Jared Smola
"Depending on how the game goes, I'd expect Gibbs to be around the 15-carry mark and continue to be a big part of the passing game (he's already got nine receptions in two games)."
I usually dismiss these kinds of things, but it is interesting that no RB weighing under 200 lbs at the combine has had multiple top 25 fantasy seasons from 2013-2022. That just seems crazy to me.Is it?This is an interesting analysis. If Gibbs becomes a bell cow RB, he will literally be a unicorn.
Does Size Really Matter for Running Back Prospects?
Every year the dynasty football community is enamored with running backs. They may have the shortest careers, but drafting a successful running back in the first round can have an immediate impact on your fantasy team’s success. On the flip side, using your pick on anything less than an...www.4for4.com
Lots of words and charts but analysis?
Not really.
Jamaal Charles was right at 200 lbs at the combine. And a bottom 10% vertical. His playing weight was listed at 199lbs.I usually dismiss these kinds of things, but it is interesting that no RB weighing under 200 lbs at the combine has ever had multiple top 25 fantasy seasons. That just seems crazy to me.
This data was for RB’s weighing under 200 at the combine. I know it’s silly to argue over one lb., but I have to admit the data is interesting.Jamaal Charles was right at 200 lbs at the combine. And a bottom 10% vertical. His playing weight was listed at 199lbs.I usually dismiss these kinds of things, but it is interesting that no RB weighing under 200 lbs at the combine has ever had multiple top 25 fantasy seasons. That just seems crazy to me.
Top 25? Warwick Dunn had, like eight top 25 finishes.Jamaal Charles was right at 200 lbs at the combine. And a bottom 10% vertical. His playing weight was listed at 199lbs.I usually dismiss these kinds of things, but it is interesting that no RB weighing under 200 lbs at the combine has ever had multiple top 25 fantasy seasons. That just seems crazy to me.
He has some weird wording in the article. Looks like he’s talking about from 2013-2022Top 25? Warwick Dunn had, like eight top 25 finishes.Jamaal Charles was right at 200 lbs at the combine. And a bottom 10% vertical. His playing weight was listed at 199lbs.I usually dismiss these kinds of things, but it is interesting that no RB weighing under 200 lbs at the combine has ever had multiple top 25 fantasy seasons. That just seems crazy to me.
ETA: someone gonna say that Sproles didn't have a couple top 25 finishes? Or are we limiting this to non-ppr leagues?
Conveniently cutting out Ray Rice.He has some weird wording in the article. Looks like he’s talking about from 2013-2022Top 25? Warwick Dunn had, like eight top 25 finishes.Jamaal Charles was right at 200 lbs at the combine. And a bottom 10% vertical. His playing weight was listed at 199lbs.I usually dismiss these kinds of things, but it is interesting that no RB weighing under 200 lbs at the combine has ever had multiple top 25 fantasy seasons. That just seems crazy to me.
ETA: someone gonna say that Sproles didn't have a couple top 25 finishes? Or are we limiting this to non-ppr leagues?
As I said in the James Cook thread there is a few forms of selection bias going on here.This data was for RB’s weighing under 200 at the combine. I know it’s silly to argue over one lb., but I have to admit the data is interesting.Jamaal Charles was right at 200 lbs at the combine. And a bottom 10% vertical. His playing weight was listed at 199lbs.I usually dismiss these kinds of things, but it is interesting that no RB weighing under 200 lbs at the combine has ever had multiple top 25 fantasy seasons. That just seems crazy to me.
Great post. And I agree 100 percent. And I agree he cherry picked the weight stat, but it did stand out to me as interesting.As I said in the James Cook thread there is a few forms of selection bias going on here.This data was for RB’s weighing under 200 at the combine. I know it’s silly to argue over one lb., but I have to admit the data is interesting.Jamaal Charles was right at 200 lbs at the combine. And a bottom 10% vertical. His playing weight was listed at 199lbs.I usually dismiss these kinds of things, but it is interesting that no RB weighing under 200 lbs at the combine has ever had multiple top 25 fantasy seasons. That just seems crazy to me.
