Peanut butter and jelly, Batman and Robin, the New England Patriots and scummy behavior…some things are just meant to be together.
You could probably add Mississippi State football and dual-threat quarterbacks to that list. This is a program that, historically, has favored runners under center, frequently starting QBs that were far better on the ground than through the air.
Be it Jackie Parker, Rocky Felker, John Bond, Chris Relf, Nick Fitzgerald, or (of course) Dak Prescott, many successful stints for Bulldog football have come with dual-threat signal-callers. State has long preferred that its offensive identity be built around running the dang ball, and the QB is often at the center of that.
This is the place with a fanbase that unironically spread #AlwaysRunNeverPass as a motto, after all. Shoutout to our friend Justin Strawn for providing us with such an iconic phrase.
But that overall history hasn’t been reflective of the approach we’ve seen in Starkville in recent years. After watching Dan Mullen and Joe Moorhead use the QB like a battering ram for over a decade, State deviated hard from the norm by bringing Mike Leach and his Air Raid attack to the SEC in 2020.
The Pirate seemingly couldn’t have cared less about running the football, instead using his simple yet effective pass schemes to madden opposing defenses. As a result, Leach largely favored pocket passers to run his offenses.
The Air Raid was quite a culture shock for Bulldog fans, as was watching a not-so-athletic Will Rogers taking snaps. Leach’s overhaul featured both spectacular highs and baffling lows, but the overall results were positive. In 2022, MSU went 8-4 with an Egg Bowl victory.
But Leach would tragically pass away prior to the Bulldogs’ adding a ninth win in their bowl game, and the program chose to move away from his unique offensive identity. Though they abandoned a throw-first and throw-often mentality, State didn’t abandon playing QBs that were passers above all else.
While dual-threat QBs returned to the roster, this post-Air Raid era of Bulldog football has still, mostly, not asked its starting QB to do much more than keep the defense honest with the occasional toting of the rock.
That’s going to change in 2026.
Technically the change was initiated towards the end of last fall when HC Jeff Lebby officially benched a veteran Blake Shapen in favor of a freshman Kamario Taylor. The dynamic runner notched a pair of starts to close out 2025, and he goes into the 2026 season entrenched as the Bulldogs’ starter.
For the first time in a long time, Mississippi State is shaping its offense around a QB whose legs can strike fear into opposing defenses. Let’s talk about the Bulldogs embracing tradition and embracing what has become the norm in college football.
Running the QB in the College Game
The QB run game is obviously nothing new to college football. Teams have been making the man under center a featured part of their rushing attacks for ages, and in the early days of the sport, that was the standard given that throwing the ball either wasn’t a thing entirely or, after being introduced, was largely considered woke nonsense.
But even with the slow yet steady embrace of the forward pass and teams eventually shaping their offenses around slinging it, the dual-threat QB never died out in the collegiate ranks. They continued to thrive and still do.
There’s good reason for that, and it’s because the clearest way towards elevating an offense is having a mobile QB on the field.
So much so that Ian Boyd of “America’s War Game” (well worth the subscription, I’ll add) lists the concept as one of his “4 Laws of College QB Play.”
If you have talent deficiencies along the offensive line and/or at the skill positions, it becomes really difficult to find consistent success without a QB that can run. You need that mobility to help overcome poor blocking, both in the run game and in pass protection, and to help open up space for your receivers and backs.
If you don’t have those talent deficiencies, guess what? It’s still better to force opposing defenses to have to account for the QB’s legs than not. This all, of course, hinges on that QB being capable of more than just a running. He still needs to be able to execute in the passing game. Otherwise, everyone would just run the Wildcat at all times.
But assuming that QB is an actual dual-threat and not just a glorified running back, the boost from having mobility at the position is too much to ignore. That doesn’t mean that you can’t win with a pure pocket passer, but it’s naturally tougher to pull off.
You either need strong enough surrounding talent to make the lack of mobility a non-factor, or that QB needs to be so well-developed as a processor that his field-generalship allows him to overcome his physical limitations (a rarity in college football). It’s a higher threshold to meet.
Mike Leach seemed to be one of the few coaches who could consistently churn out productive offenses with middling overall talent and unathletic QBs, and that’s because his Air Raid’s “endless reps-based” approach to practice simultaneously taught that middling talent how to execute at the highest level and turned those QBs into true field generals within that system.
