Player
Jahmyr Gibbs
RB · DET Lions
Yards per carry is noisy over a few hundred attempts, which is exactly why three straight qualifying years is the interesting shape rather than any single number. A back who clears 5.0 once has probably had a friendly schedule of light boxes and a couple of long runs. A back who clears it in year one, year two and year three has a running style and a blocking situation that keep reproducing the result, and that is the part a 2026 draft pick is actually buying.
Five yards a pop, every year
Two backs drafted since 1999 have opened a career with three straight 150-carry seasons at 5.0 a pop. Nick Chubb, and him.
RareEvery 150-carry season at 5.0+ yards per carry since 1999, by player (regular season)
| Back | Qualifying seasons | Years |
|---|---|---|
| Nick Chubb | 5 | 2018 (5.19), 2019 (5.01), 2020 (5.62), 2021 (5.52), 2022 (5.05) |
| Derrick Henry | 4 | 2019 (5.08), 2020 (5.36), 2024 (5.91), 2025 (5.20) |
| Jamaal Charles | 4 | 2009 (5.89), 2010 (6.38), 2012 (5.29), 2014 (5.01) |
| Jahmyr Gibbs | 3 | 2023 (5.19), 2024 (5.65), 2025 (5.03) |
| LeSean McCoy | 3 | 2010 (5.22), 2013 (5.12), 2016 (5.41) |
| DeAngelo Williams | 3 | 2008 (5.54), 2009 (5.17), 2011 (5.39) |
| Marshall Faulk | 3 | 1999 (5.67), 2000 (5.37), 2001 (5.32) |
| Tiki Barber | 3 | 2001 (5.21), 2005 (5.21), 2006 (5.08) |
Eight backs have three or more of these seasons in the last 27 years. Only two got all three out of the way in their first three years in the league: Nick Chubb from 2018 to 2020, and Gibbs from 2023 to 2025. Chubb needed a fourth season to add his fourth. Gibbs has not had a fourth season yet.
Why it matters. Yards per carry is noisy over a few hundred attempts, which is exactly why three straight qualifying years is the interesting shape rather than any single number. A back who clears 5.0 once has probably had a friendly schedule of light boxes and a couple of long runs. A back who clears it in year one, year two and year three has a running style and a blocking situation that keep reproducing the result, and that is the part a 2026 draft pick is actually buying.
He led the NFL in 40-yard runs while ranking 11th in carries. The explosives are not a volume story.
AnomalyMost runs of 40 or more yards, 2025 regular season
| Back | Team | Runs of 40+ | Carries |
|---|---|---|---|
| Jahmyr Gibbs | DET | 6 | 243 |
| TreVeyon Henderson | NE | 4 | 180 |
| De'Von Achane | MIA | 4 | 238 |
| James Cook | BUF | 4 | 309 |
| Jonathan Taylor | IND | 4 | 323 |
| Derrick Henry | BAL | 4 | 307 |
| Travis Etienne | JAX | 3 | 260 |
| Saquon Barkley | PHI | 3 | 280 |
2025 yards per carry by listed weight, backs with 50+ carries
| Weight band | Backs | Carries | Yards per carry |
|---|---|---|---|
| Under 206 lbs | 14 | 2,372 | 4.58 |
| 206 to 224 lbs | 41 | 6,642 | 4.31 |
| 225 lbs and up | 10 | 1,597 | 4.39 |
Gibbs is listed at 5'9" and 200 pounds, which puts him in the lightest of the three bands, and that band out-gained the rest of the league by roughly a quarter of a yard per carry in 2025. Gibbs beat his own band by another 0.45 yards per carry on top of that.
Why it matters. Explosive-run counts usually track carry counts, so the leader is normally whoever ran the most. Gibbs got there on the 11th-most carries of any back, which means the rate, not the workload, produced the total. That distinction matters for 2026 because a rate holds up when a workload gets split, and a total does not.
Back-to-back 350-point PPR seasons at running back. It has happened 12 times since 1999, and the other names are Faulk, Tomlinson, Holmes and McCaffrey.
