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 ESPN's Ed Werder looks at Brian Billick's lecture to the media regarding Ray Lewis.
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 Brian Billick is disturbed with the focus being on the Ray Lewis murder case.
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Brian Billick says Ray Lewis will speak "one time only" about the happenings at last year's Super Bowl.
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Mike Tirico and Tony Kornheiser aren't impressed with the way Brian Billick has been handling the media.
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Andrea Kremer says the media scrutiny of Ray Lewis will not stop.
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Is Ray Lewis done with the media for the week? Mike Tirico and Tony Kornheiser answer.
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Tuesday, January 23
Billick lashes out at media for Lewis focus
By Greg Garber
ESPN.com
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FASSEL DEFENDS COLLINS
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Giants head coach Jim Fassel launched his own offensive on behalf of a
once-troubled player Monday night, but it paled in comparison to the rant of
Baltimore Ravens head coach Brian Billick.
Fassel defended his quarterback, Kerry Collins, who in the past has
been labeled as a quitter, a racist and a heavy drinker.
"Honestly, he has already answered that question," Fassel said. "He's
got a lot better things in his life than to go backwards. I've seen his
self-esteem grow as to how he feels about himself.
"Getting the Giants to the Super Bowl isn't the success story ... the
success story is Kerry Collins himself."
Unlike Ravens linebacker Ray Lewis, Collins was among six players
available to the media at the Giants' hotel.
Fassel asked media members to limit their questions to Collins about
on-field issues. The coach said Collins would address his past on Monday
night only.
Apprised of Billick's comments, Fassel said he didn't want to comment
on one of his best friends in the coaching profession.
"I don't have any suggestions for him," Fassel said.
As far as Collins, "He'll discuss it tonight," Fassel said. "And then I
think he's answered it enough. We don't need to continue raising it.
"Let's talk about the game."
-- Greg Garber
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TAMPA, Fla. -- On the eve of the biggest football media opportunity of the
year, Baltimore Ravens head coach Brian Billick launched this preemptive
strike Monday evening:
Leave Ray Lewis alone.
Billick laid down a cease-and-desist order for the assembled media
regarding his Pro Bowl linebacker and lines of questioning that don't
involve football.
"We're not going backwards now," Billick said in a lecturing tone in
what turned out to be a 10-minute rant. "As much as some of you want to,
we're not going to re-try this. You're not qualified. I'm a little disturbed
by some of the focus."
Lewis was charged in the celebrated double-murder case in Atlanta the
morning after Super Bowl XXXIV was played there last year, but was later cleared of
those charges. Lewis pled to a misdemeanor for obstruction of justice and
was in uniform when the Ravens opened the season.
That Lewis led the NFL in tackles -- for the third time in five seasons
-- and helped carry the Ravens to the subsequent Super Bowl makes him one of
the more compelling, if not the leading story for the more than 3,000
assembled members of the media.
Even before Tuesday's Media Day, when players and coaches from both
teams will be on display for one hour at Raymond James Stadium, stories
about Lewis and have been widespread. In particular, Billick apparently was
upset by a story that appeared Monday in USA Today. Columnist Jon Saraceno
wrote a story quoting Mrs. Joyce Lollar, the grandmother of one of the
Atlanta victims, Richard Lollar.
"I could see him locked up for the rest of his life, or on death row,"
Saraceno quoted Lollar as saying. "It wouldn't bother me a bit to see him
suffering. We don't know how much Richard suffered.
"No knives jumped down from the sky and cut up those guys. Somebody in
that limo did it."
Billick may also have been reacting to a report by
ESPN's Jeremy Schaap. He interviewed family members of
both victims.
"They want to brush this aside," Jermaine Baker, the
brother of victim Jacinth Baker. "I am trying to bring
it back out, telling everybody that I believe Ray
Lewis killed my brother."
Lewis was not available for comment; he was not one of the handful of
Ravens players made available to the media Monday night.
"I equate it to an ambulance-chasing mode," Billick said, with
unveiled disgust. "It's reprehensible and unprofessional. I don't like it.
That's my personal opinion.
"It's not in the best interests of the [victim's] family. It's not in
the best interests of the league or Ray Lewis or, frankly, in [the media's]
best interests, either."
Billick said that he has advised his players not to answer questions
about Lewis' travails with the law and said that Lewis himself had a plan
for dealing with all the off-field questions. Billick intimated that Lewis
would answer such questions once -- at Tuesday's sprawling media session.
While Billick's tone and message were criticized widely by media members
for being shrill and high-handed, those critics may be confusing the medium
and the message. Billick, while apparently being genuinely angry, may have
been attempting to take pressure off Lewis by making himself the story. He
may have wound up exacerbating what promises to be a squeamish situation.
"It's going to be interesting," said Ravens tight end Shannon Sharpe,
who is appearing in his third Super Bowl. "I hope people respect him. Ray,
we don't worry about the defense once they get out on the football field.
"I just told him, "You've come this far, don't lose your head now."
|  | | Brian Billick focuses the attention on himself Monday -- and off of Ray Lewis. |
Billick opened his address with a far more gentle chiding of the
media for what he viewed as lapses in coverage. He cited an ESPN report that
said the Ravens players practiced in pads last week.
"I found it fascinating," Billick said with clear sarcasm. "I must
have missed it. We have not practiced in pads for a month and a half."
Billick also discussed his curfew plans.
"Evidently," he said, "people are concerned about the curfew I've set
-- or not set. As long as they act like men, I'll treat them like men."
How the media treats Ray Lewis on Tuesday between 1-2 p.m. EST remains
to be seen.
Greg Garber is a senior writer for ESPN.com.
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