But even Leach seemed to be buying-in to the idea of utilizing the less demanding approach to offense just before his passing, as evidenced by his recruitment of dual-threat QB and now former Bulldog Chris Parson.
What Leach appeared to have caught on to is a wider trend across the sport, which is that everyone is now valuing athleticism at the QB position. Because while, as I’ve laid out, using dual-threats in CFB is both nothing new and highly valuable in pretty much every situation, more teams now treat plus-mobility as a prerequisite for playing QB.
In 2025, there were 55 FBS QBs with at least 100 rushing attempts. From 2010-2024, excluding the COVID-shortened 2020, the average was 41.6. Even looking back at the early-2010s when spamming zone read was a cheat code, QBs overall weren’t running as much. And that was in an era where the clocks still stopped for every first down and tempo was taking over. Why is the QB run seeing an uptick now?
As always, it’s a response to the ever-going chess match between offense and defense. The spread revolution of the previous decade forced defense to adopt lighter personnel more suited for pass coverage and take a stylistic approach geared towards limiting explosive plays—drop more bodies that can play in space into coverage, don’t let receivers get behind you, and don’t allow them easy run after catch opportunities.
Playing pitch-and-catch and scoring 40-plus without breaking a sweat suddenly wasn’t so easy. The simple solution? Run the ball.
Truthfully, that’s a bit of an oversimplification. It’s not like defensive coordinators are unaware that’s the natural response from offenses, so they have their answers for how to still play effective run defense out of the two-high (sometimes three-high) safety looks that they use to stifle passing games. That’s especially true against the spacing and RPO-based run games many spread teams utilize.
Still, when you can use the QB in the run game, it helps to maximize its effectiveness. Getting an extra blocker or adding an option element makes it more likely that you can run the ball successfully enough to get the chains moving on the ground and force the defense into giving more favorable looks to throw against.
For as much as having a mobile QB benefits the run game, it’s arguably an even bigger help on passing downs. Not only are defenses better-suited for handling wide-open passing attacks from a personnel standpoint, they’ve gotten a whole lot tougher for offenses to decipher. Defenses are playing more complex coverages and do well at disguising those looks. On top of all that, their pressure packages can be equally frustrating to handle.
You can see the issue for offenses. It’s not as easy for QBs to quickly get to their primary read in the passing game, and when they don’t, it’s increasingly more likely that the pass rush is getting home (especially with the transfer portal killing offensive line development).
That makes it all the more important that you have a QB capable of evading that pressure and keeping plays alive. A QB that can make pass-rushers miss, get out of the pocket, and either find a receiver breaking open late downfield or simply scramble for yardage has become increasingly more valuable. And for many teams, it’s almost a necessity.
I can somewhat recall a quote from several years ago from someone involved in Mississippi State athletics about how when Bulldog football has done well, it’s always been with a dual-threat at QB. I unfortunately can’t find who said it and when, but as noted earlier in this piece, there’s some validity to that when you look back on various winning stretches for the program.
And it makes a lot of sense given the point of how having a mobile QB can elevate an offense. In most seasons, State is at a talent disadvantage relative to its peers in the SEC. To overcome that, you first need a scheme that can maximize lesser talent and then ideally have a QB that both fits well within that scheme and has a skillset that’s not reliant on there being great pieces around him.
With Kamario Taylor playing in Jeff Lebby’s Veer and Shoot system, Mississippi State is checking those boxes.
Dual-Threat QBs in the Veer and Shoot
The advent of spread option offenses was quite kind for dual-threat QBs previously stuck in pro-style systems. Working out of the gun gave QBs clearer reads in the option game and the ability to get downhill quickly when running. And the frequent 4-wide formations created tons of open space to run, as defenders were pulled away from the middle of the field to cover potential pass-catchers.
The extra-wide splits of receivers in Veer and Shoot systems like Mississippi State runs can amplify those advantages even more. Even slot defenders can practically be forced out of the run fit, and the constant threat of being beat deep can hold safeties back. The offense inherently opens the door to run the football effectively, and when the QB is a dangerous runner, it becomes all the more difficult to stop.
Naturally, QBs have been quite effective with their legs in the system. Robert Griffin III is who naturally comes to mind, but fellow Baylor QBs of that era, Nick Florence and Seth Russell, were both productive rushers. Even a more middling athlete in Bryce Petty totaled 20 rushing scores in his two seasons as a starter. Ole Miss’ Matt Corral ran for over 1,000 total yards in two seasons in the system. Tennessee’s Hendon Hooker did the same.