MilestoneConsecutive 350+ PPR seasons by a running back, since 1999
| Back | Seasons | Year one | Year two |
|---|---|---|---|
| Jahmyr Gibbs | 2024-2025 | 362.9 | 366.9 |
| Christian McCaffrey | 2022-2023 | 356.4 | 391.3 |
| Christian McCaffrey | 2018-2019 | 385.5 | 471.2 |
| Todd Gurley | 2017-2018 | 383.3 | 372.1 |
| LaDainian Tomlinson | 2006-2007 | 481.1 | 367.6 |
| LaDainian Tomlinson | 2005-2006 | 366.3 | 481.1 |
| Larry Johnson | 2005-2006 | 360.3 | 370.9 |
| Priest Holmes | 2002-2003 | 440.7 | 445.0 |
| LaDainian Tomlinson | 2002-2003 | 384.2 | 443.8 |
| Marshall Faulk | 2000-2001 | 459.9 | 419.7 |
| Marshall Faulk | 1999-2000 | 380.3 | 459.9 |
| Edgerrin James | 1999-2000 | 369.9 | 393.3 |
Twelve pairs, seven men. Gibbs is the first to do it since McCaffrey in 2022 and 2023, and he is the only one on the list who had not yet turned 24 for either half of the pair.
Why it matters. Three hundred and fifty PPR points is roughly the line where a running back stops being a good pick and starts being the reason a fantasy team wins. Doing it twice in a row is the part that almost never survives, because the workload that produces it is also what breaks backs. The company on this list is the argument for spending the second pick in a draft on him.
The whole backfield in one man
His carries went down in 2025 and his catches went up 48 percent. Detroit turned him into a receiver without telling anyone.
TrendJahmyr Gibbs by season (regular season)
| Season | Games | Carries | Rush yds | Targets | Catches | Rec yds | PPR |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2023 | 15 | 182 | 945 | 71 | 52 | 316 | 242.1 |
| 2024 | 17 | 250 | 1,412 | 63 | 52 | 517 | 362.9 |
| 2025 | 17 | 243 | 1,223 | 94 | 77 | 616 | 366.9 |
2025 receptions by a running back
| Back | Team | Catches | Targets | Rec yds |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Christian McCaffrey | SF | 102 | 129 | 924 |
| Bijan Robinson | ATL | 79 | 103 | 820 |
| Jahmyr Gibbs | DET | 77 | 94 | 616 |
| Kenneth Gainwell | PIT | 73 | 85 | 486 |
| Chase Brown | CIN | 69 | 88 | 437 |
| De'Von Achane | MIA | 67 | 85 | 488 |
Seven fewer carries, 31 more targets, 25 more catches. The 2024 version of Gibbs was a runner who caught three passes a game. The 2025 version was third among all running backs in receptions and had three double-digit-catch games, against Green Bay in week 1, the Giants in week 12 and the Steelers in week 16.
Why it matters. A running back's receiving work is the least injury-dependent and least game-script-dependent part of his line: teams throw to backs when they are behind, and Detroit was rarely behind. Gibbs added targets anyway, which means the role changed rather than the situation. In PPR that is the single most valuable direction a back's usage can move, because it converts to points at more than double the rate of a carry.
No back with 300 touches scored on a higher share of them in 2025. He turned one touch in 18 into six points.
Comparison2025 touchdown rate per touch, backs with 200+ touches
| Back | Team | Touches | Total TDs | TD per touch |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Zach Charbonnet | SEA | 204 | 12 | 5.88% |
| Jahmyr Gibbs | DET | 320 | 18 | 5.63% |
| Jonathan Taylor | IND | 369 | 20 | 5.42% |
| Josh Jacobs | GB | 270 | 14 | 5.19% |
| Derrick Henry | BAL | 322 | 16 | 4.97% |
| Christian McCaffrey | SF | 413 | 17 | 4.12% |
| James Cook | BUF | 342 | 14 | 4.09% |
| De'Von Achane | MIA | 305 | 12 | 3.93% |
Charbonnet did it on 204 touches, a workload small enough that a two-week hot streak moves the rate. Among the six backs who touched the ball 300 times or more, Gibbs was first by two tenths of a point, and he did it while the man behind him on his own depth chart took more of the goal-line carries.
Why it matters. Touchdown rate per touch is where a back's efficiency and his team's scoring environment meet. Detroit scored 481 points in 2025, fourth in the league, so the opportunities were there. What separates Gibbs from the other backs in high-scoring offenses is that most of his scores did not come from short-yardage handoffs, so his total is less exposed to a coach deciding to give the goal line to someone else.
MYTH TEST: David Montgomery owns the goal line, so Gibbs cannot be a 1.02 pick. The goal line part is true. It cost Gibbs nothing.
