Former Michigan Wolverine Tom Brady is appearing in his fifth Super Bowl.

Fielder’s kid comes to town and Inge cries foul
The Tigers pulled the rabbit out of the hat, signing their “Prince,” Mr. Fielder” for $214 million dollars. This signing does a few things. First, Brandon Inge is “not a happy camper”. This according to Jim Leyland at the press conference unveiling the Prince. Who the hell cares if Brandon Inge is upset? He’s a 180 hitter. Never has a .180 hitter received so much attention. Can he make this team? I guess when you have the Prince and Cabrera you can “carry” a guy who really hasn’t belonged in the big leagues for more than a few years. We were fed up with Inge a few years ago, when he returned from an injury and stated (and I paraphrase): “they can’t win without me.” Inge can stop this whining any time. Most people are tired of it. Leyland said he has to hit to make our team. He got lucky. Now he just has to mop up for Cabrera when the Tigers are leading in a game. All Inge is trying to do is position himself to get a Tiger job in the organization when he more than likely is released or quits. Want some advice, Brandon? Just do as they say, stay quiet as a mouse, and they will get you a ring. There’s nothing like that ring!

The third base situation
Cabrera may not be Brooks Robinson at third base, but who would you want to play there, a guy who hits over .300 with power or a guy who hits .180? No brainer, huh? By the way, Cabrera has great hands, has played first base like a gold glover, and with his athleticism, the big guy can play the position. Cabrera is going to boot a few more than likely, but he won’t boot so many that he will cost the Tigers the division.

Prediction for 2012
I am going to also tell you that the Tigers are “LOCKS” for their division. They could have the division tied up by the end of May, that is how potent they are at this time. The Tigers start the season with everyone they picked up last year and all are healthy with the exception of Victor Martinez, who may not be ready to play next year cause he needs at least two operations now for his injuries. They’ll miss him, but not half as much as they would have had Fielder not arrived on the scene.

Stafford and the Pro Bowl flap
There has been a lot of complaining about the fact that Matthews Stafford failed to make the NFL All Pro team. Folks, in the interests of all of us who are pulling for the Lions after these past 55 years, let’s only have him play in games that count. The Lion QB has been hurt a couple times already, and let’s not allow him to do anything stupid like playing in an All-Star Game, especially the way that they play the Pro Bowl. The game is purely an exhibition, no one is putting out at a 100%, and when you are not playing 100%, just kind of going through the motions, injuries have a tendency to occur. If he stays healthy and gets some help on the offensive line, he could pit up Tom Brady numbers, and possibly – if he stays healthy – do things that no one around here ever thought about.

Super Bowl XLVI and Brady’s place in history
How can you not bet on Tom Brady? If he wins this one, he becomes without argument the greatest QB of all time, in my opinion. You know his stats, he is all everything, and he promised his owner that he would play better in the Super Bowl than he did in the last playoff game. The most amazing feat of his career is how he takes mediocre players and makes them great and sustains that greatness while they are catching his pinpoint passes. If he leads the Patriots to victory in Super Bowl XLVI, don’t be too surprised if he retires on top. He has been one hell of a gladiator, and a gladiator with super intelligence, that is what makes him so different from all of the others. I’m not saying that Eli Manning hasn’t been a great QB, but he is more the working man’s QB than Brady. Tom kind of sits back there and just does it smoothly and quickly. Eli kind of “works” at it on every play, but he too has been great this post-season. I think it will be a 38 -27 game in favor of New England, who have too many weapons and experience for the Giants. Plus, they have Tom Brady!

Receiver Calvin Johnson is one of the reasons the Lions seem on the verge of success.

There was a sports yarn that made its way around Detroit in 1988, and which came to mind on the heels of the Lions’ loss to the New Orleans Saints in the NFL Playoffs.

It was one of those stories that circulate at bars and in workplace bull sessions; a tale that no one could claim they had heard first-hand, or even seemed to know anybody who had witnessed the encounter described. You know how those stories go — ‘a guy I knew heard it from a friend who claimed that he had a buddy who got it from a guy who overheard somebody talking about it with a bystander who was there.’ Or something.

The story involved former Tiger Kirk Gibson (this allegedly took place in ’88 remember, after Gibby left town to energize the Los Angeles Dodgers for a few memorable seasons) and an unnamed member of the 1988 Detroit Pistons. (Speaking of these kind of stories, it was pretty much true — to some minor degree at least — that Gibson was eventually run off the Tigers when he became a free agent back then because owner Tom Monaghan couldn’t stand having players who swore when they struck out or were called out on bang-bang plays at first. Batters cursing so loudly that the fans could hear them drove Tiger Tom crazy. We were lucky he didn’t fire everybody except Alan Trammell when he first took over in 1984. But I digress.)

