Could any of the Detroit Lions 1957 championship team play today?
By Robert Jones
The 1957 world champions Detroit Lions were a wild and woolly bunch. They were the team of the decade and had mostly only known success and titles, unlike their distant descendants of today. It was a team that both played with character and was filled with characters.
Yet could any of those characters play today?
To find out the answer, I have put together a formula that will hopefully give us the most realistic solution to this inter-era question.
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One of the most difficult things to do is to compare athletes from different eras. It’s one thing if they are from neighboring decades like the 1980’s and 1990’s. However, it is very hard to do so with athletes that over half a century apart.
With that in mind, my specifications are simple; for a player from 1957 to be considered a viable candidate to play in today’s NFL he must have enough size or physical gifts to actually compete as well as enough skill or intangibles.
Today’s athletes have an overwhelming advantage over the athletes of yesterday. The size, skill, workout routines and complexity of the game are vastly different from 1957. Yet if a player from 1957 can meet the criteria I am using, we will assume that given the opportunity to train like the modern day athlete, they should certainly be able to compete with today’s players.
That being said, we can rule out almost all the linemen. With players of that time averaging between 240-250 pounds on the line with few exceptions, it is asking way too much for them to compete against the 300 pound monsters occupying the trenches today.
I will give offensive left tackle Lou Creekmur an honorable mention as a Hall of Fame player and because maybe with today’s training his 6-foot-4 and 246 pound frame might be able to put on enough weight/muscle to be competitive. But even as good as that 1957 team was in the trenches, they simply don’t have enough size or skill to compete today.