The season is still young but Cook looks to be on pace to be a hit by this criteria.
Chris Johnson would certainly be a hit if included in the sample. 195 lbs.
This is why a few years back when people would make this argument, they would qualify it by saying unless the RB had elite speed. Like C2K and Jamal Charles. Enough time has passed that this author is able to leave Johnson out of it to make their case.
what has always bothered me about these things is the disengenuous way they are constructed, using several forms of selection bias to do so.
That just wont hold up against closer investigation and an honest use of analysis. These things spit in the face of the scientific method they pretend to be using.
I did come across a study a long time ago that I think actually did this right. Without selection bias or preconcieved notions to make a case. I have talked about this study many times here before because it satisfied me the methods they used unlike almost every other study like this have seen.
That study broke down each combine metric by position, testing each one for their correlation to success for players at that position, success simply defined as the approximate value of the players in their first 3 seasons in the NFL.
Correlation numbers need to be very high for them to actualy prove that the metric was a requirement or prerequisite the player needed to have to be successful. A lot of the results did not find strong enough correlation to say a player MUST have good metric in say the 40 yard dash to be successful, because there are always excrptions, outliers.
But the study did find some metrics were more important than others, and that was different for each position. Also had a chart for which metrics mattered more across the board for all positions.
Anyhow for the RB position the 3 metrics that had a strong (not perfect) correlation to success were 40 time 3 cone drill and weight. Othet metrics were not as strong as these 3 were.
So yes weight does matter.
Just not to the extent or the way these studies present them to.
If the writers of these articles would actually do a honest job with their research and findings I would have no issue with them. Say something like 90% of successful RB were over 200 lbs or whatever it is.
Its when they twist the facts to match their conclushion that I have a big issue with their work.
Here is a link to the study I was referring to.Great post. And I agree 100 percent. And I agree he cherry picked the weight stat, but it did stand out to me as interesting.As I said in the James Cook thread there is a few forms of selection bias going on here.This data was for RB’s weighing under 200 at the combine. I know it’s silly to argue over one lb., but I have to admit the data is interesting.Jamaal Charles was right at 200 lbs at the combine. And a bottom 10% vertical. His playing weight was listed at 199lbs.I usually dismiss these kinds of things, but it is interesting that no RB weighing under 200 lbs at the combine has ever had multiple top 25 fantasy seasons. That just seems crazy to me.
The season is still young but Cook looks to be on pace to be a hit by this criteria.
Chris Johnson would certainly be a hit if included in the sample. 195 lbs.
This is why a few years back when people would make this argument, they would qualify it by saying unless the RB had elite speed. Like C2K and Jamal Charles. Enough time has passed that this author is able to leave Johnson out of it to make their case.
what has always bothered me about these things is the disengenuous way they are constructed, using several forms of selection bias to do so.
That just wont hold up against closer investigation and an honest use of analysis. These things spit in the face of the scientific method they pretend to be using.
I did come across a study a long time ago that I think actually did this right. Without selection bias or preconcieved notions to make a case. I have talked about this study many times here before because it satisfied me the methods they used unlike almost every other study like this have seen.
That study broke down each combine metric by position, testing each one for their correlation to success for players at that position, success simply defined as the approximate value of the players in their first 3 seasons in the NFL.
Correlation numbers need to be very high for them to actualy prove that the metric was a requirement or prerequisite the player needed to have to be successful. A lot of the results did not find strong enough correlation to say a player MUST have good metric in say the 40 yard dash to be successful, because there are always excrptions, outliers.
But the study did find some metrics were more important than others, and that was different for each position. Also had a chart for which metrics mattered more across the board for all positions.
Anyhow for the RB position the 3 metrics that had a strong (not perfect) correlation to success were 40 time 3 cone drill and weight. Othet metrics were not as strong as these 3 were.
