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The Baltimore Ravens lost quite a few veteran stars right after winning Super Bowl XLVII. Two of them might even end up in the Hall of Fame. But while Ray Lewis went out his own way and with lots of fanfare, Ed Reed departed in less grand fashion, as he stayed in the league and went to Houston. Ray Rice, who is now taking on a larger leadership role, doesn’t think you can conclude that Lewis was any more Important to the organization than Reed. Ray Rice joined Petros and Money on Fox Sports Radio to discuss the Ravens losing key pieces after winning the Super Bowl, the offseason losses, the importance of Ed Reed in comparison to Ray Lewis and the scandal the resulted in athletic director Tim Pernetti departing from Rutgers.
On the importance of winning the Super Bowl before this team broke up a little bit in the offseason:
“Yeah, you put all your personal goals aside, and this one just means the most to you because it’s honestly the only thing that keeps your 2012-13 football team together. You see the changes we had in our locker room, but the only true thing that’s gonna keep us together is to say that we won a Super Bowl, and we had a chance to enjoy these wins together.”
On if there was a sense an offseason overhaul was coming:
“You just don’t know. You knew there were gonna be some changes, but then some were surprising and some, you knew they were gonna happen.”
On what Ed Reed meant to the Ravens organization in comparison to Ray Lewis:
“Ed and Ray, they’re both leaders. Ray Lewis meant a lot to the Ravens organization, but I’m not sure if you can — Ed Reed meant just as much to the Ravens organization as Ray Lewis. They’re both gonna be Hall of Famers, and when you lose guys like that, it’s always tough because their leadership is really what you’re gonna miss throughout the locker room. But that’s why we’ve got younger guys like myself, Torrey [Smith], Joe Flacco, Haloti Ngata, Terrell Suggs.”
On former Rutgers athletic director Tim Pernetti, who was forced to resign amid the Mike Rice scandal:
“We had a personal relationship. So I only know the person, and in that situation I actually spoke to him and asked him what happened, and he just told me everything that went down. When you go to report the situation, there’s protocol, and he followed his protocol. I asked him if he could have done more, he said he maybe could have done more. But he definitely was the scapegoat in the situation, I felt like. But I didn’t have a relationship with coach Mike Rice. Just shame on him for what he did to them kids. The healing process for Rutgers will start and Tim Pernetti will be a great guy. I think with the whole situation with Penn State and everything that happened, I think they had to clean house. There is no Big Ten without Tim Pernetti. He’s the guy who pounded that deal to get done.”
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