Jeff Lebby was around most of those players between his time as an assistant at Baylor and as the OC for Ole Miss. During his career as a play-caller, he’s shown that he wants the QB run game to be a feature within his offense. Matt Corral was a plus-runner and averaged double-digit rushes per game under Lebby. Dillon Gabriel was seldom used on the ground at UCF to start his career but proved to be quite nifty and surprisingly tough as a runner once he joined Lebby at Oklahoma.
Even Blake Shapen, a totally incapable runner in the minds of most Mississippi State fans, had more than enough quickness to be effective on the occasional Zone Read, QB Draw, or scramble. Shapen’s issues were more about the inability to evade pass-rushers and fight through contact than anything else.
While he wants to run the QB, Lebby has traditionally been selective about when he chooses to. Specifically, the bulk of his designed QB rushes happen in short-yardage and redzone situations. It’s obvious why. When it’s an clear rushing situation, it pays to have the numbers advantage that comes with the QB as a ball-carrier. You’re likely facing a loaded box from the defense and need all hands on deck to convert.
What Lebby hasn’t done a ton of is use his QB’s legs in the open-field on standard downs. He would on occasion with Corral, though not in every game, and with Gabriel and Shapen such calls were merely change-ups meant to catch the defense napping.
It makes sense given the skillsets and/or surrounding talent of those three, but that approach could change with Kamario Taylor. He’s a far more physical and dynamic athlete than any of those three, and given that he’s still raw as a passer (though has all the arm talent in the world), Lebby may want to lean on the run game more than usual.
You can also argue that even with a good group of RBs in Starkville, Taylor is the best overall runner on the MSU roster. And with questions remaining about the Bulldog offensive line, they might need him to carry a bigger load to keep the run game rolling.
That opens the door for Lebby to find a number of creative ways to put Taylor’s legs to use. Certainly you’ll see the classics—Zone Read, Speed Option, a variety of inside runs that fans will call “QB Power” despite not actually being QB Power…those will all be there. But Taylor’s athleticism may allow for even more fun.
Baylor’s Seth Russell is the QB Lebby has been around that’s probably the closest comp to Kamario Taylor. Russell was only slightly smaller at 6-3, 220 and offered much of the same combination of power, speed, and elusiveness as Taylor. Baylor expanded on some of their QB run designs with Russell as a starter, primarily when it came to using him between-the-tackles.
But they’d let him show off his ability to win in space too.
Whoever on the coaching staff drew this one up on the whiteboard was obviously confident the misdirection would work, but they were also confident they had a quick enough QB to make it effective. Frankly the guys who should be most highlighted on this play are the right guard and tackle for some dang good blocking, but you get the idea. Using the QB to self-create misdirection is a possibility.
If Lebby is looking for other unique ways to utilize Kamario Taylor’s athleticism within this offense, he could steal some ideas from new-Memphis OC Kevin Decker. Decker is an interesting member of the Veer and Shoot tree. He began studying the system in 2019 as the OC at Fordham and then installed it in 2020 with the help of one of Josh Heupel’s former student assistants.
Fordham’s offense exploded, and Decker was hired up to the FBS ranks as the OC of Old Dominion. He ran the system successfully in Norfolk for the last three years, and during his time there he put his own mark on it by diversifying the run game and leaning on that run game more than almost anyone else in the offense. Last season the Monarchs ran the ball on 62% of their plays for the nation’s 7th-best rushing attack at 238 yards per game.
One of the deadliest looks from Decker at ODU was their Blindside Zone Read. Rather than setting the RB opposite of the play direction and reading the DE to that same side, the RB aligns to the side of the play, still takes an inside zone track, and the QB reads the DE opposite. Want to put that DE into a trap and have him questioning his run keys the rest of the game? Throw this at him…
Again, it helps to have a great athlete at the QB position. Monarchs’ QB Colton Joseph, now at Wisconsin, led the team with 1007 yards and 13 scores on 6.4 yards per rush. The Blindside Zone Read, as well as many other creative QB run designs from Kevin Decker, is certainly a wrinkle we could see at State with Kamario Taylor.
