This week’s Throwback Thursday feature pits 2 teams that meet on the NFL slate of games in week 16, the Detroit Lions and Pittsburgh Steelers. The game took place on September 16, 1962 at Detroit’s Tiger Stadium. It marked the “homecoming “of a Lions’ legend, quarterback Bobby Layne. The combative signal caller had led the Motor City club to 3 NFL titles in the 1950s (although Tobin Rote started the last one in 1957). Layne was angered when the Lions traded him to Pittsburgh in the middle of the 1958 season, after an injury and amid gambling accusations that were never proven. Layne angrily proclaimed after the trade that the Lions “wouldn’t win again for another 50 years”, a proclamation that has held true since Detroit is one of the few NFL franchises that has never reached the Super Bowl. This was actually the second time that these 2 teams had met since the trade. In 1959 they battled to a 10-10 tie in a contest that saw Layne account for all 10 Steeler points with a field goal and a touchdown pass to Tom Tracy, but that game was played in the Steel City.
So that set the stage for the legendary QB to return to the place he had led to glory the previous decade. Some of the excitement was let out of the return by the fact that Pittsburgh’s starting quarterback was actually Ed Brown for this 1962 season opener. After a scoreless first quarter Detroit’s Milt Plum, who had been acquired from Cleveland prior to the ’62 season, tossed a 1 yard touchdown pass to Gail Cogdill. Pittsburgh countered that when Brown connected with Preston Carpenter on a 43 yard bomb to tie the score. The Lions owned the rest of the first half, as fullback Nick Pietrosante rambled 22 yards for a touchdown, and Plum threw for another score to Cogdill, this one a 21 yarder. The Lions took a 21-7 lead into halftime.
Things didn’t change in the second half. Detroit’s Dan Lewis closed out the third quarter and opened the final one with 1 yard touchdown runs to up his club’s lead to 35-7. Layne eventually entered the game, replacing the ineffective Brown, but he didn’t have much luck either, completing 5 of 10 passes for 76 yards. A Wayne Walker field goal and another Plum touchdown pass, of 9 yards to Pat Studstill, finished the scoring as the Lions grabbed a convincing 45-7 win. No revenge was had by Layne, but he really couldn’t be faulted, as he was put in a hopeless situation, and also was at the tail end of his career, with 1962 being his last season.
Bobby Layne, one of the last of the no face mask players