Minnesota Vikings quarterback Josh Dobbs has taken the NFL by storm this season. A guy who at one point this offseason was viewed as a backup QB in Cleveland and just another guy on the roster, to being traded twice, to giving the league some of the best moments of the young season.
It hasn’t been an easy road to NFL relevancy for Dobbs. He’s had to fight and crawl his way to stability on NFL rosters. Let’s take a closer look at the current starting quarterback of the Vikings and how he got here.
Josh Dobbs’ NFL Career Timeline Explored
Dobbs finished a college career at the University of Tennessee where he started 37 games and finished with a 22-15 record during his four years there. That career parlayed into Dobbs being selected by the Pittsburgh Steelers in the fourth round of the 2017 NFL Draft.
Dobbs spent the first two seasons of his NFL career in Pittsburgh. He would not see any game action his rookie year before appearing in five games with zero starts in 2018. Dobbs only attempted 12 total passes in his first two years in the NFL.
At the start of the 2019 season, Dobbs was traded to the Jacksonville Jaguars for a fifth-round pick in the 2020 NFL Draft when Mason Rudolph beat him out for the backup job with the Steelers and Jaguars quarterback Nick Foles got injured.
Almost a year to the date, the Jaguars waived Dobbs after not making a single appearance in the 2019 season with the team.
Dobbs was unemployed for only 24 hours before the team that drafted him, the Steelers, claimed him off waivers to rejoin the team. He spent two seasons with the team, appearing in only one game during that span before being placed on injured reserve ahead of the 2021 season.
MORE: Minnesota Vikings Depth Chart
As the 2022 season approached, Dobbs was once again on the hunt for a new team. This time, he signed a one-year deal with the Cleveland Browns. He did not play a single snap for the Browns that season and was cut in November when starting quarterback Deshaun Watson returned from suspension. He would start December on the Detroit Lions’ practice squad before being signed by the Titans two weeks later following a Ryan Tannehill injury.
Dobbs started two games to end the season for the Titans and went 0-2 during that stretch.
Heading into the 2023 season, Dobbs re-signed with another of his former teams, the Browns, and entered camp with them ahead of the season. However, Dobbs never saw the regular season with the Browns as they traded him in August to the Arizona Cardinals for a 2023 seventh-round draft pick.
Dobbs went on to start the first eight games of the season for the Cardinals, going 1-7 during that stretch before being traded once more to his current situation in Minnesota. He has since started one game, appearing in two, and has won both of the games he has appeared in for the Vikings.
Dobbs has the Vikings 6-4 and in the mix for the playoffs, giving life to the team following starting QB Kirk Cousins’ season-ending injury.
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