Detroit backfield inside the opponent 5-yard line, 2025 regular season
| Back | Carries inside the 5 | Rush TDs from inside the 5 | All rush TDs | Total TDs |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| David Montgomery | 17 | 5 | 8 | 8 |
| Jahmyr Gibbs | 10 | 4 | 13 | 18 |
Where each back's rushing touchdowns came from
| Back | Inside the 5 | 6 to 20 yards out | Outside the 20 |
|---|---|---|---|
| David Montgomery | 5 | 1 | 2 |
| Jahmyr Gibbs | 4 | 5 | 4 |
Montgomery got 70 percent more carries inside the 5 and turned them into five scores. Gibbs still finished with 18 total touchdowns to Montgomery's eight, because four of his rushing scores started outside the opponent's 20 and five more came from the middle of the field. The short-yardage work was never how he was going to score.
Why it matters. This is the most common objection to drafting Gibbs at the top of a draft, and the data says the premise is right and the conclusion is wrong. A goal-line role is worth roughly one touchdown per five carries; a 40-yard-run role is worth a touchdown whenever the crease opens. Gibbs has been scoring the second way for three seasons, which makes his touchdown total far less sensitive to Detroit's short-yardage depth chart than the objection assumes.
Going second overall
Fifteen running back seasons since 1999 have cleared 350 PPR points at age 23 or younger. Gibbs has two of them.
Rare350+ PPR seasons by a running back aged 23 or younger, since 1999
| Back | Season | Age | PPR |
|---|---|---|---|
| Christian McCaffrey | 2019 | 23 | 471.2 |
| Steven Jackson | 2006 | 23 | 415.4 |
| Edgerrin James | 2000 | 22 | 393.3 |
| Chris Johnson | 2009 | 23 | 392.9 |
| Saquon Barkley | 2018 | 21 | 385.8 |
| Christian McCaffrey | 2018 | 22 | 385.5 |
| LaDainian Tomlinson | 2002 | 23 | 384.2 |
| Todd Gurley | 2017 | 23 | 383.3 |
| Jonathan Taylor | 2021 | 22 | 373.1 |
| Bijan Robinson | 2025 | 23 | 370.8 |
| Le'Veon Bell | 2014 | 22 | 370.5 |
| Edgerrin James | 1999 | 21 | 369.9 |
| Jahmyr Gibbs | 2025 | 23 | 366.9 |
| Jahmyr Gibbs | 2024 | 22 | 362.9 |
| Alvin Kamara | 2018 | 23 | 354.2 |
Three players own two of the 15: McCaffrey, Edgerrin James, and Gibbs. Everyone else on the list got there once before turning 24.
Why it matters. Age is the quiet variable in running back pricing, because the position's decline curve is steeper and starts earlier than any other. A back who has already produced two elite seasons and enters 2026 having just turned 24 is buying seasons on the front half of that curve, not the back. That is the structural argument for taking him over an older back with a similar line.
5.88 yards every time he touches the ball for a career. The only backs ahead of him are third-down specialists and Jamaal Charles.
ComparisonCareer yards per touch, running backs with 800+ touches since 1999
| Back | Touches | Scrimmage yards | Yards per touch |
|---|---|---|---|
| Darren Sproles | 1,287 | 8,396 | 6.52 |
| Cordarrelle Patterson | 856 | 5,521 | 6.45 |
| Duke Johnson | 843 | 5,135 | 6.09 |
| Danny Woodhead | 817 | 4,936 | 6.04 |
| Jamaal Charles | 1,717 | 10,156 | 5.92 |
| Jahmyr Gibbs | 856 | 5,029 | 5.88 |
| Austin Ekeler | 1,561 | 9,053 | 5.80 |
| Marshall Faulk | 1,891 | 10,904 | 5.77 |
| Charlie Garner | 1,386 | 7,985 | 5.76 |
| Christian McCaffrey | 2,284 | 12,979 | 5.68 |
Four of the five men ahead of Gibbs were used as change-of-pace and passing-down backs who rarely saw 200 carries in a season. Gibbs has taken 675 carries in three years and is still running at Jamaal Charles's career number.
Why it matters. Yards per touch collapses when a back is asked to grind out short yardage, which is why the top of this list is populated by players who were never asked to. Gibbs has carried a lead back's volume for three straight seasons and kept a specialist's efficiency, and that combination is what separates a back who scores 360 PPR points from one who scores 250 on the same number of touches.
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