Gibby was seated on a flight from LA back to Detroit — the story went — near a member of the Pistons shortly after our basketballers had lost the excruciating ‘88 NBA Finals to the Lakers. You’ll recall that the Pistons were up 3-games-to-2 on the coast in Game Six when a phantom foul was levied at Bill Laimbeer, allowing Kareem Abdul-Jabbar to sink two late free throws to steal that game by one point and tie the series. With team leader Isiah Thomas barely able to walk due to injury, the Pistons then dropped Game Seven, 108-105, and Los Angeles thus stole the crown.

Anyway, the unidentified Piston — I don’t wanna embarrass the guy, so I won’t mention his name, (though I would if it had been Thomas because I worked with him once and came away with ample reason to despise him for the rest of my life) — apparently expressed to Gibson that yes, it was really disappointing to come THAT close to the NBA title and miss out at the end. But … you still had to take a lot of pride in coming that close, he said. So the Pistons had done well in taking the league champions all the way to the Game Seven limit.

And that, as you might imagine, didn‘t sit well with Gibby. He was said — as the story went — to have instructed the basketball player, and others within hearing distance on the airplane, about the absolute necessity of winning it all, taking your sport’s championship, when that goal was within your grasp. Such a concept, spoken with some vehemence, was one that Detroiters might expect to hear from the hard-driving Gibson, a local favorite and a winner at many levels. He apparently felt — at least as this alleged story went — that second place was as good as no place, that the opportunity may not present itself again, and that no pride should be taken in losing at the highest levels of sports competition. A team MUST win when the opportunity presents itself.

Which takes us to the Lions’ loss to the Saints. And my feeling that the Gibson yarn, while it makes for good listening and a provocative philosophy, should not be applied to the Lions’ loss.

The Honolulu Blueboys made a statement in their 2011 season, I feel, that should in no way be diminished by the outcome of that final contest.

Because the Lions, as of right now, look inevitable. And that, trust me, is the best way to look. Some examples:

The 1968 Detroit Tigers seemed inevitable all season. The club lost the pennant on the final day of the 1967 season, dropping the final game of a double-header at Tiger Stadium and handing the American League pennant to the Boston Red Sox. The pain — the game went down to Dick McAuliffe’s final and futile at-bat — burned for months, for years, decades perhaps. As well it should have. When the players reconvened in Lakeland the following spring, the Tigers WERE inevitable, and they exploded on Major League Baseball in ‘68 like no Tiger team had in decades.

The 1951 Detroit Lions went into the final game of their regular season needing one final win to qualify for the league championship game. The Lions had floundered nonstop since the mid 1930s, and within one season the influx of football legends-to-be like Bobby Layne, Doak Walker, and Les Bingaman made the team suddenly seem inevitable. Yet they were one season away, or more precisely, a little over one minute away … because that’s all that was left after Y.A. Tittle brought the 49ers back from the edge of defeat to deny the Lions the division championship. They lost the title by a half game; fullback Pat Harder said after the loss “We’ll be back next year to kick the (your obscenity here) out of somebody!” With that … they became inevitable and won three of the next six NFL World Championship crowns.

The 1949 Detroit Red Wings were manhandled in the Stanley Cup Finals by the Toronto Maple Leafs, who swept the Wings for their third straight title, despite the Detroiters having a 20-year old right winger who had scored eight goals against Montreal in a preliminary sweep of the Canadiens. The phenom winger — Gordon Howe — joined with Ted Lindsay and Sid Abel on The Production Line the following season, with the trio going 1-2-3 in NHL scoring. Joined by first-team All-Stars Red Kelly and Terry Sawchuk, the Wings were suddenly as inevitable as any hockey team ever had been. They won the Stanley Cup in 1950 on their way to four Cups through 1955.

In the spring of 1984, after the Tigers had won 92 games the previous season and finished second to the Baltimore Orioles, Sparky’s club was poised to pounce. Even in the last weeks of the ’83 season the Tigers looked like the best team in baseball, certainly the most talented with a “in their prime” core of Gibson, Trammell, Whitaker, Lance Parrish, Chet Lemon, Jack Morris, and Dan Petry. And what did they do? Win their first nine, 18 of their first 20, and 35 of their first 40. In the process they ran away from the rest of the league and fulfilled Sparky’s prophecy by capturing the World Series title.

Inevitability. It’s a terrific thing. I thought I sensed it, for the first time in a long while, Sunday night. Something historic seems afoot, and you can easily imagine the names Stafford, Johnson, and Suh taking their place in local legend and lore.

Kirk Gibson was right when he lectured that Piston back in 1988. To a degree, at least, because there certainly is no disgrace in the growing pains involved in coming of age. What the hell, ya gotta have a jumping-off point to GET from here to there. The Piston must have been paying attention. He and the other Bad Boys, jobbed in ’88, won the NBA Championship in 1989 and 1990.

