# 1963 Detroit Lions season

The 1963 Detroit Lions season marked the thirtieth year of the National Football League (NFL) franchise in Detroit and 34th overall.
It was national news in April when NFL Commissioner Pete Rozelle indefinitely suspended two future Hall of Famers, Lions defensive tackle Alex Karras and Packers' halfback Paul Hornung for placing bets on NFL teams. Five other Lions players were fined $2,000 each for betting on games that they did not play in. The Lions franchise was additionally fined $2,000 each on two counts for failure to report information promptly and for lack of sideline supervision. The gambling controversy proved to be an ongoing distraction throughout the season.
Things became lighthearted in August, when gonzo sports journalist George Plimpton endured the Lions' training camp process as an ostensible backup quarterback, going so far as to run a very unsuccessful series of downs in practice, to generate a story for the telling. Plimpton's 1963 training camp experience would culminate in a 1965 best-selling book, Paper Lion.
On Thanksgiving Day in Detroit, the Lions met the Packers for the thirteenth consecutive season. The game ended in a tie, the first for the Packers in five years, and it was the end of the holiday series for Green Bay. Their visit to Tiger Stadium the following year was on a Monday night in late September, and the visiting opponent for Thanksgiving was rotated, starting with the Chicago Bears.

## Offseason
### NFL Draft

| Round | Pick | Player | Position | School |
| 1 | 12 | Daryl Sanders | Offensive Tackle | Ohio State |
    Source:

## Preseason
### Paper Lion

Paper Lion, published in 1966, is a non-fiction book by prominent American writer George Plimpton. Plimpton pitched to a lineup of baseball stars in an All-Star exhibition, presumably to answer the question, "How would the average man off of the street fare in an attempt to compete with the stars of professional sports?" He chronicled this experience in his book, Out of My League. In Paper Lion, Plimpton joins the training camp of the 1963 Detroit Lions on the premise of trying out to be the team's third-string quarterback. (The coaches were aware of the deception; the players were not until it became apparent that Plimpton did not really know how to receive the snap from center.) Plimpton, then thirty-six, showed how unlikely it would be for an "average" person to succeed as a professional athlete. When finally inserted at quarterback for a series in a scrimmage conducted in Pontiac, Michigan, Plimpton managed to lose yardage on each play, convincing many in the crowd that he was a professional sports clown inserted for amusement purposes, not someone who was genuinely giving his best effort.

## Regular season
### Schedule

| Game | Date | Opponent | Result | Record | Venue | Attendance | Recap |
| 1 | September 14 | at Los Angeles Rams | W 23–2 | 1–0 | L.A. Memorial Coliseum | 49,342 | Recap |
| 2 | September 22 | at Green Bay Packers | L 10–31 | 1–1 | Milwaukee County Stadium | 45,912 | Recap |
| 3 | September 29 | Chicago Bears | L 21–37 | 1–2 | Tiger Stadium | 55,400 | Recap |
| 4 | October 6 | San Francisco 49ers | W 26–3 | 2–2 | Tiger Stadium | 44,088 | Recap |
| 5 | October 13 | at Dallas Cowboys | L 14–17 | 2–3 | Cotton Bowl | 27,264 | Recap |
| 6 | October 20 | Baltimore Colts | L 21–25 | 2–4 | Tiger Stadium | 51,901 | Recap |
| 7 | October 27 | Minnesota Vikings | W 28–10 | 3–4 | Tiger Stadium | 44,509 | Recap |
| 8 | November 3 | at San Francisco 49ers | W 45–7 | 4–4 | Kezar Stadium | 33,511 | Recap |
| 9 | November 10 | at Baltimore Colts | L 21–24 | 4–5 | Municipal Stadium | 59,758 | Recap |
| 10 | November 17 | Los Angeles Rams | L 21–28 | 4–6 | Tiger Stadium | 44,951 | Recap |
| 11 | November 24 | at Minnesota Vikings | L 31–34 | 4–7 | Metropolitan Stadium | 28,763 | Recap |
| 12 | November 28 | Green Bay Packers | T 13–13 | 4–7–1 | Tiger Stadium | 54,016 | Recap |
| 13 | December 8 | Cleveland Browns | W 38–10 | 5–7–1 | Tiger Stadium | 51,382 | Recap |
| 14 | December 15 | at Chicago Bears | L 14–24 | 5–8–1 | Wrigley Field | 45,317 | Recap |
| Notes: Intra-conference opponents are in bold text. September 14 night game; November 28 Thanksgiving. |||||||||

## Standings

NFL Western Conference :
| viewtalkedit | W | L | T | PCT | CONF | PF | PA | STK |
| Chicago Bears | 11 | 1 | 2 | .917 | 10–1–1 | 301 | 144 | W2 |
| Green Bay Packers | 11 | 2 | 1 | .846 | 9–2–1 | 369 | 206 | W2 |
| Baltimore Colts | 8 | 6 | 0 | .571 | 7–5 | 316 | 285 | W3 |
| Detroit Lions | 5 | 8 | 1 | .385 | 4–7–1 | 326 | 265 | L1 |
| Minnesota Vikings | 5 | 8 | 1 | .385 | 4–7–1 | 309 | 390 | W1 |
| Los Angeles Rams | 5 | 9 | 0 | .357 | 5–7 | 210 | 350 | L2 |
| San Francisco 49ers | 2 | 12 | 0 | .143 | 1–11 | 198 | 391 | L5 |
       Note: Tie games were not officially counted in the standings until 1972.
NFL Eastern Conference :
| viewtalkedit | W | L | T | PCT | CONF | PF | PA | STK |
| New York Giants | 11 | 3 | 0 | .786 | 9–3 | 448 | 280 | W3 |
| Cleveland Browns | 10 | 4 | 0 | .714 | 9–3 | 343 | 262 | W1 |
| St. Louis Cardinals | 9 | 5 | 0 | .643 | 8–4 | 341 | 283 | L1 |
| Pittsburgh Steelers | 7 | 4 | 3 | .636 | 7–3–2 | 321 | 295 | L1 |
| Dallas Cowboys | 4 | 10 | 0 | .286 | 3–9 | 305 | 378 | W1 |
| Washington Redskins | 3 | 11 | 0 | .214 | 2–10 | 279 | 398 | L3 |
| Philadelphia Eagles | 2 | 10 | 2 | .167 | 2–8–2 | 242 | 381 | L2 |
       Note: Tie games were not officially counted in the standings until 1972.