Life comes at you fast; just ask Josh Dobbs. One minute, you’re in warm and sunny Arizona, leading the Cardinals through a transitional period; the next, you’re sent packing to Minnesota to do something similar, except in much colder conditions.
Such is the life for a journeyman quarterback in the NFL, and while Dobbs will roll with the punches, it doesn’t mean he wasn’t a bit blindsided by the move.
Dobbs was traded from the Cardinals to the Vikings just before the NFL trade deadline — a move that Dobbs says he had been assured by Cardinals head coach Jonathan Gannon that would not happen. Well, it did, and Dobbs is talking about the week that was and everything that led up to him being traded.
Joshua Dobbs Opens Up on Final Week in Arizona
While Dobbs’ run as the starting quarterback in Arizona was going to be a short one, he didn’t know just how short his actual stay there would be. Even after losing his job to Clayton Tune, Dobbs says that Gannon reassured him that he would not be traded.
MORE: Joshua Dobbs Keeps Minnesota Vikings’ Playoff Hopes Alive Five Days After Joining Team
While on the Torchbearers podcast, Dobbs detailed how all that changed and what he was told leading up to the move. “I go to the facility on Monday, and JG, the head coach in Arizona, called me into his office and said, ‘We’re going to start Clayton Tune,’” Dobbs said. “I was upset with it, but I understood the situation the franchise was in.”
“Woke up Tuesday morning with a text from my agent saying, ‘You could be traded today because it’s the trade deadline,’” Dobbs elaborated.
“And listen to this — when I had my meeting with JG in Arizona, he looked at me in the face, and he said, ‘You’re not getting traded, you’re not being released, you’re going to be here in Arizona.’ I was like, ‘OK, cool.’ So then I woke up to that text saying, ‘Alright, the trade deadline’s in four hours, you could be traded, you could go to Minnesota or go back to Cleveland.’”
“The last 36 hours, whatever was told to you, something different has happened,” Dobbs said.
Despite the words of his former head coach, everything did change, and now Dobbs finds himself starting under center for a new team just mere days after being promised he wasn’t going anywhere — a true whirlwind of events that has once again landed Dobbs another starting opportunity.
Dobbs Impressed the NFL World on Sunday
Dobbs was traded just days prior and was not expected to see action at all as the Vikings went into the game starting rookie QB Jaren Hall from BYU. However, all that changed in the blink of an eye as Hall suffered a concussion early in the game, and Dobbs was not thrust into a position to go out there and try to win the Vikings a football game and keep their playoff hopes alive.
Dobbs did just that despite admitting he needed all the help he could get from teammates and coaches, as he didn’t even know the playbook yet. The Vikings, led by Dobbs, went into Atlanta and beat the Falcons 31-28 to get their fifth win of the season in unusual fashion.
Dobbs finished the game 20 of 30 for 158 passing yards and two touchdowns and was given the game ball by his head coach as the team celebrated just how outrageous of a performance it truly was for the quarterback.
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