Ray Lewis’s new role as an Inside The NFL analyst on Showtime saw the former Ravens linebacker immediately inserting himself into the story as he unraveled a bizarre and preposterous story that blamed a tweet by Colin Kaepernick’s girlfriend, Nessa Diab, for the former 49ers quarterback still being unemployed by an NFL team.
When me and Steve Bisciotti were talking, this is what we were talking about, Judy. We were talking about giving this kid an opportunity to get back in the National Football League. Look, this is what I wanted to share with people. I have been fighting for this kid behind the table like nobody has ... I’ve never been against Colin Kaepernick. But I am against the way he’s done it.
Then, his girl [Colin Kaepernick’s girlfriend] goes out and put out this racist gesture and doesn’t know we are in the back office about to try to get this guy signed. Steve Bisciotti has said it himself, ‘How can you crucify Ray Lewis when Ray Lewis is the one calling for Colin Kaepernick?
The “racist gesture” Lewis was describing is this tweet:
Lewis continued:
When they called me, it was to say, ‘Yes or no?’ ... We were going to close the deal to sign him ... Steve Bisciotti said, ‘I want to hear Colin Kaepernick speak to let me know that he wants to play football.’ ... And it never happens because that picture comes up the next day.
Fellow Inside The NFL panelist Phil Simms immediately expressed skepticism about Lewis’s tale, asking why this was the first time anyone had heard it. “Because everybody wanted to tell their side of the story,” Lewis answered before spewing a series of words that, if arranged differently, might have constructed a coherent idea.
Miraculously, Ray Lewis managed to present a version of events that both absolves the Ravens and himself from any responsibility in the failure to sign Colin Kaepernick; indeed, Lewis managed to make himself, this time, the victim of a character assassination.
[Showtime]