And if you were around town in those days, you’ll surely remember the feeling they gave you. That aura that began to cling to the Pistons, as individuals and as a team, throughout 1987 and 1988. That excitement we were fortunate to share, at special times, with the Tigers, the Wings, and the Lions of other eras.

That wonderful feel, that awakening sense … of inevitability.

Despite being a charter member of the Pro Football Hall of Fame, and having nearly single-handedly established football in Detroit, remarkably Dutch Clark never remained a household name.

In  1934, the Detroit Lions played their very first game with a 9-0 victory over the New York Giants before a half filled University of Detroit Stadium. Clark, who drop kicked a third quarter field goal for the first score, quickly became the city’s first gridiron hero.

When a syndicate lead by WJR owner G.A. Richards purchased the Portsmouth Spartans franchise in 1934 he and coach George “Potsy” Clark desperately coaxed the 27 year old Clark out of retirement. Although an All Pro in his first two seasons (’31, ’32) and the NFL’s leading scorer in 1932, (also in ’35 and ’36) Clark had left the fledgling Portsmouth franchise over a salary dispute before the ’33 season to become the head football coach at the Colorado School of Mines. Richards stated that if football was going to be successful in Detroit, Clark was a crucial acquisition.

In their inaugural 1934 season, team captain Clark, along with an exceptional cast that included Glenn Presnell, Ernie Caddell, and Ace Gutowsky, lead the Lions to a second place finish. The team amazingly shut out opponents in their first seven games but lost each of their last three contests by three points. The next year the Lion’s captured their first World Championship in a 26-7 thumping of the Giants that was highlighted by a spectacular 40 yard touchdown run by Clark.

As the game’s last true “triple threat” Clark was the undisputed Lion King.  Although often referred to as a quarterback, technically he was a signal calling tailback in the single wing formation.

An All Pro in six of his seven professional seasons, Clark, an All American from tiny Colorado College, was considered an exceptional field general, an accurate passer, a fine punter, football’s last drop kicker, and in the era of the sixty minute man, an exceptional defensive safety.

But Clark is most remembered for his open field running.

Despite being blind as a bat (“left eye twenty-two hundred, right eye twenty-one hundred” according to Clark) and not fleet of foot, the image of the ruggedly handsome Clark wearing his silver leather helmet, Honolulu Blue number 7 jersey, and satin silver pants while criss crossing the field left diving opponents and fans in awe.

The most famous description of Clark came from his coach Potsy Clark. “He’s like a rabbit in brush. He has no set plan, no definite direction. He is an instinctive runner who cuts, pivots, slants, reverses. When the interference gets him in the secondary, he begins his mad twists and turns. He’ll get out of more holes than anybody you ever saw. Just about the time you expect to see him smothered, he’s free of tacklers.”

Clark finished his Lion’s career as a player coach in ’37 and ’38 and then coached the Cleveland Rams for four seasons. In the early 1950’s he was the head football coach and then Athletic Director at the University of Detroit. Except for occasional appearances at Lion Alumni Day at Tiger Stadium, Clark, an avid Lion’s fan kept a low profile living with his family in a modest home in Royal Oak and working as a salesman for a local tool and die company.

Two years before his death in 1978 at 71, Clark had returned to his native state of Colorado.

Dick "Night Train" Lane is considered one of the greatest cornerbacks in football history.

It’s one of the coolest nicknames in sports history.

Who wouldn’t want to walk down the street and have people call out, “There goes the Night Train.” Cool, huh?

That’s the stuff of legends, and the legendary cornerback Dick Lane earned that nickname for reasons that may be unfamiliar to many football fans. That’s because there are several false stories out there about the origins of “Night Train.”

He was born plain old Richard Lane in Austin, Texas, in 1928. Richard or Dick would do just fine for the big man from the big lone star state, at least during his prep and college days on the gridiron. Always a little bit bigger and faster than most everyone he played with or against, Lane was a standout almost immediately upon strapping on his helmet. He was 6’2 and 210 pounds in his peak physical shape, with great speed and incredible instincts.

Was he tough? Well, he was raised by a single woman named Ella Lane when she found him abandoned as an infant, circumstances which would probably make anyone mentally tough. He grew to be a strong, muscular man, and spent four years in the United States Army in the years between World War II and the Korean War. When he got out of the service in California, he took a job working in an airplane factory. Unhappy with that occupation, he walked onto a Los Angeles Rams practice field and made the team. He was 24 years old.

He was so good that the offensive and defensive coaches fought over who would get to have him. Eventually Lane was turned into a cornerback, a position he seemed born to play. He was the first large man to play the position, helping to pioneer the notion of a physical yet fast defensive back.

To his teammates on the Rams he was simply Dick Lane, but this is where it gets interesting. Some sources say that Lane was afraid of flying so he took trains to and from games, rather than go into the skies with his teammates. Hence “Night Train.” That’s hogwash, of course. Lane had flown on planes several times before in the military.

