Perfect futility: Lions finish 0-16

GREEN BAY, Wis. -- The silence in the Detroit Lions' locker room was so deafening it drowned out all but the most mundane of sounds.

No laughter, no post-game jokes, certainly no congratulations for a job well done. Just the occasional sound of luggage being zipped up at the close of a hideous season historic for all the wrong reasons.

And really, with derisive chants of "Oh-and-16! Oh-and-16!" still ringing in their ears, was there anything left to say?

"It's over now. We're 0-16," rookie running back Kevin Smith said. "I wish it was just a dream. I wish I could wake up and it'd be over. But it's not."

The Lions didn't even bother trying to put a brave face on this one. With a 31-21 loss to the Green Bay Packers on Sunday, Detroit solidified its claim as the worst team in NFL history. Sixteen games, 16 losses.

Detroit Lions quarterback Dan Orlovsky (6) walks off the field after an NFL football game against the Green Bay Packers on Sunday, Dec. 28, 2008, in Green Bay, Wis. The Lions lost 31-21 to finish an 0-16 season. (AP Photo/Mike Roemer)

"0-16," one sign read, "The Perfect Season."

"You never expect it to happen when you're starting the season," said kicker Jason Hanson, the longest-tenured Lion. "Obviously, what we did here was not good."

It took 16 games to figure that out?

It's been more than 30 years since the Tampa Bay Buccaneers went 0-14 in 1976 -- and they had the excuse of being an expansion team. The New Orleans Saints during their worst days, the Indianapolis Colts before Peyton Manning arrived, the worst of the New York Jets teams -- they all managed to win at least one game.

Not the Lions.

They've been on a downward spiral for most of this decade, done in by one bad personnel move after another by TV analyst-turned-general manager Matt Millen. Their efforts on the field weren't much better, stringing together so many losses it looks as if an "L" key got stuck on a keyboard.

But this season was a debacle of epic proportions, beyond even what the most cynical of Lions fans could have imagined.

"As a Lions fan, we're used to them stinking," said Adam Gadsby, one of several Lions fans who made the eight-hour drive from Detroit to watch his team stake its dubious claim to history in person.

"But they've never stunk as well as they're stinking this year."

The stain of this dubious record will taint every player on Detroit's roster for the rest of his career. Regardless of what else he does -- make the Pro Bowl, win a Super Bowl, even be selected for the Hall of Fame -- he always will be part of that Lions team that went 0-16.

Look at the players from the '76 Buccaneers. They haven't set foot on a field in more than two decades, and those creamsicle uniforms have long since been retired. And here they are, still answering questions about that infamous season.

"It's hard for me to have anybody go through what we went through," said Richard Wood, a hard-hitting linebacker on that Buccaneers team. "It's a sad moment for all of football when a team can't win a football game. I feel for those guys, because it's a hollow feeling."

But the Lions did this to themselves. OK, so they got some help from Millen, but they were the ones making the plays.

Or not making them, in their case.

"This is us," Hanson said, "we own this."