I have a good friend in the Detroit area who is a big fan of the Tigers and Lions, along with that city’s other two pro sports franchises, the Pistons and Red Wings.
But, as he quickly points out, it is the Lions and Tigers who are his favorites.
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“People around here talk about how the town would go absolutely crazy if the Tigers won the World Series, and I know that is true,” he said. “But this is more of a Lions town than it is a Tigers town, so if the Lions won the Super Bowl, that celebration would be a whole heckuva lot bigger than it would be for a Tigers championship.”
That is the same situation as it is in Cleveland, where while a Guardians World Series triumph would be huge, a Browns Super Bowl title would be out of sight. You wouldn’t be able to even quantify it.
Coincidentally, the cities are facing each other this week and into the weekend on two separate fronts, with the Guardians and Tigers, embroiled in a smoking-hot American League Central Division pennant chase, playing three games Tuesday through Thursday at Progressive Field, and the Browns and Lions meeting Sunday at Ford Field.
Now, that’s a significant regional rivalry, Northeast Ohio against Southeast Michigan.
The Guardians haven’t won a World Series since 1948, and the Tigers not since a year in which those last two numbers are reversed, 1984.
Neither the Browns nor the Lions have ever been to a Super Bowl. The Browns last won an NFL championship just two years before the Super Bowl era began, in 1964. The Lions’ last title came in 1957, beating the Browns to do it.
The Lions are coming off a 38-30 punchout of one of the Browns’ AFC North rivals in the Baltimore Ravens on Monday Night Football.
All of this brings up an interesting question: other than with the teams in the North and its predecessor, the AFC Central, has a club ever played the current Browns franchise and the original Browns franchise, the Ravens, in back-to-back weeks? And if it did happen, then was it also during the same time that the Guardians were playing that city’s Major League Baseball team?
Just something kinda cool to think about.
Steve King
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