Football
Tashard Choice finds himself in a familiar role with the Detroit Lions: coaching Pro Bowl running back Jahmyr Gibbs.
Choice, who is entering his first year as Detroit’s running backs coach, served in the same role with Power 4 college football programs Georgia Tech (2019-2021) and Texas (2022-2024) prior to joining the Lions.
Additionally, his time as an assistant at Georgia Tech overlapped with Gibbs’ tenure with the Yellow Jackets. The now third-year pro in Gibbs spent his first two collegiate seasons at Georgia Tech (2020-21) before transferring to Alabama for his final amateur season.
Subsequently, Choice – a former NFL back and standout at Georgia Tech himself – saw first-hand the sheer talent of Gibbs. And he continued to keep tabs on the difference-making back, even as they advanced in their respective careers.
“I always tell him, he’s one of the smartest running backs I’ve ever coached. He’s just a natural football player,” Choice said of Gibbs during his media session Tuesday. “You tell him something, he understands it, he gets it right down. You don’t have to coach him over and over again on football stuff. It is easy to him.
“So having an opportunity to get around him now, coaching – I’m going to be harder on him, even more. Same way, like I tell him all day, ‘Zero, he can’t do anything right on the field.’ But Jahmyr Gibbs, I love.”
As he gets acclimated to his new job with the Lions, Choice also already has a pre-existing bond with new Detroit defensive coordinator Kelvin Sheppard.
Choice and Sheppard, who previously served as the Lions’ linebackers coach, each played with the Buffalo Bills (2011-12) and the Indianapolis Colts (2013).
Choice is proud of his longtime friend’s ascension to defensive coordinator, and it certainly helped draw him to the Motor City.
“That’s one of the things that drew me in here, because I seen one of my closest friends go from ground zero to see where he’s at right now. It’s the coolest thing alive, man,” Choice said of Sheppard. “So, I’m excited for him because I know how he’s built and I know what he wants to prove for himself. You know what I mean? I know how good he relates to the players and the coaches, and everybody loves ‘Shep Dog.’”
As much as he loves Sheppard, it doesn’t mean that it will always seem like that on the practice field this summer. You can definitely expect the former teammates to actively trash-talk one another. And you never know, there might just be a fight that breaks out between the two coaches.
“Oh, I’m going to talk trash. We don’t like each other. I may fight him. It’s funny – when you’re in them (enemy) lines, I hate him as a player on the team, but I love him at the same time. You know what I mean? But you’ll see, that’s how we are. That’s the pushing part,” Choice said of the dynamic between him and Sheppard. “Because we know when they’re going against him, they’re going to need that. My players are going to want to feed off of me. I’m going to feed off of them, and he’s the same way. So characteristics on how we are with our players are pretty similar.”
Choice and Sheppard are part of a new-look Lions coaching staff for the 2025 season. Along with a first-year defensive coordinator in Sheppard, Detroit will also have a new offensive coordinator in John Morton.
Sheppard and Morton replaced Aaron Glenn and Ben Johnson, respectively, both of whom departed for head coaching jobs earlier this offseason. Glenn left to become the head coach of the N.Y. Jets, while Johnson departed to take the Chicago Bears’ head coaching gig.
Meanwhile, Choice succeeded Scottie Montgomery, who replaced Antwaan Randle El as Detroit’s wide receivers coach.
“Coming into a room that you would hear where the guys have to have a standard – Scottie has done a hell of a job with them – you have to try to find every single avenue to coach them to get better, because that’s the job that I have to do. It is just a point where the group is so solid, and every little detail, every little knickknack, I’m picking at it,” the new Lions running backs coach expressed. “And for them to hear it and not get mad at me or hear it and not want to listen, but (instead) hear it, to be coachable, to actually try to do it, to perform on the football field, (that) has been tremendous.”
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