Another source says that Lane was called Night Train because of his ferocious, lightning quick hits on receivers. While that certainly makes for a great story, and Lane was a hard hitter, it’s also false.

Amazingly, one source on the Internet says that Lane received his nickname from his wife, who was gospel singer Dinah Washington. But Lane had the nickname “Night Train” well before joining Dinah in the kitchen, so to speak.

No, the nickname that would help to make him so memorable was given to Lane in his first season as a professional football player. Possibly as soon as the first few weeks he was with the Rams. Lane’s teammate Tom Fears gave it to him.

Fears was a remarkable man in his own right. He was the first player to line up on the line of scrimmage away from the tackle, making him the first wide receiver in NFL history. He was a good one, catching as many as 84 balls in a season, a record. He once caught 18 passes in one game, in an era when the forward pass was far less common. In addition to being a great receiver, Fears was a lover of music and a great teammate. He often played music in the locker room and he had a pet name for almost everyone on the club. One of Fears’ favorite tunes was the 1052 hit “Night Train” which was recorded by Jimmy Forrest. At some point, Fears matched the song title to Lane and thus was born one of the most enduring (and phonically pleasing) nicknames in sports history.

Dick Lane was Dick “Night Train” Lane to his Rams teammates. Within a year or two, he was almost universally known by the name, so much so that many people never called him Dick.

In his rookie season, Lane set an NFL single season record for interceptions with 14, which stands to this day even though the length of the season at the time was only 12 games. After that, many NFL quarterbacks simply stopped throwing his way, but Lane found other ways to disrupt the offense. At various times during the game, Night Train would bolt from his defensive position and run past the receiver he was assigned to defend, taking a direct route toward the quarterback. It had never been seen before, because no other player had shown the nerve and speed to pull it off. “The Corner Blitz” was thus born.

Lane also perfected an arm tackle applied to the receiver’s neck that became known as the “Clothesline Tackle” or the “Night Train Necktie” and was later banned in large part because of how effectively he was able to utilize it.

After those 14 picks as a rookie, and as he started to inflict pain on opposing receivers and quarterbacks, everyone knew Lane’s name. “By the time he arrived in Detroit for the final six seasons of his career, “Night Train” was a household name in the NFL.

In 1969, Lane was selected as the best defensive back in the first 50 years of pro football. Five years later he was elected to the Pro Football Hall of Fame. As recently as 1999, “Night Train” was ranked as the 19th greatest player in football history by The Sporting News, making him the highest rated defensive back on the list.

A future Hall of Famer, Bennie Friedman was an early football star in Detroit.

This is part 2 of Richard Bak’s series on professional football in Detroit in the 1920s. Read Part 1 here.

After the collapse of the Heralds/Tigers, Detroit had to wait another four years, until 1925, before the National Football League returned to the city.

The Panthers were owned, coached, and quarterbacked by Jimmy Conzelman of St. Louis. The energetic Conzelman, one of pro football’s true pioneers, paid all of $50 to the NFL as a franchise fee and arranged to lease Navin Field for $1,000 a game. That was a healthy rent in 1925, and Conzelman immediately looked for ways to induce locals to come down to The Corner. He managed to interest Notre Dame’s famous “Four Horsemen” backfield in playing the 1925 season in Detroit.

As part of their contract, they agreed to perform skits and a clog dance on stage while their coach played the piano. Unfortunately for Conzelman, the proposed vaudeville act fell apart when one of the Horsemen, his nostrils evidently flaring at the smell of greasepaint, decided to take a job with the recreation department in Davenport, Iowa.

On another occasion, Conzelman vigorously promoted an upcoming game featuring Red Grange and the Chicago Bears. People turned out in droves to buy tickets to see the famous “Galloping Ghost.” But Grange suffered a leg injury and pulled out of the game. “A few hours before the game was to start,” Conzelman said, “I looked out the window and saw a long line at the box office. I remember thinking to myself, ‘What a great sports town. Grange isn’t going to play, but they’re still lining up to buy tickets.’ Then I got the news from the ticket man. They were lining up to get refunds.”

Famous names like Jim Thorpe, George Halas, and Curly Lambeau visited Navin Field during the Panthers’ two autumns at Navin Field. The Panthers’ lineup was heavy with local sandlotters and ex-collegiate stars, including the irrepressible tackle and placekicker, Gus Sonnenberg.

Sonnenberg, a stumpy, barrel-chested farm boy from Ewen, Michigan, had starred at the University of Detroit. He loved to show off by tipping over cars and yanking signposts out of cement. Like Robeson, a greater destiny awaited Sonnenberg after he left Navin Field’s gridiron. He would soon become the country’s best-known wrestler, a fixture at Olympia Arena and other venues, pulling down an estimated $1 million in ring earnings before his premature death of leukemia. The colorful Sonnenberg was dubbed “The Flying Dutchman” for a favorite football tactic that he transferred to the ring. He would leap at an opponent, wrap his arms around the fellow’s legs, then slam him to the mat.

