By looking at Sam Bradford's stats alone, one might not guess that the Vikings came up short in a brutal Border Battle against the Packers.
For just the second time this season, Bradford hit the 300-yard mark in passing. The quarterback had a career day against Green Bay, throwing for 382 yards and three touchdowns. Previously, Bradford's single-game high was set almost exactly a year ago, with 380 yards against Washington on Dec. 26, 2015.
Bradford was 34-of-50 for a 68 percent completion rate with a passer rating of 110.6 against the division rivals. His season-long completion rate is now 71.3, which would edge out the all-time best of 71.2 by Drew Brees in 2011. Brees is at 70.9 percent this season.
The numbers don't mean much to Bradford, however, in the **wake of a 38-25 defeat** that officially eliminated the Vikings from the playoffs.
"It's hard to take a lot out of it," Bradford said of his performance. "Obviously I think there were some good things, but I'm probably not going to put too much thought into those."
Rather, Bradford said his mental energy will go into figuring out "what went wrong and how we can get better to keep ourselves in the ball game and to win ball games."
Bradford tried his best to find a "W" with the help of wide receiver Adam Thielen, who also had a **career day**. Thielen, who recorded 202 yards and two touchdowns on the day, hauled in a deep pass from Bradford for a 71-yard touchdown in the second quarter.
The explosive play was one drawn up for the game, and Thielen said it was well executed.
"We thought it was a pretty good play," Thielen said. "Our coaches did a great job, and Sam did a great job of getting me the ball. It was nice to get on the board, and at that time of the game it was good to get some momentum in our favor."
The Vikings were able to capitalize a number of times on the Packers secondary coverage, and Bradford on 14 occasions – and with seven different players – connected for a pass play of 10 yards or more.
"We felt like we had some good matchups out there, regardless of if they were going to play that Cover 2 or if they were going to play single-high man," Bradford said. "I thought we did a good job taking some shots at both of those coverages."
Thielen said the chemistry between Bradford and his receivers, despite only joining the team in September, is significant.
"He just comes to work every day and shows it, so it's easy for us as receivers to go out there and just play football," Thielen said. "We know that if we get open or if they play the right coverage, we're going to get the ball.
Bradford's first game in purple ironically came against the Packers in Week 2, a contest he helped Minnesota win with 286 yards and a passer rating of 121.2.
Since joining the Vikings, Bradford has thrown only four interceptions. While he escaped Saturday's contest without a pick, Bradford did fall victim to a strip sack late in the second quarter. Packers linebacker Clay Matthews blew through protection to sack Bradford from behind, and Green Bay recovered.
The caused turnover came after Thielen's touchdown had cut the deficit to eight points, and the Vikings were driving into Packers territory. Bradford said the fumble disrupted a planned deep shot to tight end Kyle Rudolph.
"We had a little bit of a double move on to Kyle over there on the right side, and we were looking to take a shot," Bradford said. "I'll have to go back and look at the play and see exactly what happened, but just kind of waiting on Kyle because it was a deeper, double-move type shot, and I think we were going to have a pretty good look for it."
Green Bay seemed to seize back momentum on the play, and the Vikings couldn't regain ground throughout the course of the game.
"The first half, I felt like we were moving the ball pretty well, and obviously we had good field position," Bradford said. "We had some positive plays to kind of get us going, and then obviously [the fumble] happened."
Bradford said the Vikings are not a team that will make excuses, and a cumulative performance resulted in a team loss.
"I think everyone in there will own up to the mistakes that happened today," Bradford said. "I think we all played a part in it, we all could have played better at times to help us win, and it's disappointing to be where we are right now."
