My family, having grown up a few short miles from the Detroit city limits, have always been die-hard Detroit Lions fans. Football fans who have paid attention over the last, oh, 50 years or so know that the Lions have been one of the worst franchises in all of professional sports over that time period, having only a single winning playoff game to show for it.
Matt Millen has been general manager for the Lions since 2001, and in that time the team has only won 31 games, set the record for the most consecutive road losses, have gone through a handful of coaches, and inspired a “Fire Millen” movement that included fan marches calling for Millen to be tarred, feathered and run out of town.
A few days ago I made a declaration on Twitter that I would not be rooting for the Lions until either Millen was fired or the sole owner, William Clay Ford Sr., passed ownership of the team along to his son. I now can cheer for my hometown team again, as this morning I was thrilled to learn that Millen had, in fact, been let go, after a dismal 0-3 start to the season and no hope of things getting better.
Might the end of the disastrous Millen era be a harbinger of good things to come? Most sports fans know about the infamous Chicago Cubs “Billy Goat” curse, which has supposedly prevented the team from winning a World Series over the last century. The Detroit Lions have their own curse, however, known as the “Curse of Bobby Layne.” Bobby Layne was a remarkably talented All-Pro quarterback who led the Lions to three championships in his eight years with the team. After he got injured, the Lions traded him to the Pittsburgh Steelers. As the story goes, Layne was so upset at the Lions the he vowed they wouldn’t win another championship “in fifty years.”
That fifty year deadline is up in 11 days. With the curse lifted, will the Lions be able to turn it around? I have my doubts, but even so, I’ll be rooting for them.
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