Former NFL player Teddy Bridgewater discusses new Florida law named in his honor
ORLANDO, Fla. —
A meal and a ride home — simple ways for a high school coach to help a student, but exactly what got Teddy Bridgewater fired. Now, a new Florida law bears his name.
Bridgewater, a former NFL player who was recently with the Detroit Lions, announced his retirement from the league last week. For one season, though, he was on the sidelines for Miami Northwestern High School’s football team as head coach.
In that season, Bridgewater struck gold, leading his players to a state title. But he was fired, accused of inappropriate benefits to his players.
“They called me in and they had already made the decision that they were going to move forward. They brought in another coach who was already on my staff,” Bridgewater said during an interview with WESH 2 News anchor Stewart Moore.
Those “benefits” were simply making sure the kids got home safely and had something to eat when they got there.
“It’s very important as a coach and a father, a protector, to just make sure I was able to do for my players because I was once in their shoes, I knew what it was like to have to catch the bus across town,” he said. “One of my mom’s co-workers seen me on the bus stop and gave me a ride way across town to football practice, or my mom couldn’t take me home or pick me up from practice and I had a coach who would drop me off. Like, it just meant a lot to me.”
WESH 2 News partner Second Harvest Food Bank of Central Florida reports 1 in 6 kids live in households that are food-insecure.
SB 178, the Teddy Bridgewater Act, authorizes a K-12 head coach to support the welfare of a student by using personal funds “to provide, in good faith, effects such as food, transportation, and recovery services,” up to $15,000 per team, per year.
“For them to put that law in place, it shows that at some point in their lives they experienced that same, coach dropping them off, coach stopping at McDonald’s, getting them a cheeseburger or some French fries, and it meant a lot to me,” Bridgewater said.