Thoughts On Detroit Lion's Thanksgiving Day Game and William Clay Ford, Sr.

I doubt that the game will be taken away from the Lions. William Clay Ford, Sr. and the Ford Motor Company have given a lot to the NFL in the 44 years he has owned the team.

Even with these hard economic times, Ford Motor Company is still a pretty big player, and I really doubt the NFL wants to mess with that, regardless of the ineptness of William Clay Ford, Sr. the owner.  

No matter how much fans complain to Lion upper management or to the NFL, it’s not about us, the team or the owner. Bottom line is it’s all about the Benjamin’s. 

One hopes this season of failure after failure will galvanize Mr. Ford into action. One hopes that he sees the benefit and profits that come when having a contending team.  

You look to Robert Kraft and what he did for the New England Patriots and you have to know that he is raking in the bucks with sell outs after sell outs, marketing and a fan base that has faced just as much diversity as the Lions have.

But he did something about it, he is first and foremost a fan of the game. He wanted to make the Patriots a winner and in his relatively short time as an owner, 14 years, has gotten his team to the Super Bowl five times, winning three of them.

Mr. Ford has the ability and the wherewithal to duplicate Robert Kraft’s achievement with the Patriots. But Mr. Ford is not a fan of the game let alone a fan of the team.  He doesn’t appear to have the gumption to make the Lions a winner.

If it were me and I was the owner of an NFL team, I think the measure of success would be how many Super Bowls have I gotten to and how many did I win. Instead, Mr. Ford seems to be content to try and become successful based on longevity.

I liken him to Keith Richards of the Rolling Stones: He’s been dead for 10 years but his body just doesn’t know it.  

Like the Rolling Stones, William Clay Ford, Sr. just doesn’t know how to end this fiasco gracefully. Unlike the Rolling Stones, William Clay Ford, Sr. doesn’t have any fans that still want him to continue.

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