The Panthers finished a respectable 8-2-2 in 1925. The following season they compiled a 4-6-2 record, averaging just 1,500 fans for nine home dates. Conzelman sold the franchise back to the league. “We were simply ahead of our time in Detroit,” he later reflected. “The town wasn’t quite ready for pro football.”

Two years later, in 1928, a syndicate of 20 local investors pooled $10,000 to back the third and final stab at establishing the NFL in the Motor City during the 1920s. The syndicate bought the Cleveland Bulldogs and moved them lock, stock, and jockstrap to Detroit. Coached by Roy Andrews and dubbed the Wolverines, the franchise owed its nickname, as well as its quarterback, to the University of Michigan.

Two-time All-American tailback Bennie Friedman, two years removed from U-M’s gridiron, had popularized the forward pass, regularly drawing gasps from the crowd for daring to throw the then balloon-shaped ball on first down. Sobered by Conzelman’s experience with trying to fill Navin Field, the Wolverines scheduled most of their games at the University of Detroit’s Dinan Field.

With Friedman, a future Hall-of-Famer, leading the circuit in scoring, passing yardage, and probably rushing (statistics are incomplete), the Wolverines lost only to the first- and second-place teams, finishing third with a 7-2-2 record. On Saturday, November 3, they were beaten by the Frankford Yellow Jackets, then took an overnight train from Philadelphia to Rhode Island, where they dropped a 7-0 verdict to the Providence Steamrollers on Sunday. At season’s end the Wolverines were sold to Tim Mara, owner of the New York Giants, who bought the entire team just to acquire the rights to Friedman. Each Detroit investor got back $350 of his original $500 investment.

The Wolverines did manage to set a still-standing record during their brief existence. Their .778 lifetime winning percentage is the highest of any franchise in NFL history. However, it would be another six years before local radio magnate George A. Richards brought pro football to stay in Detroit.

Before his career as a civil rights activist and actor, Paul Robeson spent one year in the 1920s playing professional football in Detroit.

Many people who believe professional football in Detroit began with the Lions are surprised to learn that the team that moved here from Portsmouth, Ohio in 1934 actually represented the fifth attempt to launch a National Football League franchise in the city.

The four previous attempts all occurred in the 1920s, a decade that saw unprecedented prosperity and population growth in Detroit – but not enough enthusiasm for college football’s weaker sister to keep any of the NFL franchises around for longer than a couple of seasons.

Pro football was a risky proposition in 1920, the year the American Professional Football Association was founded inside the showroom of a Hupmobile dealership in Canton, Ohio. Over the next dozen years the loosely organized affiliation of mostly midwestern clubs sounded more professional than it really was. Teams made up their own schedules, statistics were sporadically kept, and the awarding of championships often was arbitrary and almost always hotly debated. The APFA, which changed its name to the National Football League in 1922, included a franchise in Detroit, the Heralds. The 1920 Heralds (re-named the Tigers in 1921) were followed by the Panthers (1925-1926) and the Wolverines (1928). All failed to attract a following large enough to ensure their survival.

The Heralds had been organized as an amateur team in 1905 by a group of University of Detroit athletes when the school temporarily dropped its football program. By World War I, the Heralds were a well-known semipro squad, having won city and state championships. They were coached by Bill Marshall and managed by John Roesink, a local merchant and sports promoter. Roesink owned the Heralds’ home venue, Mack Park, but the Heralds often leased Navin Field when larger crowds were anticipated. In 1917, for example, the Heralds drew 16,000 rooters to The Corner in a benefit game against the Fort Custer All-Stars. The Heralds also hosted Jim Thorpe and the Canton Bulldogs that year.

When the new pro league looked to put a team in one of the nation’s largest cities, the established Heralds were a natural choice. Like all clubs, the Heralds were a mix of former high school and collegiate stars and overage sandlotters. The team’s captain was Clarence “Steamer” Horning, an All-American tackle and punter from Colgate who also took an occasional turn running the ball. Players typically made between $50 and $100 a game and worked full- or part-time jobs to supplement their salary.

Detroit’s first NFL game took place on October 17, 1920, as the Heralds traveled to Chicago to take on the Chicago Tigers. A couple of botched punts led to two Chicago scores as the Tigers notched their only league victory of the season, 12-0, in front of a Sunday crowd of 5,000.

The following Sunday, October 24, the Heralds played the Columbus Panhandles in the first-ever NFL game in Detroit. Emblematic of the league’s low status was the fact that the Heralds’ tussle with their traditional rival was played at Mack Park because Frank Navin had reserved his ballpark for an amateur hurling match. The Heralds defeated Columbus, as an end named Fitzgerald returned an interception 85 yards for the only points in a 6-0 whitewash. Horning “played splendid football on defense, being in every play and stopping the Columbus ball-toters repeatedly,” observed the Free Press, which also mentioned that “A big crowd watched the contest.”

