F-I-O, Matt Rhule said — and QB Teddy Bridgewater is doing exactly that for Panthers
The Carolina Panthers have a quarterback playing very well right now.
And when a team has a very good quarterback — as we were reminded of once again in Carolina’s 31-21 win over Arizona on Sunday — the world of possibilities open up dramatically.
Teddy Bridgewater played a dazzling game Sunday. Well, it was quietly dazzling, which is Bridgewater’s style. He threw for 276 yards and two touchdowns, converting one third down and red-zone opportunity after another. But his best play actually came on an un-Teddy moment — a juking, spinning, diving 18-yard touchdown run.
“Awesome,” Carolina center Matt Paradis said, describing that run. “Unexpected, but awesome.”
It was Bridgewater’s first TD run in nearly five years. He generally doesn’t do that sort of thing. He last scored on the ground on Dec. 20, 2015, which was back in his Minnesota days and, more to the point, back before he tore up his knee so badly he missed almost two full seasons.
I try to avoid comparing Bridgewater to Cam Newton as much as I can, because it’s not really fair to either player. They are very different quarterbacks. But in this case, I will, because Bridgewater’s run was very much the sort of play Newton would make.
His postgame description of the run, though, was very un-Cam. While Newton always had something funny or dramatic to say about any touchdown scored in a win, Bridgewater described it like this: “I was just out there trying to play football and, you know, trying to score touchdowns in the red zone.”
As for the significance of the rush being his first post-injury rushing TD, Bridgewater said it never entered his mind.
Bridgewater wasn’t perfect. He tried to force one ball into double coverage and got it intercepted. There were a couple of others that came close to being picked off. But he also completed so many tough passes. And he made it very difficult to guess who he’s targeting near the end zone — this time it was running back Reggie Bonnafon and tight end Ian Thomas who caught his two TD passes rather than any of his wide receivers.
It was helpful that the offensive line — missing left tackle Russell Okung for the second game in a row — didn’t allow a sack and got a collective game ball, presented by Bridgewater, afterward. And the Panthers ran the ball effectively, too, as Mike Davis and Reggie Bonnafon combined for 137 rushing yards.
All that is well and good, but you still have to have the quarterback who can throw the 20-yard deep sideline out, or slide in the pocket and find his third option, and Bridgewater did all that. Wide receiver Robby Anderson has emerged as his best option through four games, but the ball is being spread around nicely during the absence of Christian McCaffrey (which will last at least one more game; McCaffrey is first eligible to return on Oct. 18 at home vs. Chicago). Eight different players caught a pass Sunday for Carolina.
It’s far too early to declare the Panthers are suddenly playoff contenders. Carolina beat Arizona last year, too, remember. Kyle Allen threw four touchdown passes, Carolina sacked Kyler Murray eight times and the Panthers won, 38-20. So you can’t put a ton of stock into a win over Arizona.
Still, it’s worth celebrating for Panther fans, so let’s remember one more play.
On Carolina’s first drive, head coach Matt Rhule went for a fourth-and-2 at the Arizona 41. It’s exactly the kind of call this team should make — if you don’t make it, so what? This team needs practice in clutch situations like that, because it actually messed this one up.
Bridgewater faked his handoff correctly to the left and took off to the right. But a wide receiver was supposed to be running parallel with him, so the quarterback had either a run-pass option.
Rhule said as much afterward, noting that the wide receiver in question — and he didn’t say who — simply botched the assignment.
“We had some sort of miscommunication,” Rhule said. “Something happened wrong — and so it was just Teddy.”
With nothing else to do but run, Bridgewater took off for the right sideline.
“This week, Coach mentioned three letters,” Bridgewater said of Rhule.
The letters?
“F-I-O,” Bridgewater said. “Figure It Out.”
As Rhule explained it later: “Great players are way more important than great coaches, and great players figure it out. And that was a great example of Teddy just kind of figuring it out.”
Bridgewater ran for 6 yards on the play, beating the defense to the right sideline. The drive stayed alive. Carolina ended up scoring a touchdown at the end of it to lead 7-0. Later came that 18-yard TD run from Bridgewater, in which he again figured out something on an improvised scramble.
So now Carolina is 2-2 and headed toward 0-3 Atlanta next weekend. It was only a couple of weeks ago I was thinking about how the Panthers hadn’t won a game in 329 days; now the team hasn’t lost one for a couple of weeks, despite missing their best player in McCaffrey.
There are a number of reasons for that.
But the biggest one is Bridgewater, figuring it out on the fly.
