Kevin Furlong is a season ticket holder with the Detroit Lions. As masochistic as that sounds, it seems that Kevin didn't appreciate an email that the Lions inadvertently sent him concerning a problem with his tickets. The email read: "Lance...he is not talking about you here. Mark was asked to speak to these people and he said no. F... 'em until next year."

As if that wasn't hostile enough, when a local sports reporter contacted the Lions for comment, and suggested that the tone of the F-bomb email shed some light on the larger issue of the Detroit Lions producing a generally poor football "product," the Lions executive vice president and chief operating officer, Tom Lewand, replied: "If you write that, it will be factually incorrect and bordering on slander," Lewand said. "And I will come after you." Boy, they sure are grouchy up there at Ford Field. Cheer up! Brett Favre retired!

From the Oakland Press:

Furlong owned season tickets for three years. He had two in the club level the first year. The second year, he received two more in the lower level stands after being on a waiting list — so he had four. The third season, they reduced the size of the club level, including a portion where his seats were located, which were on the aisle.

He said he wanted to keep those two seats, add two club-level seats and asked that two seats he had in the stands be combined with his seats from the club level that were moved to the stands. The Lions agreed. It gave him six season tickets.

But when he went to sit in his old seats, somebody else was sitting in them. He asked them to leave, but when he looked at his tickets, he noticed his seats had been moved.

"It was an embarrassing and awkward moment," Furlong said. "I was stunned."

When he contacted the Lions, he was told nothing could be done about it during the 2007 season, but he was promised aisle seats for 2008.

Yet, when Furlong received his season ticket invoice for 2008, it was for the same seats he had in 2007.

It was then that Furlong canceled his season tickets in an e-mail to Schul. Powser then e-mailed Furlong with an offer for more desirable seats, but Furlong said it was a matter of principle — and he wouldn't accept the offer.

Then Furlong received the inadvertent e-mail from Schul.

The entire e-mail reads, "Lance...he is not talking about you here. Mark was asked to speak to these people and he said no. F... 'em until next year."

"Mark" is Lions ticket director Mark Graham.

Once he heard of the e-mail, Lewand called Furlong and invited him to a game.

"I did so before I heard from any media on this," he said.

Lewand offered no excuses for the incident, but absolved Graham from blame, although the e-mail in question indicates Graham refused to discuss the issue with season ticketholders such as Furlong, who had their seats unexpectedly moved for the 2007 season.

"It was an inaccurate characterization of a conversation held in 2007, not this year,'' Lewand said of Schul's e-mail.

Lewand said he was, "deeply disappointed with the e-mail and light it portrayed, and I have addressed it."

"There are a number of different levels this could have been avoided and we realize that," Lewand said. "One, with the invoice we sent out for this year. If it had been correct, none of this would have happened. We never condone our fans being discussed in that manner, whether it be in an e-mail or any type of discussion among members of our organization."

Whoops. We'd always assumed that season ticket holders got good customer service, considering the amount of money they spent. Guess not.

The Detroit Lions have since "clarified" that "I will come after you" wasn't meant as a threat towards Pat Caputo, the Oakland Press writer.

Does e-mail show how Lions really feel about their fans? [Oakland Press] (Thanks, Kraig!)
(Photo: yodie ann )