The Heralds played two more league games, both shutout losses on the road, to finish their abbreviated NFL campaign with a 1-3 record. Like other league clubs, they filled in their schedule with as many semipro games as possible.

The Heralds returned the following season with a new name, the Tigers, and snazzy new orange-and-black uniforms to replace their longtime red-and-white ones. The team had adopted the name of their baseball cousins, looking to capitalize on their popularity.

The first NFL game at The Corner was between the Tigers and Dayton Triangles on Sunday, October 9, 1921. No attendance figures were given, though the Free Press noted the game “was played under fine weather conditions and a good-sized crowd was on hand to cheer the home team, something that has been lacking in past games here.” The Tigers won, 10-7. The winning score was delivered by Tillie Voss, a familiar face around local gridirons. The former University of Detroit standout and ex-Herald end returned a blocked kick 65 yards for a touchdown.

The Tigers’ victory proved to be their only one of the campaign. The turnstiles quit spinning, management quit paying its players, and the club finally dropped out of the league with a 1-5-1 record, but not before hosting one other game of note. On October 16, the Tigers took on the Akron Pros. Akron won handily, 20-0, thanks in part to the skillful play of two black stars. One was wingback Fritz Pollard. The other was end Paul Robeson, a true Renaissance man playing his only NFL season. In years to come, the powerful and imposing orator, actor, singer, and activist would be a regular visitor to Detroit, performing in downtown theaters and participating in various civil rights causes. A hero to African Americans and white liberals in the 1940s and ‘50s, few knew that the internationally famous figure had once chased an NFL football around Navin Field for the better part of a Sunday afternoon.

How do the greatest of Detroit’s Golden Era of Sports rank alongside the stars of the last 20-30 years? Where do the old-time legends rate, the players only your great grandpa saw play?

If you’ve ever found yourself involved in a bar room debate about who the greatest was, you came to the right place.

Selecting the greatest in anything is a subjective practice that requires research and analysis. It also relies heavily on personal opinion. No list of the greatest anything is right or wrong. It’s a reflection of the opinions of the list maker.

Here at Detroit Athletic Co., we’re up for the task, so we asked our four regular contributors to select the greatest athletes in Detroit sports history. We took their lists and scored each athlete based on where they rated among our experts and came up with our final rankings. What we came up with is the Top 50 Detroit Athletes of All-Time.

We wanted to select a serious list, so we took the time to established a set of criteria, to help guide our picks. Namely:

1. What were the athletes’ accomplishments in their sport?  Things to consider are titles won, championships, records set, rankings  within their individual sport, career statistics, all-star selections, and individual awards (especially MVP awards).
2. What was the length of their career, and how significant was their contribution as a member of a Detroit team? Did they spend a large portion of their career in Detroit, or at least have major impact here representing the city?
3. How popular was the athlete in Detroit and Michigan? Did he have a lasting impact on his sport or Detroit franchise that still exists today?
4. Did the athlete transcend sports and have a cultural impact on Detroit in some way?
5. Was the athlete a central figure in historical moments that are legendary in Detroit sports history?
6. Was the athlete a major factor in a post-season or playoff series that resulted in a Detroit championship? Call this the clutch factor.
7. Was the athlete inducted into the Hall of Fame for his sport?
8. Did the athlete have an impact on the rules or equipment or play of their specific sport?
9. After their active playing career, did the athlete contribute anything else (as coach, executive, owner, broadcaster, etc.) that significantly added to the enjoyment of sports in Detroit?
10. Has enough time elapsed since the conclusion of the athlete’s career to properly assess his greatness? Or if he is still active, has he accomplished enough to be ranked among the greatest in Detroit sports history?

Our panel of experts:

• Richard Bak, one of the foremost Detroit historians and author of several books on Detroit sports and history, including Cobb Would Have Caught It: The Golden Age of Baseball in Detroit and Joe Louis: The Great Black Hope.
• Tom DeLisle, a longtime writer who has witnessed Detroit sports since the 1940s. In 1967 he was part of a group of writers for the Detroit Free Press who won a Pulitzer Prize in Journalism for their coverage of the Detroit riots.
• Bill Dow, a freelance sportswriter based out of Michigan who has contributed to several publications in the last 12 years and been following Michigan sports for four decades.
• Dan Holmes, a writer and webmaster who worked for the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum and MLB.com, is the author of one book on baseball, and contributor to two others, including Deadball Stars of the American League.

SEE OUR TOP 50 >

Veteran defensive end Kyle Vanden Bosch has helped invigorate the Detroit front four.

It takes a lot of work to appear insane.

It helps if you’re clever, or downright smart.

