"After playing 16 NFL seasons, getting invited to 13 Pro Bowls and establishing himself as a future Hall of Famer and one of the most feared middle linebackers in league history, Ray Lewis returned home this offseason and decided change was in order. The decision wasn't motivated by any particular aspect of his play during the 2011-12 campaign as Lewis, despite missing four games with a toe injury, still led the Ravens in tackles and played at a high level for much of the Ravens' 13-5 season. It also wasn't prompted by some of the criticism that he heard at times last year in regards to his coverage of running backs and tight ends. Approaching his 37th birthday, Lewis simply looked at the landscape of the NFL and decided that he needed to adjust to how the game was being played. "My mentality was change with the game," Lewis said yesterday after the first day of the Ravens' three-day mandatory mini-camp. "There are no more true, true, true, physical, physical fullbacks that are going to come at me and sledgehammer all day. So, just adjust to the game, and as you see guys get older in their careers, you see a lot of people don't do that. And that was my thing this year. It was like, 'All right, the game is changing like that. Everybody wants to go with all these little five-wides and all this different stuff.' Just change with the game, and that was kind of my thought process. … If you've been in the game so long, you just learn to adjust to it."" Read more: http://www.baltimoresun.com/sports/...ides-change-in-order-20120612,0,3096751.story
