Michigan's new OC Jason Beck plans to unleash QB Bryce Underwood's running game

ANN ARBOR, Mich. -- The last regime of Michigan football seemed to have ideas of how it would deploy then-freshman quarterback Bryce Underwood, and it seemed, well -- limited. But there's a new staff overseeing the whole of the team, let alone the offense, and they have some different ideas of how to utilize the second-year QB.

Former head coach Sherrone Moore, in particular, was reticent to run Underwood. That's not to say he didn't run at all -- he had 88 carries for 392 yards a year ago. But in the first two games, he nearly never ran, but when Biff Poggi took over as interim coach, the plan appeared to have changed dramatically.

When Moore came back from his two-game suspension, Underwood appeared to be back in the box as a pure pocket passer, running only when the play broke down. Moore would say, when asked about it that if you're going to run your quarterback, you'd better have two. So what does new offensive coordinator Jason Beck -- who ran Devon Dampier while at both New Mexico and Utah -- think about that as a philosophy?

"(Let them) do what they do best. And so if they can run, then it's a weapon, and they'll be fine," Beck said. "If guys aren't good runners, then they can get themselves hurt.