Kyle Vanden Bosch, the Detroit Lions defensive lineman noted for his enthusiastic play, has those traits. And though he may appear to be an out of control beast as he chases opposing quarterbacks, there is a method to Vanden Bosch’s madness.

In a recent radio interview, Green Bay quarterback Aaron Rodgers shared his impression of Vanden Bosch.

But even though Vanden Bosch seems like a madman on the football field, he’s actually a very smart man. In college at the University of Nebraska, he was Academic All-Big 12 for the three consecutive years and finished with a 3.82 GPA.

With the Huskies, Vanden Bosch was also a member of the Innocents Society, the Chancellor’s Senior Honorary at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Membership in the Innocents Society is based upon “superior academic achievement, unparalleled leadership, and selfless service to the University and community.”

With those kinds of smarts, Vanden Bosch is far from a meathead football player, he’s a well-spoken (despite Rodgers’ assessment) man with an intellect.

At Nebraska, Vanden Bosch earned a degree in finance in 2000, before being selected in the 2001 NFL Draft in the second round by the Arizona Cardinals. He was coveted for his tremendous strength – in college he added 40 pounds of muscle to his frame and was named the top weight lifter on campus three times.

The muscular lineman spent four seasons with the Cardinals, but it was with the Tennessee Titans where he emerged as an NFL impact player. In five seasons in Tennessee, Vanden Bosch made two Pro Bowl appearances, and in 2005 he finished fourth in all of the NFL with 12.5 sacks. When he became a free agent after the 2009 season, the Lions inked him to a $26 million, four-year deal. The move reunited Vanden Bosch with Jim Schwartz, who had been his defensive line coach with the Titans.

So far, the move has proved to be a smart one for Vanden Bosch and the improving Lions. The veteran defensive end has fit in well with younger players like Ndamukong Suh and Nick Fairley on the talented Detroit line.

With the Lions making the playoffs for the first time in over a decade in Vanden Bosch’s second season in Detroit, his antics look far from crazy, instead they seem downright genius.

In 1957, Tobin Rote was under center for the Lions' last NFL championship.

It was a little bizarre to the say the least.

In the summer of 2000, over the course of thirteen days, three former Lion quarterbacks passed away.

On June 27th , 72-year old Tobin Rote, the quarterback who led the Lions to their last world championship, died at a Saginaw hospital after suffering a heart attack nearly two weeks following back surgery.

In 1957, the Lions platooned Rote and fellow Texan Bobby Layne before Rote finished off the season after Layne broke his leg in the second to the last regular season game.

He then engineered two of the greatest games in Detroit Lions history.

In the divisional playoff game at San Francisco’s Kezar Stadium the Lions were trailing at halftime 24-7, and through the thin walls of the adjoining locker rooms the Detroit players could hear the 49ers celebrating.

“We could hear them laughing,” Rote said in 1991. “The walls were paper thin and they were going on about how they were going to spend their championship game money. It made us angry.”

Under Rote’s leadership, the Lions roared back as they scored three touchdowns in 4:29 and went on to win 31-27. The next game the Lions won their third World Championship in six years with a 59-14 rout of the Cleveland Browns as Rote threw four touchdown passes and ran for another.

Five days after Rote’s sudden passing, Lion fans learned that former signal caller Karl Sweetan, a fun loving party boy who for two seasons in the mid-sixties was embroiled in a quarterback controversy with Milt Plum, had died at a Las Vegas hospital of complications from vascular surgery.

Sweetan had lived in Nevada for 27 years after moving there to play semipro football when his NFL career ended in 1970. When he died at age 57 he was a blackjack dealer at a Vegas casino.

In his two seasons with the Lions, (1966-1967) Sweetan was probably best remembered for his record setting 99-yard TD to flanker Pat Studstill on October 16, 1966, in Baltimore. A few years later the Texas native made the national news when New Orleans coach J.D. Roberts reported to NFL security that Sweetan had contacted him in hopes of selling him a Los Angeles Rams playbook. Sweetan was arrested for wire fraud and interstate transportation of stolen property but the indictment was dropped after the D.A. determined that the monetary value of the playbook was less than the federal crime threshold for the sale of a stolen object across state lines.

And then just eight days later on July 10, Bill Munson, who had been acquired to replace Sweetan in 1968, was found by his nephew drowned in the swimming pool at his Lodi, California home. His death at age 58 was ruled accidental by local authorities. After eight seasons with Detroit where he competed for playing time with Greg Landry, Munson completed his NFL career with Seattle, San Diego, and Buffalo.

Munson maybe best remembered for nearly taking the 1970 wild card 10-4 Lions to the first ever NFC championship game in 1970.
Down 5-0 with less than two minutes to play, Lion head coach Joe Schmidt substituted Bill Munson for the ineffective Greg Landry. Munson marched the Lions down to the Dallas 29 yard line. With just 35 seconds left and on 3rd and 10, Munson threw what looked like a sure touchdown to Earl McCullough but the ball was picked off by Mel Renfro, sealing the Dallas victory.

