ESPN may be having second thoughts about hiring Ray Lewis as an analyst after the former Baltimore Ravens star made a few flagrant comments about Ray Rice’s recent suspension and domestic-assault case.
On ESPN’s Outside the Lines Sunday, Lewis once again weighed in on Rice’s suspension but took it one step further by saying there are certain things you can cover up and some things you can’t.
Here’s what Lewis had to say:
Yeah, this is one of those situations that. … It’s family. I spent 17 years of my career at this one place. I’ve known Ozzie Newsome now over 19 years of my career, of my life. That’s half my life. I’ve known Steve Bisciotti over 15 years of my life. Each one of those men, bottom line, has never lied to me once. They’ve given me an opportunity at life to change not only my life but my family’s life as well as my kids’ lives.
If this incident, what we’re dealing with, if they could do this all over again, they would. If the NFL could do this all over again, they would. Whether they saw the tape or not, who really knows outside of the people who was actually there to know what went on? But sometimes I think we get lost in trying to figure out who’s head to go after, who to attack now about what they didn’t do.
Sometimes we forget why we’re here. We’re here for one reason and one reason only. We’re here for domestic violence. We’re here because we saw a friend of mine brutally hit his wife in an elevator. There’s some things you can cover up and then there’s some things you can’t. Right now is a sad day for me because the reputation that I left in this organization, this isn’t it. This isn’t it. What was built that many of years took hard work to get that. Took a hell of a reputation to put on the line. Men’s families. Men’s lives. How to actually get acclimated as a pro.
So yeah, am I little bit offended when you talk about a guy by the name of Ozzie Newsome? Absolutely, because he’s one of the five-star generals in this world as a man. I don’t want us to lose fact. I don’t want us to lose what’s really going on here. Ray Rice put a lot of people in jeopardy with his actions. A lot of people in jeopardy. Not just himself. He needs to understand that because none of this happens if what happened that night in that elevator don’t happen. … If I ask for anything in this whole thing, I ask let there be light.
One has to wonder if Lewis remembers what happened on the night of Jan. 31, 2000, or did he block that permanently from his memory? In 2000 Lewis pleaded guilty to obstruction of justice after being originally charged with two counts of murder but then striking a deal with prosecutors in exchange for his testimony against two people who were with him the night Jacinth Baker and Richard Lollar were stabbed to death. In legal circles, some may consider obstruction of justice an attempt to cover up a crime.
Once again social media was all “WTF, Ray Lewis?” after hearing his ironic comments:
https://twitter.com/the_blueprint/status/513694220415414273https://twitter.com/Tmath/status/513694128522022912https://twitter.com/AlejandroDaGr8/status/513716201705713665https://twitter.com/NFLGoodwitch/status/513712007938592768https://twitter.com/GGChanel/status/513710895793328128https://twitter.com/Crutch4/status/513694203164262400https://twitter.com/MrSpradley/status/513693980329246720
Here’s the thing: I’m going to need Lewis to refrain from talking about domestic violence if he’s not going to talk about turning state in a murder case and basically throwing his friends under the bus. ESPN really needs to rethink the fact that Lewis cares more about how Rice’s legal issues are ruining the image of the Ravens than actually caring about domestic violence. Or maybe ESPN also forgot about that night in January?