Cheer up, Lions fans, your long national nightmare is about to end. That's right, in just three days the curse of Bobby Layne is set to run out, and your beloved football team will once again return to prominence in the NFL. What's that you ask? The Lions were cursed? Yeah, I had no idea. But apparently this explains everything from Matt Millen, to Joey Harrington, to Barry Sanders suddenly walking away from the game. The Curse Of Bobby Layne website has the full story.
In 1958, after leading the Lions to 3 NFL Championships and providing Detroit nearly 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"
With this news, and the fact Millen was finally relieved of his duties two weeks ago, things are really starting to look up for the Lions. But back to this curse business ...
The site does a rundown on all of the Lions regular season and post-season failures (complete with line charts and graphs!), while also breaking down the coaching graveyard. Apparently, not one of the Lions coaches during this 50-year stretch of futility ever worked in the NFL again as a Head Coach.
My favorite section, however, might be the one titled, "The Humiliations," which looks back at all of the absurd happenings in Lions history, from Marty Mornhinweg taking the wind in overtime, to the team once, allegedly, trading its first-round pick and not even realizing it. Too bad that didn't happen the year they took Mike Williams. Or Kevin Jones. Or Charles Rogers.