Let’s just say that after those three consecutive deaths in the Summer of 2000, other former Lion quarterbacks were probably looking over their shoulders for the Grim Reaper.

At times Motown fans were almost overwhelmed with the success of their sports heroes. During one magical stretch in late September and early October, the Tigers were rolling through a 12-game winning streak to take a choke hold on the AL Central, while Matthew Stafford and Calvin Johnson were highlighting the Lions surprising unbeaten streak to start their season.

Here’s my selections for the best moments of 2011, in chronological order:

Verlander throws another no-hitter
If not for a single pitch that the home plate umpire ruled was a smidge inside, Verlander would have had a perfect game on May 7, in Toronto against the Blue Jays. The tall right-hander was magnificent that day, with his fastball and curveball both well in command. He retired the first 22 batters for allowing the walk on a 3-2 pitch. He got a double play grounder on the next batter and shut down the Jays in the ninth to secure his second no-hitter, having thrown his first in 2007. It may have been his best individual game performance of the year, but it was just the beginning for Verlander, who would go 21-2 the rest of the way to lead the Tigers to their first division title in 24 years. JV won the Cy Young Award and the MVP Award for his stellar season.

Red Wings score two goals in two minutes to skate past Sharks and force Game Seven
On May 10, three days after Verlander’s masterpiece, the Red Wings took the ice against the San Jose Sharks in Game Six of their Conference Semi-Finals. The Wings, favored in the series, had lost the first three games, but fought their way back to win Games Four and Five in San Jose. In Detroit for Game Six, the two rivals battled through a scoreless first and second periods. In the third with less than ten minutes left, the Sharks struck first to take a 1-0 lead. A few minutes later, the Wings scored on a breakaway, keyed off a pass by Niklas Kronwall. Less than two minutes later, Pavel Datsyuk dished the puck to Valterri Filpulla for another goal and a Detroit lead. An empty netter made the final, 3-1 Wings. The victory made the Wings just the sixth team in NHL history to win three straight and force a Game Seven after losing the first three of a series. Unfortunately, the Wings lost Game Seven.

Cabrera slugs ninth-inning homer to win game for Verlander over White Sox
On June 4, Verlander was about a month removed from his no-no, and he was throwing well but he hadn’t yet gotten into the zone that would be the signature of his 2011 season. In this game, against a Tiger rival who had given him troubles, the right-hander locked it in. In a 2-2 tie after battling former Tiger Edwin Jackson most of the game, Verlander threw four pitches over 100 MPH in the 8th inning, working himself out of a jam. It was obvious that his night was done, but that he might not get a win for his effort. Then Austin Jackson tripled to open the ninth, but after two outs, it looked like he would be stranded at third. Miguel Cabrera made sure that didn’t happen, slamming a fastball from Jesse Crain to deep right-center. Score: 4-2 Tigers. Valverde closed it down in the ninth, and Verlander had his sixth win of the year in dramatic fashion. He would win his next five starts, and 18 of 20 decisions the rest of the way.

Lions shock Cowboys with 17 points in 4th quarter
The Lions entered this game 3-0, having won seven straight dating back to the 2010 season. QB Stafford and freakishly talented wide receiver Johnson were stifled in the first half however, and Detroit looked mediocre again, trailing 20-3 at the half. When Tony Romo tossed a touchdown to make it 27-3 early in the 3rd, it felt like the old Lions were back. But this was not your father’s Lions, y’all. A pair of Romo passes were intercepted by Detroit defenders and returned for scores. Then, in the 4th quarter, Stafford and Megatron connected for two TD’s, the final one a dagger to the hearts of the Cowboys late in the game. The final score was 34-30, advantage Lions, and at 4-0 with a victory over a team many picked to go to the Super Bowl, they started to earn respect.

Tigers eliminate Yankees in Game Five of ALDS
Just four days after the Lions thrilling win over Dallas, on October 6, the Tigers squared off with the Yankees in a deciding Game Five of the ALDS. The night before, the Yankees had thumped the Tigers to even the series, and with the contest taking place in Yankee Stadium, it seemed like the momentum was with the Bombers. But Doug Fister, the lean gunslinger acquired from Seattle at the trade deadline, gutted out five innings before handing over a 3-1 lead to the bullpen. What followed was a nail-biting, edge-of-your-seat finish that saw three Tiger relievers stave off the pesky Yankees. Joaquin Benoit especially earned his big contract, stamping down the Yanks over  1 1/3 innings, whiffing ARod with two runners on in the 7th. Two innings later, Papa Grande fanned ARod again, this time to end the series, 3-2 Tigers. For the second time, Detroit eliminated the Yankees in a playoff series.