Guys - this might be a better question for my old man, but he’s long gone. So I ask the DEN, did Willie Clay ever have an old fued with the NFL? Did he and Rozelle ever battle over something? Maybe an alochol filled fight over a dame?
Why else must they continue to stick to our Lions!? Always something, every year, it’s just another thing they jab us in the ass…again and again. Latest is once again getting the Packers last game of the season in Green Bay.
I would just love Martha or Sheila or one of the sons to call up the league office and say, Ford Truck advertising gets yanked from NFL until you put our Lions in good graces!
The league didn’t miss a 43 yard field goal.
The league didn’t leave Sterling Sharpe wide open.
The league didn’t draft Andre Ware.
The league didn’t trade No. 8 overall — who became Willie Roaf — for Pat Swilling.
The league didn’t get humiliated by Rodney Peete
The league didn’t tell Barry, Calvin, or Matt to quit on them
The league didn’t hire Matt Millen.
The league didn’t sign Bill Schroeder and Az Hakim.
The league didn’t go 0-16.
There’s been plenty of games (@ Dallas in 2014 for sure) to suggest at a minimum officials don’t respect the Lions, especially when they’re playing a premier talent, but Detroit doesn’t need the league to help them be terrible. They’ve been plenty horrible enough on their own.
Cowboys game in 2014 - I have no doubt that Jerry Jones called the league office at halftime and said, “unless you want Detroit and Carolina next week instead of the Cowboys Packers game, you better fix this crap now!”
And they did. Still pissed on that call reversal. Almost as bad the TUCK rule!
To your bigger question (feud between Ford and league): nope. Ford has poured billions into the league from an ad standpoint. But there’s been some articles shared here that suggested when Lions ownership wasn’t meddling, they were asleep at the wheel.
Occam’s razor applies here: simply, we’ve had bad ownership. The results bear that out. Nothing more.
The Fords have been actually well respected and have had a big hand in the labor negotiations for all the CBA’s. It typically is talked about every year around thanksgiving when people are talking about reasons the NFL would not take the game away from the Lions. They owe the Fords a great deal from that perspective.
Mentioning Bill Schroeder should get someone a 7 day suspension from posting. It brings back way too much PTSD. Since you’re the Godfather, we will let this one slide this time!!
The NFL wants to suppress this, but a close examination of the Zapruder film reveals that William Clay Ford was at the Grassy Knoll on November 22, 1963. The NFL’s silence on this matter is still costing the Ford family to this date. The Bobby Lane curse was manufactured to explain our inexplicably bad luck and as a distraction from this explosive fact.
That would surprise me, because I know after Morningweig was fired, we couldn’t get a black coach to come in for an interview because everyone knew we were hiring Mooch and WCF paid a $250K fine for that.
This thread is important and the question is understandable.
There are too many tinfoil hats in society today, and it’s been prevalent here—more so than at any point in this forum’s history—regarding the Lions somehow being screwed out of winning something meaningful.
This forum was hard to even read during the playoffs. Every damn game was supposedly “rigged.” The logic never, ever follows. In the words of the great Don Draper, “there is no conspiracy… the universe is indifferent.”
Back to the Lions …
The problem/danger in that thinking is you’re letting the actual perp (ownership) off the hook. Lions ownership is to blame. They don’t share that responsibility with ANYONE else. Let’s not forget that.
We agree - it’s ownership! But the crazy thing, I was actually excited when Matt Millen was hired to be GM. I thought he was going to be the answer. Oh how I was so incredibly wrong.
It’s been a while since this happened so my memory is a little suspect on this. I don’t think WCF was fined I believe he paid Millen’s fine. I could be wrong I tried drinking away the last 25 years of Lions football.
