ALLEN PARK, Mich. — Early in 2009, just before the N.F.L. draft in which the Detroit Lions owned the first pick, Troy Aikman and Matthew Stafford had dinner together in Arizona, where Stafford was training.

Aikman, the Hall of Fame quarterback for the Dallas Cowboys and now a broadcaster for Fox, lives in Highland Park, Tex., an area of Dallas close to where Stafford grew up and played sports alongside his childhood friend Clayton Kershaw, who is now a star pitcher for the Los Angeles Dodgers.

Aikman said he had never seen Stafford play in high school, but they met a few years later when, while eating at the same Dallas restaurant, Stafford walked over to Aikman’s table and introduced himself as the quarterback for the University of Georgia and an N.F.L. hopeful.

They became friendly, and by the spring of 2009, Stafford was projected as the No. 1 draft pick, as Aikman had been 20 years earlier. As they ate together before the draft, Aikman asked Stafford straight up: Do you really want to go to the Lions?