Vikings and Caleb Williams part of under-center trend
The league is getting QBs under center more, which could cause some more issues for the Vikings defense against the Bears and could help JJ McCarthy
By Matthew Coller
EAGAN — Back in my day, the quarterbacks used to line up with their hands underneath the center’s rear end. We didn’t have all this silly shotgun college nonsense!
There was a time when the talk around the NFL was that college spread offenses had infiltrated the pros to the point that every team was eventually going to be running their entire offense out of the shotgun.
Not so fast, as Lee Corso would say.
After years of increases in shotgun formations, the pendulum has started to swing back the other way. Per SumerSports data, the league average of under-center snaps was 28.1% in 2024 and has increased to 33.0% in 2025.
The Chicago Bears have massively increased how often young QB Caleb Williams is under center.
Why? In part because it works. Certainly many of the passes that are thrown from under-center formations utilize play-action and are in situations where the team can either run or pass but the numbers do not lie as it pertains to QBs’ success. Per Sumer, the league QB rating from under center is 106.9 this year.
Williams is averaging 8.2 yards per attempt and has a 95.4 QB rating when taking the snap directly from behind the center’s booty. This year he’s taking 46.2% of snaps there, whereas last year under multiple play callers that number was only 28.2%.
“They are just playing into his strengths and skill set,” linebacker Blake Cashman explained to Purple Insider. “When you can suck up the under coverage a little bit on these play fakes and get Williams moving with his legs, he gets time to see routes develop downfield. They’ve done a good job there. I get why they’re doing it. That’s where we have to be good with identifying run-pass keys and anybody who’s an edge player has to have a good angle on the quarterback make sure he’s not escaping and getting out.”
Williams has used play-action on 32% of his drop-backs, per PFF.
Not that teams are obligated to run when they are playing out of the shotgun — they figured out long ago ways to mix things up on early downs with their RBs like the Eagles did with Wentz — but head coach Kevin O’Connell explained that there is a specific benefit to the under-center run game that differs from shotgun.
“The marriage of the run and the pass becomes a little bit harder offsetting the back,” O’Connell said. “Some teams like Atlanta have really featured the pistol to try to find the common ground of both, which they’ve had success with. I think it just comes down to what is the foundation of your offense.”
The foundation of the Bears offense under Ben Johnson was forged in Detroit, where Jared Goff was very comfortable running everything under center and where they built the passing game off running the ball with Jahmyr Gibbs and David Mongtomery. Now they are building it off RBs D’Andre Swift and Kyle Monangai and a vastly improved run blocking offensive line.
For the Vikings defense, the unpredictability of the Chicago offense is greater when the QB is under center because the menu is larger.
“You’re defending every run, play-action, boot, screen from under center that the their offense has,” defensive coordinator Brian Flores said. “There are more opportunities for them to protect when he’s under center and keep more guys in, push guys down the field, but they’ve also got some drop-back and some boot, quick game there as well. So there’s a lot to defend within all that, there’s certainly run game out of that too. So that’s where a lot of the balance shows up when they’re under center.”
O’Connell said that defenses are adjusting by having different checks based on whether the opposing team lines up under center or in shotgun.
You are also more likely to see bigger personnel groupings with a fullback or extra tight ends while under center. KOC explained that it forces a decision by the defense: Are you going to keep three linebackers on the field or stick with nickel? The Lions played against the Vikings’ bigger personnel with LBs, whereas the Ravens kept hybrid player Kyle Hamilton in the as a nickel.
“We’ve got CJ [Ham] here and those 21 [personnel] runs can present problems with the insert of the fullback,” O’Connell said. “We’ve got a bunch of tight ends we feel good about running the ball with. So a lot of times it just comes down to, as an offense, what’s the foundation of our plan for the week? Defensively, are we getting normal matches to our personnel groupings?”
We can pretty strongly bet that the Bears are going to go from under center pretty often against the Vikings because we have seen other teams have success with it. The Steelers threw an extra offensive lineman at them. The Eagles hit on some deep play-action shots out of under-center looks. The Ravens always run a lot of that with Lamar Jackson.
At times this year players and coaches have talked about how game situations dictate run/pass ratio and the different ways teams can play when they are ahead or behind. That is evident when we look at the Vikings under-center snaps in 2024 vs. 2025.
Last year they were among league leaders at 49.7% of snaps en route to a 14-3 season but JJ McCarthy has only been under center 30.5% of his reps. Out of his 108 total passes, 65 have come with his team trailing and in turn only 27% of drop-backs have included play-action.
Thus far, McCarthy hasn’t mastered the under-center stuff in the same way that Sam Darnold did in 2024, when he posted a ridiculous 126.4 passer rating on under center throws. McCarthy is only 15-for-29 passing with 132 yards. However, the Darnold stats are proof of concept. If the Vikings can get into the right situations to lean into under-center passing, they have the horses and scheme to improve vastly in their efficiency with McCarthy at the helm.
It will be one of the games within the game to watch during Vikings-Bears on Sunday: Which team can get ahead and take advantage of their under-center opportunities.
ADDITIONAL NOTES
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