How bad have things gotten for the winless Detroit Lions?
The Lions, teetering on the brink of the NFL's first 0-16 season, have managed to evoke the rarest of emotions from around the league.
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More's the pity for winless Detroit
The Lions, on verge of making history if they go 0-16, surprisingly get more empathy than scorn in the NFL.
For The Record
Los Angeles Times Thursday, December 25, 2008 Home Edition Main News Part A Page 2 National Desk 1 inches; 39 words Type of Material: Correction
Worst NFL teams: A chart in Wednesday's Sports section listing the worst NFL team records since 1960 failed to include the 2007 Miami Dolphins, who finished 1-15. That would have placed them tied for the fourth on the list.
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Pity.
The quarterback of the 1980 New Orleans Saints, a team that went 1-15, says his heart goes out to the Lions.
A linebacker from the 1960 Dallas Cowboys, who went 0-11-1, says he can hardly watch the Motor City meltdown.
The son of the late coach whose 1976 Tampa Bay Buccaneers finished 0-14, the only modern-era franchise to lose every game, said he's sickened by what's unfolding.
And yet we watch. We can't turn away.
"This is history," said Steve Sabol, president of NFL Films, who is triple-staffing the Lions' finale at Green Bay on Sunday with six camera operators. "We're covering it almost as if it were a playoff game."
A year after the New England Patriots became the first team to go 16-0, the Lions are perfection's hideous mirror image, four quarters from being crowned champions of Stupor Bowl 0-and-XVI.
"It's sickening for me to watch, because I feel so bad for them," said Rich McKay, president of the Atlanta Falcons and son of legendary coach John McKay, coach of the winless Tampa Bay expansion team. "People say, 'Are you happy to see someone pass up the '76 Bucs?' Absolutely not."
Archie Manning, father of NFL stars Peyton and Eli Manning, knows just how painful it can be to be part of a pathetic team. Even now, nearly 30 years after quarterbacking those woeful 1980 Saints, he vividly recalls the feeling as the losses piled up.
"One of the worst things was watching our coach, who we all liked and admired in Dick Nolan -- good coach, good man -- and every week he'd stand up there and it was almost like he would die a little more," Manning said. "It would kill you.
"I have so much empathy for these teams when they go through that because, even though it's been that long ago, I can remember what it's like. It's awful."
It seems the one place where sympathy is running low is in Detroit, where long-suffering Lions fans for years have endured the mismanagement of that franchise, the bad decisions on draft day, the worse decisions on game day . . . the whole stinking mess.
The Lions might be on a collision course with the worst record in league history, but Sabol doesn't think that, talent-wise, they're at the all-time bottom of the barrel. He says the 1972 and '73 Houston Oilers were worse, teams that posted consecutive 1-13 seasons.