So yes weight does matter.
Just not to the extent or the way these studies present them to.
If the writers of these articles would actually do a honest job with their research and findings I would have no issue with them. Say something like 90% of successful RB were over 200 lbs or whatever it is.
Its when they twist the facts to match their conclushion that I have a big issue with their work.
But a study like you described would be MUCH more helpful and relevant.
That’s interesting stuff. Reminds me of my MBA stats class where we had to do a regression analysis and I did one on dog racing. Turns out the one hole really is significant in predicting success.Here is a link to the study I was referring to.Great post. And I agree 100 percent. And I agree he cherry picked the weight stat, but it did stand out to me as interesting.As I said in the James Cook thread there is a few forms of selection bias going on here.This data was for RB’s weighing under 200 at the combine. I know it’s silly to argue over one lb., but I have to admit the data is interesting.Jamaal Charles was right at 200 lbs at the combine. And a bottom 10% vertical. His playing weight was listed at 199lbs.I usually dismiss these kinds of things, but it is interesting that no RB weighing under 200 lbs at the combine has ever had multiple top 25 fantasy seasons. That just seems crazy to me.
The season is still young but Cook looks to be on pace to be a hit by this criteria.
Chris Johnson would certainly be a hit if included in the sample. 195 lbs.
This is why a few years back when people would make this argument, they would qualify it by saying unless the RB had elite speed. Like C2K and Jamal Charles. Enough time has passed that this author is able to leave Johnson out of it to make their case.
what has always bothered me about these things is the disengenuous way they are constructed, using several forms of selection bias to do so.
That just wont hold up against closer investigation and an honest use of analysis. These things spit in the face of the scientific method they pretend to be using.
I did come across a study a long time ago that I think actually did this right. Without selection bias or preconcieved notions to make a case. I have talked about this study many times here before because it satisfied me the methods they used unlike almost every other study like this have seen.
That study broke down each combine metric by position, testing each one for their correlation to success for players at that position, success simply defined as the approximate value of the players in their first 3 seasons in the NFL.
Correlation numbers need to be very high for them to actualy prove that the metric was a requirement or prerequisite the player needed to have to be successful. A lot of the results did not find strong enough correlation to say a player MUST have good metric in say the 40 yard dash to be successful, because there are always excrptions, outliers.
But the study did find some metrics were more important than others, and that was different for each position. Also had a chart for which metrics mattered more across the board for all positions.
Anyhow for the RB position the 3 metrics that had a strong (not perfect) correlation to success were 40 time 3 cone drill and weight. Othet metrics were not as strong as these 3 were.
So yes weight does matter.
Just not to the extent or the way these studies present them to.
If the writers of these articles would actually do a honest job with their research and findings I would have no issue with them. Say something like 90% of successful RB were over 200 lbs or whatever it is.
Its when they twist the facts to match their conclushion that I have a big issue with their work.
But a study like you described would be MUCH more helpful and relevant.
This is not up to date. It would be nice to see the same study done and brought up to the present. In my view the larger the sample size the better. There could be some other interesting things done with this data such as change detection that might show some metrics changing over time. It does seem to me that NFL players particularly on defense are getting smaller than they used to be. Weighing less but being faster. Offensive players may be changing in this direction also over time. As the game becomes more focused on passing than running the ball.
One new problem we have as far as trying to bring such a study into the present is that the RBs have stopped doing the 3 cone drill since Covid. The combine was cancelled in 2021 so no data for that year as the event did not happen. PFR has input pro day data for that year into their database to take its place. But many of us know the pro day data does not match the combine data. Then in 2022 and 2023 almost no RB have done the 3 cone drill. So we dont have any data for that for the last 3 seasons.
