Your turkey of the week

 I know what this is, this epic clash between the winless Lions and the playing-like-they're-winless Bears. This is NFL Tryptophan.

On Turkeycide Day, see, we're going to get Andy Dalton vs. either Jared Goff or, more likely, someone named Tim Boyce. We're going to get a team that can't win for losing (the Bears) vs. a team that can't win, period (the Lions). If this turkey were your Thanksgiving dinner, it would look like this.

NFL Tryptophan, yes, sirree. Start of the second quarter, everyone in the house is going to be stacking zzzz's higher than an elephant's eye.

I don't know why the NFL insists on punishing like this on a day we're supposed to be thankful, except that it's a combination of inertia and tradition. They've been foisting the Lions on us on Thanksgiving for decades now, and, because it's the Lions, it's mostly been six flavors of ugly. I guess it's the NFL's way of making us thankful for college football, and also that it's now hockey and college basketball season as well.

Me, I don't exactly mark my Thanksgivings by the Lions vs. whoever, but I do remember the greatest Lions Thanksgiving ever. And by "greatest" I mean "maybe the worst NFL game ever played, unless you're of the firm belief that the elements make football what it is."

The year was 1968, I was 13 years old, and the 3-7-1 Lions were playing the winless Eagles in 100 yards of goulash. They called it the Mud Bowl, because that's what it was. The field conditions were so horrible no one could do much of anything, both teams mucking around like hogs in a wallow, wearing the same shade of brown. It was like watching a knife fight between troglodytes far beneath the earth's surface.

The Eagles eventually won this travesty 12-0 on four field goals by Sam Baker. The only offensive player who did anything of significance was Eagles running back Tom Woodeshick, who slogged his way to 79 yards on 37 muck-encrusted carries. The quarterbacks, Norm Snead for the Eagles and Greg Landry for the Lions, completed just 13-of-30 passes for 115 yards between them. Together, the Lions and Eagles scratched out just 20 first downs.

It was wretched football. But it made for some arresting visuals.

Tomorrow?

Well, the game in Ford Field will be indoors, of course, because the NFL no longer thinks the elements should be part of the game. So it won't be a Mud Bowl.

A Dud Bowl, however ...

Well. That's a lock,