Jahmyr Gibbs — Week 2: Sixteen Carries, Eight Targets
2026 NFL Season · Half-PPR Scoring · Friday, Sep 18
Gibbs carried 16 times for 52 yards, with a 16-yard run and fifteen others that gained 36, and caught six of eight targets for 61 yards and an 11-yard touchdown on second and four. His eight second-half carries gained five yards. Twenty-nine carries in Week 1 became sixteen on the short week, in a 41–31 loss to the Bills.
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21 to nothing, Bills, five-oh-seven left in the half, second and four at the Buffalo 11. Jared Goff threw short right to Jahmyr Gibbs in the end zone for the touchdown. +2.1 expected points added — expected points added is what a play was worth given down, distance and field position — and Detroit's first points of the night, at the end of a 12-play drive on which Gibbs touched the ball seven times — four carries and three catches, including eight yards on third and four to keep it alive — plus a 19-yard run that came back on a holding call.
The line: 16 carries, 52 yards, no rushing touchdown, two first downs, five of the 16 successful, −2.5 expected points on the carries; eight targets, six catches, 61 yards, one touchdown, five first downs, +6.0 expected points on his targets. The carries went nothing, 16, nine, nothing, 10, −1, six, seven, two, nothing, two, nothing, two, nothing, −1, nothing. Eight before halftime for 47 yards, eight after for five. The 16-yarder came on first and 10 with three 34 left in the first quarter; the 10 was third and seven, converted. A 19-yard run in the second quarter came back on a holding penalty. Three carries inside the 20 gained six, nothing and −1. The catches: 12, eight on third and four, the touchdown, nine, nine, and 12 on the last drive.
The split: Gibbs 16 designed runs, Sione Vaki one, and Goff one aborted snap +2 scrambles. 20 rush plays against 42 pass plays, 10 designed runs before halftime and eight after. Eight targets put him second on the team behind Amon-Ra St. Brown's 13, ahead of Sam LaPorta's seven. Detroit trailed from the nine-minute mark of the first quarter and never got within one score after the second Buffalo touchdown.
Back in June the preview's whole read on Gibbs was the title — the committee is gone — with David Montgomery's hundred 58 carries out of town and a pick-1.3 price paying for the top of the range, correctly. Week 1 was 29 of 33 carries, and the question the episode left was whether 29 on a Sunday becomes 20 on a Thursday. It became 16 of 18 designed runs, so the share held and the volume did not, because the game did not allow it. Eight targets is the other half of the read showing up. Two weeks, one of each kind of game, and no second back has had more than two carries in either. Detroit is home to the Jets on Sunday the 20-seventh.
_Data via nflverse._
When Jahmyr Gibbs's week moves the numbers, you'll know — every episode, in one weekly email.
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