When late NFL commissioner Pete Rozelle decided to experiment with playing a showcase matchup on Monday night, he picked a can’t-miss rivalry: the Detroit Lions vs. the Green Bay Packers.

On September 28, 1964, the Packers came to Detroit to play the league’s first-ever Monday game. Per renowned local sportswriter Bill Dow’s personal account, the two teams squared off before a sold-out Tiger Stadium crowd of 59,203 — the largest football crowd to ever pack into the old ballpark.

That 14-10 Packers win wasn’t even televised — but the bleacher-busting attendance proved there’d be an audience for weeknight pro football. It was the first step toward the “Monday Night Football” we know and love: a weekly, nationally broadcast showcase of the best of the NFL.

After a few more one-offs, the real deal began in 1970, and it wasn’t long before Detroit and Green Bay got prime-time bids.

In 1971, the 4-2 Lions went on the road to play the 2-4 Packers at Milwaukee County Stadium; playing a few big games in Milwaukee every year helped the tiny-market Packers balance the books. The nation watched the two teams battle to a 14-14 tie, with zero second-half scoring. Hall of Fame tight end Charlie Sanders scored the game’s last touchdown, a 49-yard bomb just before halftime.

Though neither team made the playoffs that season, Detroit and Green Bay were matched up again on a Monday the next year. On October 16, 1972, Tiger Stadium again played host to Joe Schmidt’s Lions and Dan Devine’s Packers. This proved a much more exciting contest, despite 47-degree weather and 15 mile-per-hour wind.

The Lions roared out to a 17-0 first-quarter lead and extended it to 20-7 just after halftime. Detroit kicker Errol Mann made three of four field-goal attempts, including long ones of 45 and 51 yards.

But the lone miss was costly.

Green Bay came back in the third quarter with a field goal of their own and an 80-yard punt return touchdown by Ken Ellis. A 15-yard Packers touchdown pass and extra point put Green Bay up by the final score: 24-23.

But after playing the first-ever Monday game, and having two matchups in the first three years of the televised series’ existence, the tradition took a 45-year hiatus.

Why the extended break? It was due in part to both teams being pretty bad for a pretty long time.

After making the playoffs at the end of that 1972 regular season, the Packers didn’t get back into the postseason again until 1993 (except for the strike-shortened year of 1982), Brett Favre’s first season as starter.

The Lions, of course, didn’t fare much better. These two Monday night games came in the middle of seven straight second-place finishes in what was then the NFC Central, playing about .500 football the entire time.

Excepting the 1982 strike year and 1983, when Billy Sims carried them to the postseason, the Lions also weren’t good until the 1990s.

Here’s where it gets weird: Detroit and Green Bay both made the playoffs six times during an eight-year stretch from 1991 to 1999 — sometimes directly at the cost of each other. For all the great battles Favre, Barry Sanders, Herman Moore, Sterling Sharpe, Leroy Butler, Chris Spielman and Co. fought in the regular season and the playoffs, they never met on a Monday night.

Neither the Lions nor Packers is a great national draw right now. Without quarterback Aaron Rodgers, Green Bay is assumed to be toast; despite losing three straight games (and four out of their last five), Detroit is currently favored by as many as three points, per OddsShark.com.

Win or lose, let’s hope this game gets Lions-Packers on track to being a “Monday Night Football” staple.