In Charlotte, NFL legend Ray Lewis offers a story the Carolina Panthers could learn from

From the outside looking in, there doesn’t seem to be much of a connection between the Carolina Panthers franchise and Ray Lewis — the career Baltimore Raven and Hall of Fame linebacker whose menacing eyeblack and gladiator scowl defined one of the toughest eras of the NFL.

Lewis found a connection, though.

“When I went to Baltimore in 1996, I’ll never forget it,” Lewis told a crowd in the Carmel Country Club in Charlotte on Friday morning. He was responding to a question asked by a member of the Hood Hargett Breakfast Club, which put on the speaking event, about how the Panthers could pull themselves out of their historic rut — six straight losing seasons, including a league-worst 2-15 2023 season that concluded last weekend.

Lewis then mildly chuckled about his own 1996 season: “We were horrible.”

“We were 4-12,” he continued. “The next year we were 6-9-1. The next year we were 6-10. Could not figure it out for anything, until people inside the locker room, myself being one of those voices, said, ‘We gotta change this. We gotta change the culture.’ Because a lot of times, you have those players there who are used to losing. ... So you have those molds in there that you have to clear out.”

Lewis then leveled with the presumably Panther-heavy crowd.

“I’m just going to tell you, I think it’s going to take a few years, and I think it’s going to take the right people and players,” he said. “To your question, the players used to be more invested in who came in and out of the locker room. Now, it’s just — most are about the check. But back then, it was about, ‘Oh, I want to play with him.’ I almost lost my mind when I learned I’d play with Rod Woodson. I was like, ‘You mean to tell me I could play with Rod Woodson?!’

“When I started bringing those types of people, and started going into the front office, that’s when that type of change actually started.”

In his fourth year, in 1999, the Ravens went 8-8. And then in 2000, they won a Super Bowl — and Lewis was the game’s MVP.

“And that’s when we started winning.”

Cultural change isn’t easy to achieve in the NFL. And for what it’s worth, the Panthers have gone headlong into rebuilding mode this offseason. Owner David Tepper fired head coach Frank Reich after Week 12 and fired Scott Fitterer after Week 18, and now the franchise is casting a wide net in the respective searches for both positions.

Those two jobs aren’t the beginning and end to the decisions the Panthers have to make this offseason, either. Carolina ended with 21 unrestricted free agents on its roster. That includes Brian Burns, a defensive pass rushing star whose contract extension negotiations have been riddled in tension since training camp. That also includes breakout star Frankie Luvu and OLB Marquis Haynes and even the talented and arguably underused safety Jeremy Chinn, who told The Charlotte Observer on move-out Monday that he’s seeking to be “somewhere I’m wanted” — whether that be with a new regime in Carolina or somewhere else.

Nevertheless, Lewis’ advice is something these Carolina Panthers could use.

“Inner change is what Carolina is definitely needing,” Lewis concluded Friday.

Ray Lewis and his ‘Championship Mentality’

It helps that inner change is something Lewis is well-versed in. That was made evident on Friday, when the Miami Hurricanes alum and star told various life stories of trouble and triumph.

Some of the stories were told in his New York Times bestselling book, “I Feel Like Going On: Life, Game, and Glory” — and many have informed a book he’s working on now, he said, which will be titled “Championship Mentality.”

Among those stories:

▪ How he got his name. Lewis’s mother, Sunseria, was 15 years old when she gave birth to him. With his biological father (Elbert Ray Jackson) absent, Sunseria asked a friend if he would “come sign as my son’s father,” Lewis said Friday. “And that guy’s name was Ray Lewis. And that’s the reason I walk in the name Ray Lewis.”

▪ Meeting Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson. One of his first days on the Miami campus, Lewis met and worked out with Dwayne Johnson, who he still calls “Dewey.” This was right after Lewis had received an unexpected offer letter from Miami and right before he’d predict that he’d be the greatest Hurricanes to ever play in the Miami football program. Of that workout with Johnson: “35 minutes into it, he said, ‘Bro I’m done.’” Lewis then laughed. “He’s like, I don’t know what you got going on in your life, but this is a little intense.’”

▪ Losing his son to a drug overdose. In June, Lewis lost oldest his son, Ray Lewis III, due to a lethal combination of drugs in his system. The father spoke on the difficulty of it as a father and of trying to forge forward: “My son used to get up every day, and he’d say, ‘Pops, let’s make today a good day.’ And so now when I think about the joy he gave me for 28 years, I realize that we don’t have time. That the only time we actually have is (now), is getting up every day.”

One of the most poignant stories was a simple one about the meaning behind his cathartic entrance dance onto the field on NFL Sundays. You know the one: where he slides to the right and then slides to the left before opening up his chest to the sky and unleashing an intensity only he seemed to possess. Lewis said that was his way of acknowledging the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, and his scream at the end symbolized a catharsis, of giving his worries to God.

“There will be no dancing up here today,” Lewis later quipped. But before long, there Lewis was, dancing in the memories of a challenging childhood, a longshot college recruitment, a legendary NFL life — offering something anyone and everyone could learn from.