For the first time in his NFL career, Jahmyr Gibbs is set to walk into a season as Detroit’s clear-cut No. 1 running back.
That’s the natural next step for a player who has been building toward this moment since he arrived in the league in 2023. Gibbs came into the NFL as the No. 12 overall pick after two seasons at Georgia Tech and a final college year at Alabama.
Across his three collegiate seasons, he piled up 2,132 rushing yards and 15 touchdowns, while adding 103 receptions for 1,215 yards and eight scores. That same all-purpose impact has carried over to the pros without much slowdown. Last season alone, Gibbs ran for 1,223 yards and 13 touchdowns and also chipped in 616 receiving yards with five more scores.
He did all of that while sharing the backfield with David Montgomery, who was treated by Dan Campbell and Detroit’s staff as a No. 1-type runner in his own right. But Montgomery, the “thunder” to Gibbs' “lightning,” has since been traded to the Houston Texans, and the path is now wide open for Gibbs to take full control.
Detroit did bring in Kansas City Chiefs running back Isiah Pacheco this offseason, but the depth chart picture is still pretty straightforward. Gibbs is the lead back, and there’s no real debate about that heading into 2026.
Pacheco should give the Lions a sturdy second option. In Kansas City, he started 42 of 51 games over four seasons, and he appeared in 13 games last year, making 12 starts while running for 462 yards and a touchdown on 118 carries.
After Gibbs and Pacheco, Detroit is expected to keep one more running back on the season-opening roster. That last spot looks like a fight between Sione Vaki and Jacob Saylors.
Vaki hasn’t done much offensively in his first two seasons. He has only seven carries for 18 yards in 27 games, and his offensive workload has been almost nonexistent, with just 27 total snaps and only one offensive snap in 2025.
Saylors, meanwhile, has a real chance to push him out. The undrafted free agent from East Tennessee State had only two carries for 11 yards in 2025, but he made his mark on special teams by returning 33 kicks for 897 yards.
Vaki has some special teams value too, but it hasn’t come close to matching what Saylors has done there. Since the Lions made Vaki a fourth-round pick in the 2024 NFL Draft, he has returned just four kicks for 94 yards.
Right now, Saylors looks like the favorite to claim the final running back job in Detroit.
The other two backs on the roster are Kye Robichaux and Jabari Small. Robichaux, an undrafted free agent in 2025, had been in position to compete for a practice squad spot before an injury in early August changed that picture. He was waived, then brought back and placed on injured reserve for the rest of the year.
Small also dealt with an early training camp injury last summer. He later joined Detroit’s practice squad in late November and stayed there through the end of the season. The Lions have since signed him to a futures contract for 2026.
At this point, both Robichaux and Small appear to have a solid chance to land on the Lions’ season-opening practice squad.
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