Instead of pulling a paycheck from the NFL's model franchise, you could still be working for the league's biggest joke.

Instead of playing for a team that has employed three coaches in 40 years, you could be playing for one that has torn through six in 13.

Instead of traveling to Nashville, Tenn., this weekend to battle the Titans for the AFC's No. 1 seed, you could be in Detroit.

Playing for the Lions.

Staring at the prospect of 0-16.

Enduring endless streams of abuse.

And wondering if it was this bad for the 1976 Tampa Bay Buccaneers, whose coach, John McKay, delivered the greatest line in sports history when asked what he thought of his team's execution.

"I'm in favor of it," McKay said.

You're even listed on the Lions' 2008 roster in their media guide, Mr. McHugh, so people who watched you play at Penn State might think you're a still a backup fullback in Detroit.

They might not know you were released Sept. 1 and signed by the Steelers.

Ever marvel at your luck?

"Oh yeah," McHugh says. "It's amazing. You go from potentially making history for being the worst team to having a chance to play for it all. It's pretty neat."

Now, before we talk to a man who has spent his career in Cleveland and Detroit, to another who grew up a Lions fan and is deeply ashamed, and to another who was happier to escape Detroit than Clint Eastwood was to escape Alcatraz, let's address the NFL's most pressing question:

Are the Lions going to win a freakin' game?

They play at home Sunday against 7-7 New Orleans and visit 5-9 Green Bay in the season finale. Two losses will put them at 0-16 (this is why Motown has become 'O' Town), but at least they could boast of a moral victory: They could top the '76 Bucs (0-14) for the worst season in NFL history.

So, Sean, you played with these guys for three years and call some your friends. Will they win a game?

"No," McHugh says, incredulously, at once laughing and scoffing at the question. "I watched them on Thanksgiving (a 47-10 loss to the Titans), and, ah, I don't think they will."

In another corner of the Steelers locker room, we find Detroit native Larry Foote, who is man enough to admit the truth.

"Yeah, I grew up a Lions fan," Foote says. "We're just in a little funk right now."

The Lions have won precisely one playoff game since 1957, two years before a cornerback named Dick LeBeau joined the team.

Which brings us to a current Lions cornerback, Duquesne University graduate Leigh Bodden. He's the fellow who spent his first five NFL seasons in Cleveland before getting traded to the Lions in February.

I'm tempted to ask Bodden if he ever imagined, six years into his NFL career, that Duquesne would still be the best team he ever played on.

Instead, I inquire about the atmosphere around "the city of Detroit" during our phone conversation.

"I don't really go out in the city of Detroit," Bodden says. "The fans, I mean, we haven't given them anything to cheer for. Everybody's seen that."

Foote feels bad for players who spend an hour with the Lions, let alone the better part of a career.

"Can you imagine getting drafted there and going 8-10 years with that?" Foote said. "You don't know anything else. I couldn't imagine it. Here, the expectations are so high, it's like doomsday when you're not winning. That's why them Lions players, when they come here, they're in awe.

"Go ask Kirschke."

OK, let's go talk to defensive end Travis Kirschke, who toiled in Detroit for five years (and San Francisco for one) before a blessed landing in Pittsburgh.

Any difference between the programs here and there, Travis?

"Obviously, this program is winning," he said, "so that's one humongous difference."

You wonder what runs through Kirschke's mind when he sees his old team on TV or reads about them in the newspaper.

"The spectacle," he says. "Every year, I'm as optimistic as they are. They can't do that again. Yet, they keep doing that."

And if they do it two more times, they will never be forgotten.

Pity the paper Lions.