Probably the closest comp to what the 2026 Bulldog offense might look like is what we saw from the Alex Golesh South Florida Bulls in the last few years. The newly-hired Auburn HC took the Veer and Shoot to Tampa after working as an OC for Heupel. His brand of the offense is quite similar to what we’ve seen from Lebby at Mississippi State—using the classic Briles Baylor attack as a foundation while mixing in a few more formations and motions and expanding the dropback passing game.
Golesh built everything in his offense around QB Byrum Brown, also now at Auburn. Another QB with plenty of similarities to Kamario Taylor both in size and skillset, Brown frequently carried the Bulls, to the extent that their offense could often be boiled down to “Brown either chunks it deep to an open WR or just makes something happen with his legs.” In his two full seasons as a starter, he averaged a team-leading 15 rushes per game.
While that’s not what anyone wants Taylor to have to do, there’s plenty of good to pull from those USF teams when it comes to the QB run game, as highlighted by this thread from Pace N Space…
One example is this QB GH Counter out of a “pseudo-empty” set. QB runs out of empty formations are always dangerous because the defense has to choose between not allowing easy matchups in the passing game or having numbers in the box vs the run. Another element you’ll see from offenses is to go empty but keep an H-back in like USF does here.
Defenses often still treat this as an empty formation since there is no tailback, but having the H-back as an extra blocker opens the door for the offense to use a true power run game in those situations. The defense ultimately goes Cover 0 here, and with the DBs playing off, Brown could take the RPO screen to the field. But he knows the overhang defender that’s walked down into the box won’t catch him off the edge, so he follows his H-back up the middle for six.
Jeff Lebby has already utilized a few different fun designs with Kamario Taylor in the run game, like this fake jet sweep QB “Super” Counter from an unbalanced formation in the Egg Bowl.
You can be confident that almost every week of the season, there will be some sort of wrinkle based on Taylor’s athleticism. The next area to watch for schematic growth will be the play-action and RPO game off the QB run.
I’m sure most Bulldog fans remember Dan Mullen dialing up play-action shots where, rather than a fake to the RB, the QB himself would fake running before pulling up and firing the ball.
In an offense like Lebby’s with so much RPO and play-action, nearly every pass comes after a fake to the RB. While the defense has to respect the threat of a handoff, they aren’t necessarily going to fly downhill every time they see play-action. When it’s the QB doing the run action though, it’s a bit harder for defenders to hold back.
Here’s an example within the Veer and Shoot, with Tennessee hitting a deep post for a score after faking a QB Sweep.
We saw Taylor throw a couple goal line pop passes to the TE off of his own run fakes last season. Ideally that idea expands into open-field plays that can turn into explosives.
This applies to the RPO game as well. The meta for defenses with handling RPOs is to slow-play the run, taking away the pass option first to force the run and then swarming to the ball-carrier. But again, when it’s the QB who is getting downhill, you can open up those pass options.
A popular example in college football is the RB rail route RPO attached to some sort of QB run. Most teams pair it with Counter, as is the case with this rep from Ole Miss. The back is left wide open on the rail route for a TD.
Lebby has that one in his arsenal and used a similar design against Ole Miss themselves in the 2024 Egg Bowl. If you remember Michael Van Buren underthrowing a wide open Davon Booth for an interception to start the second half, that’s what that was. Apologies for making you all think about that again…
A particularly lethal QB RPO in style right now is to get into an empty formation and have a slot WR or TE run a glance route as the QB runs ahead. You’ve spread the field and essentially have the QB and the slot attacking the same space. It functions like a pop pass and can lead to big gains over the middle of the field. Utah got a lot of mileage out of it last season.
The QB run game opens the door up to countless possibilities for an offense. When you give a play-caller as good as Jeff Lebby an athlete as special as Kamario Taylor, chances are you’re going to see some really cool designs on Saturdays in Starkville.
That’s on top of the big picture here which is that Mississippi State is back to having an “elevator” at the QB position. That would be true even if he were merely a good runner and only a serviceable passer. But the flashes Taylor showed as a true freshman made it clear he’s the type of player than can truly maximize this Bulldog offense and give MSU a chance even when outmatched. In a critical season for Jeff Lebby’s tenure, that’s a big help.
There’s something almost comforting in knowing the Bulldogs are once again led by a dual-threat QB. Having a guy that can plow ahead at the goal line and isn’t dead in the water against a free pass rusher…it’s nice. Makes you feel somewhat nostalgic. We just need a few QB runs called on 3rd and 10 to bring us all the way back to the “good ‘ole days.”
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