Detroit Lions

The Detroit Lions are an American football team based in Detroit, Michigan. Originally based in Portsmouth, Ohio and called the Portsmouth Spartans, the team began play in 1929 as an independent professional team, one of many such teams in the Ohio and Scioto River valleys. For the 1930 season, the Spartans formally joined the National Football League (NFL) as the other area independents folded because of the Great Depression. Despite success within the NFL, they could not survive in Portsmouth, then the NFL's smallest city. The team was purchased and moved to Detroit for the 1934 season.
The Lions have won four pre-Super Bowl NFL Championships, the last in 1957, but have yet to qualify for the modern day Super Bowl. Since 1957, the team has only won a single playoff game, in 1991.

1950s
Detroit enjoyed its greatest success in the 1950s. Led by quarterback Bobby Layne, they won the league championship in 1952, 1953, and 1957. They defeated the Cleveland Browns in each of those NFL Championship Games, but also lost to the Browns in the 1954 Championship Game.
In 1958, after he had led the Lions to three NFL Championships and provided Detroit nearly a decade of Hall of Fame play, the Lions traded Bobby Layne. Bobby was injured during the last championship season, and the Lions thought he was through and wanted to get what they could for him. According to legend, as he was leaving for Pittsburgh, Bobby said that Detroit "would not win for 50 years." Since this time, the Lions have not won another championship and have only a single playoff game win. Some have attributed the Lions' subsequent 49 years of futility to the "Curse of Bobby Layne."
Notably, the Lions succeeded in one of the greatest comeback victories in NFL postseason history. Trailing the San Francisco 49ers 27-7 in the 3rd quarter of the 1957 Western Conference Playoff game, Lions quarterback Tobin Rote rallied the team back with 24 unanswered points to beat the 49ers 31-27 at Kezar Stadium in San Francisco. The following week, Rote led the Lions to a decisive win over the Browns for the 1957 title. The Lions have only one playoff win since then.

1960s
On January 7, 1961, the Lions defeated the Browns 17-16 in the first-ever Playoff Bowl matching the runners-up from the two conferences into which the NFL was divided at the time (the Lions also appeared in the game in both of the next two years pursuant to their having finished second to the Green Bay Packers in the Western Conference in all three seasons; the Playoff Bowl was abolished in 1970 when the merger of the NFL and AFL went into full effect).
In the mid-1960s, the Lions served as the backdrop for the sports literature of George Plimpton, who spent time in the Lions training camp masquerading as a player. This was the basic material for his book Paper Lion, later made into a movie.
In 1964, William Clay Ford, Sr. purchased a controlling interest in the team for $4.5 million. This began a 43-year period that continues today, during which the Lions have won just one playoff game.

1970s-80s
Motown soul singer Marvin Gaye made plans, after the death of duet partner Tammi Terrell, to join the Lions and go into football. He gained weight and trained for his tryout in 1970, but was cut early on. He remained friends with a number of the players, particularly Mel Farr and Lem Barney, who appear as background vocalists on his 1971 classic single "What's Going On."
On Thanksgiving day, November 28, 1974, after over 35 years, the Lions played their final game in Tiger Stadium, where they lost to the Denver Broncos 31-27 in front of 51,157, amidst snow flurries and a 21 point Broncos 3rd quarter. The Lions have played their home games indoors ever since.
The Lions made the playoffs only once in the '70s, losing a defensive struggle to the Dallas Cowboys, 5-0, in 1970. The team went through a string of average seasons, finishing 2nd or 3rd in the division in every season from 1970 through 1978. Finally, in 1979, the team finished with a 2-14 record, and thus earned the first pick in the following draft.
In 1980, the Lions drafted running back Billy Sims with the first overall pick in the NFL Draft. The Lions made the playoffs in 1982 and 1983, winning the division in the latter season. However, Sims suffered a career-ending knee injury in 1984, and the team would not finish with a record above .500 for the rest of the decade.

