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Opinion: How can we root for Ray Lewis?
By Robert Rossi, Managing Editor Emeritus, on January 26, 2013 1:33 PMDisclaimer: I am a Patriots fan.
So if you think my loyalties make me too bitter, biased or crazy to write anything worth reading about Ray Lewis, that’s fine. Click off this page. I won’t even know! That’s the beauty of the Internet.
However, if you’re the type of person who believes sports reflect something deeper than box scores and stat lines, I encourage you to keep reading. If you’re the type of person who has an emotional response to the names Lance Armstrong, Tiger Woods, Kobe Bryant, Michael Vick, and/or Ben Roethlisberger, then maybe this is a conversation worth having.
Turning athletes into idols and then tearing them down has been a part of sports as long as the games themselves (don’t believe me? Read this book). What’s puzzling to me is why Ray Lewis has escaped the fate bestowed upon the polarizing figures listed above and instead gets invited to do things like this:
Maybe it’s because most of us have forgotten or were too young to really understand what was going on with “the Ray Lewis murder trial” more than a decade ago. Here are the facts:
- At a Super Bowl party in Atlanta, Lewis was involved in an altercation that left two men dead from stab wounds. Lewis and two others were indicted on murder charges.
- Lewis pled guilty to a charge of obstruction of justice after admitting to lying to the police, and agreed to testify against his two codefendants.
- The clothes Lewis wore the night of the killings has never been found, and witnesses alleged that Lewis may have attempted to cover up the killings.
- He paid an undisclosed settlement to the families of both victims.
These facts can support dozens of potential theories as to what actually happened that night. Best case scenario, Lewis may have been simply trying to protect his friends before wising up and coming clean. Worst case, he got away with murder and tried to make his buddies take the fall for it. Truth is, we’ll never know so there’s no use in speculating.
Again, the real question is why, while other athletes like Kobe Bryant and Tiger Woods lose endorsement deals without being convicted of a single crime, Ray Lewis gets to endorse what is literally the most non-threatening product in the world, as well as the ubiquitous Madden NFL:
It’s true that winning seems to substantially boost the popularity of any controversial athlete, as Kanye West so eloquently points out with regards to LeBron James’ recent championship. Lewis, of course, was named Super Bowl MVP the season following his murder trial and his popularity has only risen since.
However, “winner” doesn’t seem to quite capture the essence of Ray Lewis the way it does for cutthroat competitors like Bryant and Woods. His success as a player is equaled, if not exceeded by his reputation as a passionate leader and dedicated teammate, prone to breaking out in tears after victories and making declarations like this:
“When you sacrifice something for God he will give you anything your heart desires if it aligns with his will; God kept telling me no weapon formed against me shall prosper.”
I found this quotation in a piece by James Skrmetta examining the double standard surrounding the respective unbridled religiosity displayed by both Lewis and a young quarterback you may have heard of named Tim Tebow. Why do we admire the passion of an admitted criminal, but vilify the same trait in a man who, by all accounts, has done nothing wrong at all short of failing to become a great NFL quarterback?
I don’t pretend to know the answers to any of these questions, but in the immediate aftermath of Sunday’s game, I just couldn’t stop thinking about them. Lewis’ teary “National Anthem face” replayed over and over on my screen and Twitter exploded with congratulations from average Joe’s declaring that Ray “deserved to win.” I mean, what does that even mean? Besides cheating, how can you win a game and not deserve it? So why did so many people feel compelled to say it?
Perhaps I’m just a salty hater despondent over the combination of the Patriots losing and the thousands of Tom Brady Uggs jokes I’ve been forced to read and hear over the years. Regardless, people who care about sports can’t simply leave morality at the door while they watch a game, nor should they.
So if you think you’re up for some soul searching, all I ask is that you think about your own attitude towards Ray Lewis – whether you love him, hate him, or feel something in between – and ask yourself why you feel that way. You’ll be better off for it.
At least it’s better than sitting in your Mod and dwelling on the Pats losing.
Follow Robert Rossi on Twitter @RVRossi.
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1 Comment
You make a good point about how it’s wrong to idolize professional athletes who don’t deserve idolization due to their off-the-field behavior. Just because someone is good at his or her sport doesn’t mean we should mindlessly glorify him or her as a wonderful person, or as a role-model for our kids.
This phenomenon is pretty widespread.. it’s been around for awhile.. we all know it exists.. and there’s no arguing it’s existence..
It’s tough to fight against this tendency, so I’m glad you’re making this good point, Rob.
Names like…
Lance Armstrong, Tiger Woods, Kobe Bryant, Michael Vick, and/or Ben Roethlisberger…
These guys have all done pretty bad things… but all very different things…
You have to look at everything on an individual basis, and see how each person reacts and grows afterwards.
If we were making a “blacklist,” why not throw a number of MLB players and a few more NFL guys on there too. Some guys would make the list for literally CHEATING (and lying about it), and others would make the list for acting sketchy off the field (Vick, Bryant, Big Big… and Ray Lewis).
That being said…
It’s not fair to put Ray Lewis at the TOP of this list, or to make him the highlight of this article.
Obviously, and admittedly, you did it because you are a Patriots fan, and because the world has been hyping up Ray Lewis for the past month.
So.. very understandable.
But know this:
The details surrounding Ray’s incident are not quite as speculative as you’ve led us to believe..
- None of legal personnel on either side of the “Ray Lewis murder trial” actually believe that Ray ever killed someone himself. In fact, it’s become pretty clear that what happened is: one of his boys killed someone, and he lied about it to police because he didn’t wanna give up his friend.
His boy stabbed one or two guys, and he helped cover it up (by lying—hence the ‘obstruction of justice’ charge to which he pled guilty).
You’re right—we’ll never know for sure what really happened… but this is what many smart people have come to accept. They see the way he’s grown, and they give him the benefit of the doubt, and move on…
And even still—what he did is pretty bad… that on it’s own is enough to get this guy on a “blacklist”
… but regardless, it’s still not fair to call this man a murderer, or to associate his name with the word “murderer.”
You didn’t do this.. but- more than you should – you led us to believe this might be the case
I don’t even like Ray Lewis that much all.. I’m tired of seeing his face, I’m tired of hearing about it.
And more than anything, I’m tired of hearing is ridiculous “God talk” that he’s been spewing at a greater speed than usual for the last few weeks.
He’s playing into the hype, it’s obvious.
All that being said….
You can call Ray Lewis a bad guy.. you can call him a douche bag.. (he probably he both of those things)
But one of the few things you can’t call him is a murderer.
(so I’m glad you didn’t)
Looking back.. I think the only thing about this article that I really have a problem with is the title. (if you’re gonna leave it up to the readers to make their own decisions, then why is the title implying that there is already something wrong with rooting for RL?)
Other than that, I think this is very well-done, especially coming from a sour Pats fan.