Millen Claims 0-16 Lions Season will be his Magnum Opus

DETROIT, MI—The Detroit Lions made history on Sunday, becoming the first 0-15 team in the history of the NFL, and look poised to become the first team to finish a season with zero victories since the 1976 Tampa Bay Buccaneers.

The team’s horrific performance this year was not impeded by the firing of longtime GM Matt Millen earlier this season, who, in an exclusive interview with SSNN, revealed that the looming 0-16 season was the crown jewel on a masterpiece Millen had been crafting since 2001.

“All those years of struggle, all that hard work, it will finally pay off next Sunday,” Millen said. “I never thought I would reach this day. Even though they always doubted me, and said, ‘Deep down, you know he hates to lose,’ despite all that, my dream is about to become a reality.

“I mean come on, even the most incompetent of NFL teams records at least one victory,” said an exasperated Millen “I knew it wouldn’t be easy, achieving an 0-16 season. It would take years of horrible trades, worse draft picks, and incompetent coaching to get there.

“Harrington, Rogers, Williams, McDougle, Claiborne, Gibson, Fair, Cody, Lehman and Edwards; they were all lambs to the slaughter,” chucked Millen.

“On top of all that,” Millen commented. “You probably don’t want to know how I was able to keep my job. Around 2004, [Lion’s owner William Clay] Ford stopped buying my excuses and told me I had to shape up soon, or I would be gone. Well, let’s just say I know a few tricks and [the following has been removed for disturbing imagery of the most graphic and perverse nature—Ed], but even then I knew that I was just living on borrowed time. Sooner or later, I would be fired, and the dream of 0-16 would be lost forever. I mean, no NFL team will ever hire me again, so I knew I had to make the most of what I had.”

How and why, SSNN asked, did Matt Millen, a standout NFL player and popular media personality, become so devoted to the idea of losing?

“When I got to Detroit in 2001, I started out with high hopes for what I could achieve,” Millen recalled. “After all, they had finished 9-7 in 2000, and looked poised to make the playoffs that season. But then, a wild idea struck me: what if I utterly and completely eviscerated the Lions franchise? What if I ruined them so completely that even the idea of making .500 for the season would forever seem an impossibility? What if I built the first 0-16 team in NFL history? What if I killed the Detroit Lions?

“We were so close in 2001,” remembered Millen. “Started out 0-12. I thought maybe I could achieve the impossible in one season. Alas, that was not to be.

Millen revealed that contrary to popular conception, losing in professional sports requires a good deal of effort on the part of management.

“You’d think that be all there was to it, just not try. But I’ve learned that in professional sports, you actually have to work your ass off to suck that hard for that long.”

“We got Roy Williams and Shaun Rogers, they actually turned out to have something,” reminisced Millen. “Good thing I got rid of them before they could do too much damage.”

“Look at how teams turn around!” cried Millen. “The Arizona fucking Cardinals are going to the playoffs! So are the Falcons! And the Dolphins! I mean Christ, Mary and Joseph, they only had one win last year! And now they could overtake the Patriots! Shit! The Patriots! I remember when they blew!

“Most teams end up with a win or two just out of sheer luck,” commented Millen. “It’s really not a coincidence that it’s been over 30 years since a team has gone defeated for a year. None of the players enjoy losing, so you can’t get them in on the joke. You just have to build the worst team possible. I have truly taken suckitude to unheard of levels.”

“I remember when poor old Kitna told the press we were gonna win 10 games,” laughed Millen evilly. “I admit, there was a twinge of concern when they managed to get to 6-2. But I designed the team to self-destruct mid-way through the season, no worries.”

Millen’s schemes were uninterrupted by his firing in late September, after the Lions started the season 0-3.

“They finally got rid of me, but I had planned for that,” laughed Millen. “This was gonna be my year, no one could tak e it away from me. I almost feel sorry for [GM Martin] Mayhew and [Head Coach] Rod Marinelli. They must feel so helpless, like they are just re-arranging chairs on the Titanic. Hey, maybe now they’ll change it to ‘rotating players on the Detroit Lions.’ That’d be killer.”

When asked if he was responsible for the current crisis the city of Detroit is facing in the auto industry, Millen only laughed and said, “I will not rest until Detroit is a smoldering wasteland.”

It’s going to be tough for this sport to sweep any nations, but it’s still pretty frickin’ cool!