Vikings GM: Indoor stadium should help Bridgewater

The Minnesota Vikings will move into the newly built U.S. Bank Stadium for the first time in 2016, and the team hopes that the indoor facility will prove beneficial to its young quarterback.

General manager Rick Spielman told PFT Live on Thursday that Teddy Bridgewater should take another step in his development as a result of the controlled environment.

"If you look at Teddy’s stats and how he performed when we were indoors -when we were in Detroit, even out at Arizona, some of those ideal conditions - we feel he's going to even take another step forward," Spielman said. "He still has to be able play outdoors. We still have to go to Chicago, we have to go to Green Bay every year."

Now two seasons into his pro career, Bridgewater has played four games in a domed stadium.

He only sports a 2-2 record over that stretch, with an even 3:3 touchdown to interception ratio, but his completion percentage (70.9) is significantly higher than that of his 24 games outdoors (63.6).

In his lone game under a retractable roof, a 2015 loss in Arizona, Bridgewater completed 69.4 percent of his passes for 335 yards and one score.

Though the sample size remains quite small, the difference in statistical production falls in line with the NFL's longstanding trend that quarterbacks indeed perform at a higher level in pristine conditions.

Bridgewater taking advantage of that for at least his eight home games per season would certainly help the Vikings to field a more balanced offense as Adrian Peterson continues to approach the end of his prime.