on \u201cThe Rich Eisen Show\u201d<\/a> but didn\u2019t back down from his original criticism.<\/p>\n\u201cI don\u2019t take back what I said,\u201d Weddle told Eisen. \u201cHearing it doesn\u2019t come off very well, but the point is, you have to play quarterback a certain way to win a national championship. My understanding of Michigan is they expect national championships. These kids are paid to play a certain way. What I saw from two games last year, and (when) I went out to spring ball, I saw not very good QB play.\u201d<\/p>\n
Weddle, who was named to the Pro Bowl six times during a 14-year NFL career with the Chargers, Ravens and Rams, is one of the most high-profile figures to express doubts about Underwood, the No. 1 prospect in the 2025 recruiting class. Weddle\u2019s comments gained extra attention because of his connection to Whittingham, who was Utah\u2019s head coach for Weddle\u2019s final two seasons at Utah.<\/p>\n
Underwood had an up-and-down freshman season that included a three-interception performance against Texas in the Citrus Bowl and an 8-for-18 showing for 63 yards against Ohio State. Whittingham backed Underwood as Michigan\u2019s starting quarterback before the Wolverines opened spring practice and stuck by that assessment after Underwood was 3-for-9 for 22 yards in Michigan\u2019s spring game, saying, \u201cBryce is our starter right now.\u201d<\/p>\n
Weddle visited Michigan with his son Gaige, a top 2028 prospect who plays safety and quarterback. Weddle came away unconvinced that Underwood is poised for a breakthrough in his second season as a starter.<\/p>\n
\u201cIs he talented? Yes. Is he a freak of nature? Yeah. No one\u2019s denying that,\u201d Weddle told Eisen. \u201cI\u2019m not naive to that, but I do know what high-level championship quarterback play looks like. I tried stopping these guys my whole career. My expectation when I watch quarterbacks is, \u2018Can he lead this team to a championship or not?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
Michigan made a splash by signing Underwood to an NIL deal valued at more than $10 million over multiple years. Underwood started all 13 games for the Wolverines, but concerns about his development were growing before Michigan fired Sherrone Moore and hired Whittingham, who brought offensive coordinator Jason Beck from Utah to run the Wolverines offense.<\/p>\n
Shortly after Weddle went public with his criticism, Underwood posted a laughing emoji on Instagram with the message, \u201ckeep zzz,\u201d short for \u201ckeep sleeping.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI know the coaches there are coaching and doing the best they can,\u201d Weddle said. \u201cI don\u2019t know (Underwood) from anything. I just go off of what I see, and what I saw was not good.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Eric Weddle, a retired NFL All-Pro safety who played for Kyle Whittingham at Utah, visited his former coach\u2019s…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":681319,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[67],"tags":[1607,399,1777,398,396,397,99],"class_list":["post-681318","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ncaa-football","tag-college-football","tag-football","tag-michigan-wolverines","tag-ncaa","tag-ncaa-football","tag-ncaafootball","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/681318","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=681318"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/681318\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/681319"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=681318"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=681318"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=681318"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}