Detroit Lions Football 2023–2024 — The Heart of a Champion
As one of the few people still around since the last Detroit Lion’s football championship in 1957, my undying hope of another championship is higher than ever with the 2023–2024 team.
I’ve said it since last year that this is the best Detroit Lions football team I’ve seen in my lifetime. With warriors like Amon-Ra St. Brown, Frank Ragnow, Kalif Raymond, Jahmyr Gibbs, Sam Laporta, Penei Sewell, David Montgomery, Josh Reynolds, Jared Goff, Ify Melifonwu, Alim McNeill and so many others this is the most deeply talented team we have ever had. Even better than the 1957 championship team with Bobby Layne and Hopalong Cassady. The Lion’s general manager Brad Holmes has a keen eye for talented football players and has acquired the best from the last three draft classes. These players may not be superstars yet, but they play with a ferocity and heart of a champion.
I’ve been frustrated with the Detroit Lions since 1963 when I first fell in love with football at seven years of age. I remember on Monday, September 15, 1963, racing home from school with my best friend David to rip open the Detroit News Newspaper to get to the sports section and see the Detroit Lions perched on top of the NFL’s Western Conference in first place with a 1 and 0 record after defeating the Los Angeles Rams 23–2 the day before in the first game of that season. Unfortunately, the Lion’s winning ways did not continue, and they ended the 1963 season with a record of 5 wins, 8 losses, and 1 tie. I cried a lot that year after the losses. The 1960s were the era of Vince Lombardi and the Green Bay Packers winning most of the championships, including the first two Superbowls. Also, the 1960s featured the great running back Jim Brown of the Cleveland Browns. There would not be another dominant running back in the NFL like Jim Brown until Barry Sanders started with the Lions in 1989.
The Detroit Lions in 1963 were just in the beginning of the longest running period of losing, futility and ineptness in the history of professional football. Some say the curse put on them by their great quarterback Bobby Layne in 1958 when he was traded to the Pittsburgh Steelers was the cause. Since 1958, whatever could go wrong in their games went wrong. From blown referee calls, to injuries to key players, and miraculous plays by their opponents. Many sub-par quarterbacks and players had their best games against the Lions. Two of the greatest head coaches in professional football history, Bill Belichick and Don Shula, once coached for the Lions but were never their head coach. As the Lion’s bad luck would have it, they moved on to become head coaches and achieve greater success for other teams. For the Lions it seemed if it wasn’t for bad luck, they would have no luck at all.
Despite having some great football players like Lem Barney, Billy Sims, Barry Sanders, Matthew Stafford and Calvin Johnson, the Lions could not build a talented team around them to take them to the Superbowl, let alone win a playoff game or even make it to the playoffs. The Lions reached bottom in 2008 when they didn’t win a game and finished with a 0 win and 16 losses record. They set the standard for football futility.
As a Lions fan, I could only take refuge and find entertainment in watching the great players like Barry Sanders make amazing plays. The Lions in the 1990s with Barry Sanders gave us hope and were mostly winners in those years except for the playoffs.
Over the years Lions fans have had high hopes that “this is the year” only to be quashed by a referee’s bad call against the Lions, injuries to key players, stupid errors, or miraculous plays by the opposing teams such as kicker Tom Dempsey’s 63-yard field goal at the end of the game in 1970 to give the New Orlean Saints a 19–17 victory over the Lions. This at the time was the longest field goal in the history of the NFL. What made it more fantastic was that Dempsey was born without any toes on his kicking foot.
I worked for the City of Detroit from 1989 to 2020. The Lion’s football depression carried over to the city and in 2013 it declared bankruptcy. It was a depressing time for a Detroiter. Without the diehard Lions fans the City’s football team also would have gone bankrupt. Detroit sports fans are the most loyal fans on the planet.
My heart literally and figuratively gave out in June just before the 2020 football season opened. I had several cardiac arrests. Luckily, I was resuscitated and survived. After another Lion’s losing football season in 2020 another miracle happened in my life. The Lions fired their head coach and general manager and began the greatest rebuild in their football history.
The Lions hired Brad Holmes from the Los Angeles Rams to be the new general manager. Then they hired Dan Campbell who was a former Detroit Lion’s tight end and New Orlean Saint’s coach to be the new head coach.
The Lions great quarterback, Matthew Stafford asked for a trade. He had grown weary of the losing. The Rams traded their quarterback — Jared Goff and two first round and a third-round draft pick to the Lions for Stafford in 2021. The rumor was the Rams cast Goff off because they didn’t believe he could lead them to a Superbowl win even though he did lead them to the Superbowl in 2019, which they lost. Goff was considered a has-been at the time of the trade. This ended up as the trade of the century for both teams.
Stafford led the Rams to the Superbowl championship in his first season with them. Goff was less than spectacular in 2021 with the Lions only winning 3 games that season. At the time it looked like the Rams got the better deal.
The 2021 losing season gave the Lions the second pick in the 2022 draft. Also, they had the Rams first pick in that draft. The Lions chose Aidan Hutchinson with the second pick of the draft and Jameson Williams with the twelfth pick of the draft. Hutchinson became a great player almost immediately. Williams started slowly due to injury and other problems but has become a key player for the Lions towards the end of the 2023 season. The Lions also added four key players in the 2023 draft that contributed greatly to their success. These draft picks and other player acquisitions by the Lions in the past three years fit the mode of the type of the “football player” that Holmes and Campbell wanted in building a championship football team.
When I say “football player” I mean it with respect. Amon-Ra St. Brown was a fourth-round draft pick in 2021. He didn’t rank as a spectacular player when he was drafted. He didn’t have size or great speed. But he had the grit, intensity, brains, desire and most of all heart of a champion that overcame any limitations he had and made him a great “football player”. He said one time that he was so angry he could run through a brick wall. I believe he would and could do that. There appears to be no limits on what he can achieve.
Dan Campbell said, “This team is going to kick you in the teeth … and when you knock us down, on the way up we’re going to bite a kneecap off … and we’re going to get up … and if you knock us down again, we’re going to get up and bite off the other kneecap.” The Lion’s players don’t quit. They may make a mistake, but they get over it and come back with a vengeance.
In 2022 the Lions started out winning only one of their first seven games. It seemed like the curse was continuing. However, something was different. They were always in the game losing most of them by one touchdown or less. Then things started turning around and they discovered winning. They won eight of their final 10 games in the 2022 season and narrowly missed the playoffs. Jared Goff was playing great, and we didn’t miss Stafford so much.
The Lions started hot in the 2023 season. Except for the loss to the Baltimore Ravens, they played well compiling a twelve win and five loss record for the regular season. They would have had one more win if the referee in the Dallas game had his head in the game and hadn’t made the wrong call. Yes, Decker reported!
I believe that if these 53 football players on the Detroit Lion’s roster do their jobs and play to their potential, then no one can beat them. They have shown this over the past two seasons. They can only beat themselves. Win or lose in the 2024 playoffs and Superbowl, I have finally seen a Detroit Lions football team that has made me proud to be a Detroiter and fan. Vince Lombardi would have loved to have coached this team.
By Richard Drumb cardiac arrest and Detroit Lion football survivor.
