When Jahmyr Gibbs was in kindergarten, he wore a “Spider-Man” costume under his clothes. “I used to tell all the girls my name was Peter Parker,”
he says, laughing. “They would come knock on my door, ask if Peter can come out. My mom would be like, ‘Who?’ And I’d say, ‘Ah, that’s me.’”
Wait, a Spider-Man costume? Did you think there’d be a moment where you had to rip off your shirt and spring into action?
“Yeah,”
he laughs again. “If someone fell down the slide, or my homeboys fell off their bike? Then I’m there.”
So take comfort in this, Detroit Lions fans: Gibbs may now be the lone star of the rushing attack, but he has been prepping for this superhero moment since he was a kid.
Great Power, Great Responsibility
With great power comes great responsibility. That’s a signature line from Spider-Man’s Uncle Ben. It could also be pasted over Gibbs’ locker this season. After three years of sharing the spotlight with David Montgomery, Gibbs is now center stage, a solo act, no more Knuckles to his Sonic.
And with a new contract that makes him the highest-paid running back in the NFL, it won’t just be Lions fans looking to see how far the one-time Spiderman can soar. The whole world will be watching. Which won’t faze Gibbs in the slightest.
“We’re just beginning to scratch the surface with him,”
his coach, Dan Campbell, recently told the media.
[ WATCH: Make the new “Freep Sports Show” your go-to Detroit/Michigan sports podcast, available anywhere you listen to podcasts (Apple, Spotify). Join us live on our YouTube stream after every Lions game this season. ]
And what’s beneath that surface is more than football talent. It’s a remarkable story of endurance, belief, happy accidents, and love from unexpected places. Oh, yeah. And speed. Lots of speed.
The Fast Track
“Were you always fast?”
I ask Gibbs as we sit alongside a practice field at the Lions training facility in Allen Park.
“Yeah,”
he confirms. As a kid growing up in Dalton, Georgia, “I was always the fastest in school. The first time I played football, I ran like 60 yards for a touchdown.”
How old were you?
“Nine. I was actually playing lineman. I don’t know why. I was so skinny. I was just pushing people. Finally, I was like, ‘Can I get the ball?’”
He did. And from that first carry, his gift was blinding. Young Jahmyr could outrun defenders. Outrun his sisters. Outrun his friends. Even outrun his dog.
“Speed,”
he says, modestly, “was never an issue.”
But there were other issues. Gibbs grew up poor, raised largely by his grandmother, and while he doesn’t care to speak much about it, he spent nights with her at homeless shelters, needing food and clothing to get by.
During one of those stays, they met a couple of volunteers named Greg and Dusty Ross. Later, when he was a teenager, Jahmyr would reconnect with them, move in with their family and, eventually, be adopted by them.
“They made a big difference [in my life] because I didn’t really care about school. I wasn’t really doing my homework and all that. They pushed me to do my homework, take the SAT, ACT, got me a tutor, helped me out, gave me clothes, food, just everything.”
About that time, Gibbs’ football prowess was catching the attention of college scouts. Among them was a man named Tashard Choice, who is now Gibbs’ running backs coach with the Lions, but back then he was an assistant coach and recruiter for Georgia Tech.
“The first day I met Jah was at a high school practice,”
Choice recalls. “I was supposed to stay for like 30 minutes. But I watched him do one drill, I watched his feet, and I said to his coach, ‘I’m out of here.’”
“The coach laughs. He’s like, ‘You leaving already?’ But I could already tell what type of kid Jah was. True running backs, the ones that are different, it hits you in the face. When I watched his feet, I knew it. I was like, ‘Oh my goodness!’”
Ringing Endorsements
“Oh my goodness” is a common reaction to Gibbs with a football. Speed is one thing, but instincts, cutting, juking, instant acceleration, and great hands in the passing game – well, that’s the stuff of superlatives. And Gibbs could major in superlatives.
Consider this: In the first game of his senior year in high school, he gained 420 yards and scored eight touchdowns. Eight touchdowns?
In his first year at Georgia Tech, he led the team in all-purpose yards (968) and scoring (seven TDs) – despite playing in just seven games.
As a Lion, he already has more touchdowns and more games with a touchdown than any NFL player in history through his first three years.
The chorus of experts singing Gibbs’ praises could fill a halftime show stage. Montgomery has said, “It’s evident Jahmyr is, or, if not, will be the best running back in the league.”
