Ray Lewis Calls Doping Allegations “Sad, Foolish”

As we told you yesterday, Ravens’ LB Ray Lewis is being accused of using a banned substance (Deer Antler Extract)
to assist his recovery from a torn tricep muscle, an accusation he is adamantly denying to the world. Below are his comments from his media session today:

On his reaction to Sports Illustrated story: “I think, honestly, and I am going to say it very clearly again, I think it’s probably one of the most embarrassing things that we can do on this type of stage. I think it takes totally away from – you give somebody the ability to come into our world. Our world is a very secret society, and we try to protect our world as much as we can. But, when you let cowards come in and do things like that, to try to disturb something. I’ve said it before, I’ve said a million times, the reason why I am smiling is because it is so funny of a story, because I never, ever, took what he says I – whatever I was supposed to do. It’s just sad, once again, that someone can have this much attention on a stage this big where the dreams are really real. They are really real. I don’t need it, my teammates don’t need it, the 49ers don’t need it, nobody needs it, because it just really shows you how people really plan things and try to attack people from the outside. It’s foolish. It’s very foolish, and the guy has no credibility. He’s been sued four or five times over the same B.S. Just to entertain it, I can’t, I won’t and I just truly believe he doesn’t have the privilege for me to speak about it ever again.”

On if he is angry: “Me? Never angry. I’m too blessed to be stressed. No, you’re not angry, you can use a different word. You can use the word agitated, because I am here to win the Super Bowl. I am not here to entertain somebody that does not affect that one way or another. The word agitated would probably be better. Angry? I can never let any – anything from the outside can never affect me to be angry.”

On if he understands that it is difficult for the media to take athletes’ statements at face value: “I am always very careful with speaking about something I don’t know about. I don’t know about Lance (Armstrong), I don’t know about anybody. I can only tell you about Ray Lewis, so to speak about other people’s cases, other people’s situations, that is totally on them and that is totally on whatever you guys want to write from there. But, as far as me, I live a certain way, I do things my way. Everything else is everybody else’s business.”

On what it took for him to play that many seasons in the NFL: “It is a combination of a lot of things. God has been awesome in my life to keep me coming back. I’ve had my share of injuries, and I’ve had my share of bumps and bruises. I think the formula of truly always finding a different way to be better every year. Some people just come back and train for football, period. I am always trying to evolve, to do something different. Every year, my regimen has always changed. That is one thing that I’ve always challenged a lot of athletes, don’t become one minded and say, ‘I’m just a football player.’ There are so many things, so many fine-tuned muscles and things that we have to work out. That’s why I think so many exercises, whether it’s karate, whether it’s cycling, whether it’s wrestling, whether it’s swimming, whatever it is, every year I am always going to try to strengthen myself in some other areas. That is one of the biggest keys that I always saw as my success. I never got to a point that I stayed the same. Every year, I was always getting different, climbing, climbing and climbing. That is one of the keys to longevity.”

On if Sports Illustrated story is a distraction for his teammates: “It’s not. It’s a joke, if you know me. I tell them all the time, and this is what I try to teach them, is don’t let people from the outside ever come and disturb what’s inside. That is the trick of the devil. The trick of the devil is to kill, steal and destroy. That is what he comes to do. He comes to distract you from everything you are trying to do. There is no man who ever trained as hard as our team has trained, and there is no man who went through what we went through. So, to give somebody credit that doesn’t deserve credit, that would be a slap in the face for everything we went through. So, these are lessons that I teach my teammates, that outside don’t matter. I don’t care what nobody says about us, or what they want to report. I’ve been in this game 17 years, 17-plus good years, and I have a heck of a relationship and too much respect for the business, and my body, to ever violate like that. So, to entertain foolishness like that from cowards who come from the outside and try to destroy what we’ve built, like I just said, it’s sad to even entertain it on this type of stage, because this type of stage is what dreams are made of. This is what kids dream their whole lives, to be up here on these days, stepping in the NFL and saying that I am on the biggest stage ever. You are supposed to be smiling the whole week. Listen, I promise you, we all in here have a past, but how many people dwell into it. No, it ain’t about your past, it’s about your future. For me and my teammates, I promise you, we have a strong group of men that don’t bend too much. We keep pushing forward. So, it is not a distraction at all for us.”