Late-Round Perspectives: Jacob Gibbs

JJ Zachariason (0:00)

Jacob Gibbs is a fantasy analyst at CBS Sports, who's one of the hosts of Beyond the Box Score, and who puts together the Fantasy Football Today newsletter. He's got an obsession with advanced football data, he practices mindfulness as a yogi, and he and I go further back than you probably realize. These are his late-round perspectives.

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Jacob Gibbs (1:10)

Last show we did together was last summer with Ben Gretsch.

JJ Zachariason (1:13)

Last summer.

Jacob Gibbs (1:14)

Breaking ground, just phenomenal stuff. Brought up all the RPO stuff with Pittman. Everybody was out on him, and then he ended up having a really good year. So yeah, let's make some more magic.

JJ Zachariason (1:23)

Yeah, here's the thing though, with the Pittman stuff especially, so for those of you who missed that discussion, it was one where Gretsch had talked about, had done a really quick high level look at RPOs, and the impact that RPOs may or may not have on fantasy football. And so I started talking to him and I had this epiphany of just wanting to dig into it a little bit more. I think I did an episode of Late-Round Podcast on it in particular, and basically found that there is a lot of data that backs up what Gretch was just generally talking about that was more of like a logic thing at the time. And the data being that teams that were heavy RPO seemed to hyper target their number one wide receiver more than a team that wouldn't be running those heavy RPOs. And I think intuitively it makes sense because what an RPO is, you're either running or passing, right? And you have to make a read very, very fast and quick, right? And so from the perspective of like Michael Pittman, that actually got me on Pittman more than where I was like off of Pittman last year totally. And then the RPO stuff made me say, well, what if he is hyper targeted to some degree? And then I think this year though with Pittman, we're just seeing the effects of what a lot of people were afraid of last year of Anthony Richardson being started for most of the year, you know?

Jacob Gibbs (2:45)

I mean, I think he's got a back injury, man, and it's brutal.

I've got a back injury, and I would not be trying to take NFL hits. That's so crazy that he's even out there, honestly.

JJ Zachariason (2:55)

Yeah, that's what I actually, I've been dealing with a lower back the last week or so, and I'm like, I don't understand how athletes have to manage this and deal with this. Back injuries have to be the injury that's just most debilitating to human beings.

Jacob Gibbs (3:08)

Yeah, your back and your core, that's where everything starts with mobility. If your back is affected, you're just totally thrown off.

JJ Zachariason (3:15)

Yeah, you're a big gym rat, right?

Jacob Gibbs (3:17)

Yeah, before I got started full-time, I managed a fitness center. I'm super into yoga. I teach yoga. I really, really enjoy that. For sure, for sure.

And especially with our job, you gotta be intentional about moving because it's so easy to just sit here and just type away and hardly move at all. So yeah, for sure.

JJ Zachariason (3:37)

Has yoga influenced your mindset a lot over the last handful of years? We should just go over your journey in the space because you and I go way, way, way back. And I don't think that that connection has been made by a lot of folks who are seeing you now on the Twitter streets, you're tweeting data all the time and growing your following and whatnot. I don't think people realize that we have like the Numberfire days and you're working at Number and doing stuff at Numberfire. But take us back to where that was and how that started. And then I do want to hear, though, about like the yoga mindset and if that's like changed your perspective on what you're doing with your work.