1990s
The 1990s were "The Barry Sanders Show" in Detroit. During his first season after being drafted in 1989, Sanders missed the NFL rushing title by 10 yards because he chose not to go back into the game when the Lions already had the game won. According to Wayne Fontes, when he offered Sanders the chance to gain the yardage and the rushing title, Sanders declined, reportedly saying, "Coach, let's just win it (the game) and go home."
In 1991, the Lions started the season by being shut out on national television, 45-0, by the Washington Redskins. The Lions then rebounded, winning their next 4 games. They went 12-4 for the season, They won their first division title in eight years, capping the regular season with a win over the then-defending AFC Champion Buffalo Bills. They were inspired late in the season by the loss of guard Mike Utley, who sustained a career-ending paralysis injury against the Los Angeles Rams on November 17, 1991. As Utley was carted off the field in that game he flashed a "thumbs up" to his teammates and the Silverdome crowd. It became a rallying symbol for the remainder of the season.
In the playoffs, the Lions got their only postseason victory since 1957, when they defeated the Dallas Cowboys 38-6 at the Silverdome. They lost to the Redskins in the NFC Championship Game, 41-10. This was the first time a team that had been shut out in its opener had reached the conference title round. Two teams have since matched this feat: The Philadelphia Eagles and the New England Patriots did it in 2003.
The Lions also made the playoffs in 1993, 1994, 1995, 1997 and 1999, making the 1990s one of the most successful decades in team history. In 1993, they went 10-6, first in the NFC Central Division, but lost to the Green Bay Packers. In 1994 they lost to the Packers in the playoffs again. In 1995 they lost to the Philadelphia Eagles, in embarrassing fashion, 58-37 (entering the fourth quarter, they were down 51-21). In 1997, Detroit lost to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in the first round. In 1999, The Lions closed out the decade reaching the playoffs for the sixth time in a ten-year span, which is a franchise record for playoff appearances during a decade. However, they lost yet again in the first round, this time to the Washington Redskins. Detroit's 1999 playoff berth also marked the second time in Bobby Ross's first three years as head coach that he led the Lions into the post season. The last Lions' head coach to accomplish that feat was Buddy Parker, in 1952-53 during his second and third seasons at the helm.
In 1997, Barry Sanders ran for 2,053 rushing yards. Sanders was one of the greatest running backs ever to play in the NFL. At the time, his career total rushing 15,269 yards was second only to Walter Payton's 16,726 yards and he joined Jim Brown as the only players among the NFL's 50 all-time rushing leaders to average 5 yards a carry, so when he retired abruptly after the 1998 season, his absence left a hole in the roster that may never be filled.

2000s
After finishing the 2000-2001 season at 9-7, and missing the playoffs by a field goal in the season's last game, Lions owner William Clay Ford, Sr. hired Matt Millen, a former player and broadcaster, as president and CEO of football operations. Millen at the time had no business experience in running a football operation.
The Lions went the entire 2001(their last season at the Silverdome), 2002(their first season at Ford Field), and 2003 seasons without a road victory, thus becoming the only team in NFL history not to win on the road for three consecutive entire seasons. The streak, encompassing 24 games (also an NFL record) came to an end on September 12, 2004, when the Lions defeated the Bears 20-16 at Soldier Field in Chicago.
Millen has also received tremendous criticism for his draft failures. Three in particular stand out: quarterback Joey Harrington, chosen third overall in the 2002 draft, was traded to the Miami Dolphins for a conditional late-round draft pick after four unremarkable seasons in Detroit; wide receiver Charles Rogers, a caution on many pre-draft reports for his fragile physique, was nonetheless chosen second overall in the 2003 draft, and played sparingly in his three injury-plagued seasons before being cut before the first game of the 2006 season; Millen's sixth first-round draft pick, Mike Williams (10th overall - 2005 draft), caught just 8 passes in eight games with the team before being traded along with Josh McCown for a 4th round pick in the 2007 NFL Draft.
Over the seven seasons of Millen's leadership as team CEO, the Detroit Lions own the NFL's worst winning percentage (31-81, .277), have never had a winning season, have never finshed higher than third place in the NFC North, and have not played in any post-season games. Millen received a five-year contract extension at the start of the 2005 season.
On December 9, 2005, one group of Lions fans, known as "The Lions Fanatics," organized an "orange out" event, which encouraged Lions fans to show up at Detroit's Ford Field clad in orange, the color of their opponent that week, the Cincinnati Bengals. That same day, Detroit sports talk radio station WDFN organized a "Millen Man March" in protest of Millen's contract extension.
On December 24, 2006 another group of fans planned a walkout protest towards the end of the first half in the game against Chicago, to express their disgust with Millen. However, only around 100 fans participated in this protest, as the Lions fell to the Bears 26-21.
In 2007, the Lions started 6-2. However, they finished the season by going 1-7, their final record being 7-9.

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