It would seem unlikely that over the course of 62 seasons, two N.F.L. teams could combine for eight championships but manage to play each other in 50 largely irrelevant games. But mediocrity has been the standard when it comes to games between the Detroit Lions and San Francisco 49ers.
The 4-1 49ers will be in Detroit today to take on the 5-0 Lions, and two former N.F.L. West rivals well separated from their glory days find themselves in a rare spotlight.
As this New York Times graphic illustrates, the teams have played each other 61 times in the last 62 seasons and just 11 times have both squads had winning records coming into the game. Today’s game will be the twelfth time.
Fans who have come to the game more recently probably blame Detroit for the irrelevance of the rivalry, but before the Bill Walsh-led renaissance, the 49ers carried their fair share of bad records into the matchups, and recently the franchise has been nearly as bad.
The one exception to the rule has been the playoffs, where the teams have faced each other twice, with both games being rather memorable.
The 1957 Lions engineered a fourth-quarter comeback against Y.A. Tittle’s 49ers in the first round despite not having star quarterback Bobby Layne. Detroit went on to win the N.F.L. championship against the Cleveland Browns.
The 1983 49ers were trailing the 9-7 Lions in the fourth quarter of the division round when Joe Montana connected with Freddie Solomon for a touchdown to tie the game, with kicker Ray Wersching’s extra point sealing Detroit’s fate. The 49ers went on to lose to the Redskins in the N.F.C. championship game.
With many football fans tuning in to see if these teams are for real, it will be a good chance to show off how far both teams have come from their recent doldrums.
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