Who needs coaching – or knowing who to play with – when you are Joshua Dobbs?
Just five days after being traded from the Arizona Cardinals to the Minnesota Vikings, the quarterback was pushed into his new team’s road game against the Atlanta Falcons after rookie Jaren Hall was injured on the team’s second possession of the day.
Even without making a move with the offense in practice leading up to Sunday, Dobbs turned in an impressive performance from the backfield by completing 20 of 30 passes for 158 yards and two touchdown passes, including the game-winning scoring layup to Brandon Powell with 22 seconds remaining to lift Minnesota to Win 31-28. The result moved the Vikings to 5-4 on the season for their fourth straight win.
Dobbs was also the leading rusher on the day, with seven carries for 66 yards and a touchdown run, with several runs to extend drives and keep hopes of a win alive.
“He’s smart as hell.”
Powell and fellow Vikings receiver Jordan Addison confirmed to reporters after the game that Dobbs did not throw any passes during practice.
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“He’s very smart. To be able to come in here and learn that offense that quickly and go out there and play with them, he’s smart. That’s a smart guy,” Powell said. “He paid attention. He came to the game, he never practiced, and we won the game.”
“It’s hard to go out there and execute when you’re not getting reps, but he did it.”
Addison added that everyone in the offensive huddle was letting the Dobbs know what they were going to do on each play, and confirming the routes the receivers would take. Regardless, Dobbs was at the center of a huge celebration with his teammates in the locker room after the win.
Powell is right. Dobbs is “smart as hell.” He was an aerospace engineering major at the University of Tennessee and graduated with a 4.0 GPA I had an externship with NASA. So the phrase “rocket scientist” is not an exaggeration.
Dobbs plans to learn his teammates’ names
Dobbs, who started eight games for the Cardinals after being traded by the Cleveland Browns before the start of the regular season, described the whirlwind of the week like someone taking Spanish lessons for an entire year and then being told they need to. Take a French language test. He said the coaches asked him how comfortable he felt with the playbook in case he needed to play, and he said, “Anything on the call sheet that we put up this week, I’ve got it. I can run it. I’ve got it.” He even admitted that before Sunday, he didn’t know the majority of his teammates’ full names.
“If we had to pull the roll, I’d be a bad teammate today,” Dobbs said.
But no Fourth-round pick in the 2017 NFL Draft He has the next thing to learn, as Minnesota prepares to take on the New Orleans Saints in Week 10.
“Names, these are for this week. This is an assignment for this week,” Dobbs said.
“Devoted travel trailblazer. Freelance beer scholar. Passionate analyst. Hardcore twitter fanatic.”
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