0-16 grim reality for Lions
GREEN BAY, Wis. — They'd known for weeks it was possible, each loss bringing them one stumble closer to a mark no team wants — or even wants to think about.
Yet when it finally happened, the Detroit Lions were still stunned, unable to find words to adequately describe the shame in their accomplishment. They are losers of historic proportion, the worst team ever in the NFL. Sixteen games, 16 losses, the perfectly imperfect season.
"I don't have anything positive to say," Calvin Johnson said.
What's to be said? That can be printed, that is.
With a 31-21 loss to the Green Bay Packers on Sunday, the Lions brought a merciful end to their "annus horribilis." Not since 1976, when the Tampa Bay Buccaneers went 0-14, had a team failed to win at least one game in a full season. (And those Bucs had the excuse of being an expansion team, not to mention some really bad uniforms. Detroit, in its 75th season, is one of the NFL's senior citizens.)
The New Orleans Saints during their worst days, the Indianapolis Colts before Peyton Manning arrived, the most woeful of the New York Jets teams — they may have flirted with the Bucs' mark, but none was this bad. Even the Oakland Raiders, who've been putting the fun in dysfunctional the last few years, managed to finish off the year with a win.
But not the Lions. Just as they had all year, instead of finding the will to win, they found a way to lose.
Any Given Sunday? The only given with these Lions were losses.
"We all knew this was a possibility," Jeff Backus said after the Lions were jeered off the field by chants of "0-and-16! 0-and-16!" "Nobody wanted it to happen, nobody thought it would happen. I'm sure it's going to bug people for a long time."
Actually, what's bugging the Lions has been ailing them for years.
But this season was a debacle of epic proportions.
They were outscored 517-268 in their 16 losses. Oh, sure, they came close to winning a few times, including two losses to NFC North champion Minnesota by a total of six points. But there were plenty of ugly ones, too. Like a 37-point blowout by Tennessee and a 35-point rout by New Orleans — both at home.
"We just plain and simple didn't get it done, for whatever reasons," said Backus, who, as Millen's first draft pick, has had a front-row seat for Detroit's carnage.