Campbell has said he could be “one of the best, if not the best.”
Micah Parsons of the Green Bay Packers called Gibbs “the fastest person I’ve ever seen on the field.”
And Parsons has run a 4.39 in the 40-yard dash.
Gibbs, at a healthy 24, is like Apple stock right after the first iPhone release, or a Texas oilfield just after the first drill hits. The riches are exceeded only by the promise of more.
Humble Beast
But for all this hype, Gibbs remains a quiet, “show, don’t talk” kind of talent, a guy who once cringed at having to give a captain’s speech at Georgia Tech and finally, according to Choice, uttered a single sentence like, “Let’s go win,” and still had the whole team cheering.
“He really doesn’t want to be the center of attention, even though his game is so flashy,”
Choice says. “His style of play is so entertaining, it makes people marvel at him. But he’s humble.
“Like his grandma calls him: a humble beast.”
The Humble Beast is aware of his talent, even if he’s not sure where it comes from.
“I think right now I run more on instinct,”
he says, “because my body naturally reacts to reads. I’ve been running the same runs since I was like 10 years old, so it’s just natural. Even if I don’t really see it, my body just moves that way.”
Gibbs recalls a game in his rookie season against the Minnesota Vikings where he took the ball and made a juke to his left to avoid a defender that he swears he never even saw.
“I went back to huddle and I was like, ‘Bro, I have no idea what’s happening.’ I mean, all I saw was like a glimmer and then my body just went.”
Such waterbug darting draws comparisons to Barry Sanders, another nearly inexplicable rushing talent. And Gibbs has been hailed in many corners as the new Barry.
But he will settle for the new role the Lions have carved out for him, upping his carries and their reliance on his skill set, now that Montgomery is gone.
“I was sad to see him leave,”
Gibbs says of his backfield mate. “Everybody on the team loves him. The whole organization loved him. I wasn’t really chasing [being the main running back]. I’d be super happy if he was still here. If he was here for the next five years, I’d be happy with that, too.”
By the same token, Gibbs is ready for his closeup. Just pull off the shirt and let the superhero shine.
‘It’s All a Masterpiece’
By the way, about that contract “hold-in.” Gibbs spent eight days – excruciating days, he says – waiting for a new deal to be worked out while he sat at the practice facility not practicing.
“It was definitely stressful. It’s something I really didn’t want to do, but you know, this is business. Still, I was definitely missing being out here.”
“I was calling my agent every day asking, ‘Are we done?’”
He’s done now, with a three-year, $67.5 million extension that puts him at the top of the heap for his position.
“Money for me is just about having resources,”
he says. “I’m kind of self-motivated. I don’t really need any exterior motivation. I know what I want to be and where I want to be at. And I think you know the extension and all that is just – what’s the word – I think I definitely have a responsibility here to be great and do whatever it takes to help my teammates.”
You get the sense with Gibbs that none of the business stuff really matters. He plays football because he loves it and because he finds himself inside it. He is an extremely likable, even funny guy who has a reputation for shyness, yet is admired by almost everyone around him.
Choice, who knew him since high school, says they kid around about everything from video games to a tiny knee brace that Isiah Pacheco once wore. But beyond the laughter, and even beyond the football talent, there is a determined young man who has quietly watched life unfold around him and knows “who is full of crap and who isn’t,” and who honors those close to him with affection and love.
“Jahmyr Gibbs is one of those dudes that don’t come around often,”
Choice says. “He’s always had angels around him. His grandma, Dusty and Greg, his family, people along the way to help him. And for him to come to the Detroit Lions, where he’s under Scotty Montgomery, and he has a David Montgomery, and he has a coach Campbell – I mean, just think about his journey.
“To me, it’s all a masterpiece. In the end, he can be as good as anybody who’s ever played the game. He has an opportunity, but he’s not gonna say it. He’s gonna work like it. He believes every time he steps on the field, he’s the best cat on the field. And I told him he should.”
“With great power comes great responsibility.”
The season is knocking on the door. And the kid who once called himself Peter Parker is about to answer, not as a mild-mannered teen, but as the superhero he once dreamed of, and now the world expects him to be.
Buckle up.
Contact Mitch Albom: [email protected]. Check out the latest updates on his charities, books and events at MitchAlbom.com. Follow @mitchalbom on x.com.