Detroit Lions head coach Dan Campbell warned fans that without running back David Montgomery in the mix, the team would lean on Jahmyr Gibbs as their bell cow. While the game went into overtime, Gibbs had a career-high 29 rushing attempts. He had 24 attempts before overtime, which would have been the second-highest amount of his career. With five receptions added in, it was quite an impressive workload.
Campbell made it clear that he does not expect Gibbs to handle that kind of workload every week. However, he also noted that the plan is to utilize the star who just signed a three-year, $67.5M extension.
“You know what I like? Winning the game, man, and we were going to win this game,” said Campbell on the usage of Gibbs. “That guy’s our hot hand, and ultimately, do I want to set records with how many carries? No, that’s not something I want to do. When you look at a guy, and you feel like, ‘alright, man.’ He’s in good shape. I mean, he had a really good camp, and he is in phenomenal shape. He’s in the best shape I’ve seen since he’s been here. Now that doesn’t mean we’re not going to monitor, and we’re going to keep an eye on this guy because we understand that too, but we did what we had to do today.”
Gibbs 34 touches in Week 1 would have him on pace for 578 by the end of the season. The NFL record for touches in a season is 492. So, Gibbs is not going to maintain this pace. However, Campbell made it clear that if the game plan calls for it, they are going to lean on Gibbs.
Detroit Lions Lean on Jahmyr Gibbs for Heavy Workload
Gibbs has always been one of the most efficient running backs in the NFL. Still, that does not come with the same volume that some other backs have. Before Week 1, Gibbs had six games in his NFL career with more than 20 carries. He had 10 games below 10 carries.
So, if anything, they were not quite utilizing him enough. A lot of that had to do with Montgomery. Montgomery averaged 15.6 rushing attempts per game in his first year with Detroit. Gibbs started to eat into that workload, and he dropped to 13.2, and then last year was at 9.3. So, things were trending this way.
However, Jacob Saylors did not have a single carry, and Sione Vaki only had two. Vaki struggled when he saw the field. The Lions currently do not have a backup qualified to take work away from Gibbs.
Gibbs is in for a career year with the Lions
Gibbs will not maintain this pace, but it is hard to see him keeping up any sort of rate like this while not shattering his career numbers. As a rookie, Gibbs had 945 rushing yards and 316 receiving yards.
In his second year, he exploded for 1,412 rushing yards and 517 receiving. He was quite as strong the following year, but still posted 1,223 yards on the ground to go with 616 through the air.
As of now, he is expected to have a career year.
Lions HC Makes Intentions Clear With $67.5M Star