The most interesting thing about this study is that it found that none of the combine metrics mattered for players from the WR position. Which is pretty interesting in itself. For the other positions it shows which metrics mattered more than others and by how much. So I have found this helpful when looking at players from any position. If one is playing IDP for example this study has some information that might be helpful to people looking at safeties and so on.
The author does not specifically comment about the RB position at all. Just shows the graph. What we can see from the graph is that the 3 metrics that were statistically significant, 40 time 3 cone drill and weight that weight was the least significant of these 3 metrics. Based on the length of the bars.
As far as Gibbs specifically he is somewhat of a tweener between the RB and WR positions. So do we only consider him as a RB for this type of analysis? Or do we consider him as a WR too? If we consider him as a WR then the combine metrics do not matter at all.
I hope Dan Campbell gives us that … but they seem really hell bent on having a plodder (Craig Reynolds) run the ball up the middle 15-20x a gameGibbs vs Bijan … Battle of the beasts
I’d def bet the over one that
Receiving yards 24.5 OU? I think I like the over there One good screen pass can net 15-20.
Fingers crossed for a repeat of Bo v Barry from 10 Dec, 1990Gibbs vs Bijan … Battle of the beasts
You guys keep calling him Gibby you are gonna wreck his career. he's not a hockey player.
Dude haven't you heard, they have a million super-creative plays for him, they're just saving them for a game where... uh... look they're just saving them, alright?Draft a pass catching speed back 12th overall and then don’t call a single play to get him in space. Brilliant.
Agreed. He’s locked in as a committee back. Gibbs is explosive (straight-line speed), but he’s not showing the escapability needed to offset his lack of size (weight).Gibbs is not the guy. He's not big enough to be a workhorse. I think he'll have some good games. He's too explosive not too. He needs Montgomery.
Out performer Bijan. It’s the lack of receptions today that left fantasy players a little disappointedGibbs had 16/79...people in here act like he had 10/20 or something.
Detroit's playcallers should watch the tape of that gameShould have drafted Achane
He's been meh so far. There is no denying that. In full PPR leagues he has scored 8,12, and 9. From a ranking perspective that doesn't even qualify as a rb2. That puts him in 25-30 territory. That's not what people expected.Gibbs had 16/79...people in here act like he had 10/20 or something.
Good callOver/under on Gibbs rush attempts this week?
Lions have 54 RB ATT through two weeks
I'll go with:
- Gibbs 18
- Reynolds 6
- Knight 2
- Cabinda 1
How many weeks we gonna hear this?Should have had at least 2 more receptions and X number of yards to those totals.
Very first play for the lions on offense was a designed screen to Gibbs... wide open but fell down, Goff threw it into the turg
Early or mid 3rd quarter on another screen, he dropped a pass that Goff put right on the money.
very unusual concentration of targets today
cannot remember a game in the Ben Johnson era with only 4 players targeted
- Amon-Ra 12
- LaPorta 11
- Raymond 6
- Gibbs 2
- throw aways 2?
4 OL out, Reynolds with groin, Monty out....still, was atypical of what they usually do....first two weeks it was 7 and 8 different players
You basing this off 3 games says a lot about your ability to assess talent. I’m pretty sure you admitted to not watching college football.12th overall for this guy when they could've gotten Achane in 3rd is wild.
There was some initial concern Reynolds would see more of the work, but that was squashed quick. little weird he got so many carries yet only saw 2 targets.Jahmyr Gibbs rushed 17 times for 80 yards in the Lions’ Week 3 win over the Falcons, catching 1-2 targets for 2 yards.
With David Montgomery out, Gibbs was granted control of the Detroit backfield. He out-carried Craig Reynolds 17-4, though Reynolds did take the field for a handful of passing situations. Gibbs was elusive with the ball in his hands but got stuffed in a number of short-yardage situations. When Montgomery is healthy, he will likely reclaim that role plus the majority of Detroit’s carries on the whole. Gibbs will project for RB2 numbers if Montogmery is unable to return from his thigh injury in Week 4 against the Packers.
- Rotoworld