. “Doctors are pleased on how he’s recovering. Our trainers are doing an excellent job on the rehab. This was a very significant injury and there’s not a lot of history to put a timeline on this – especially at that position. It’s very difficult to predict, so we’re just taking it along. No expectations one way or another. When he’s ready, he should be able to go.”
It might not sound like much, but it’s a lot more than anyone from the organization has said since Bridgewater went down on Aug. 30.
On Mike Zimmer’s status away from the team
“Hopefully he’ll be back next week to get check up and see where we go from there,” Spielman told Rome.
Zimmer is away from the Vikings, resting and recovering at his ranch in Kentucky after undergoing an eighth operation on his right eye to help repair a detached retina. He could’ve had his eye surgeries done earlier in the offseason, but he didn’t want to miss any of the action leading up to the draft.
“He didn’t want to miss the combine, he didn’t want to miss the Senior Bowl, then we’re out at pro days and he didn’t want to miss any of the draft meetings,” Spielman explained. “Once we got through all that and we got through the draft, we said now it’s time to shut it down. Get out of here for a couple weeks, let’s let this thing heal and hopefully we’ll get a positive result. The most important thing is that you’re back and ready to go for sure either at the end of this offseason program – and be 100 percent healthy by the time we get to training camp because we definitely need his leadership.”
Spielman also talked a bit about Adrian Peterson, saying there’s no bad blood between him and the Vikings.
