Baltimore Ravens Respond To ‘Inaccurate’ ESPN Report With Statement And Steve Bisciotti Press Conference

Steve Bisciotti and the Baltimore Ravens called a press conference on Monday to address what they said were "numerous errors, inaccuracies, false assumptions and, perhaps, misunderstandings" in a story released by ESPN's Outside the Lines on Friday. The story was titled "Rice case: purposeful misdirection by the team, scant investigation by NFL."

Prior to the presser, the team also provided the media and fans with an eight-page document breaking down the story, section by section, and quoting several Ravens executives on what they allege to be the truth.

One part of the story that received lots of attention was a series of text messages that went back and forth between Rice and Bisciotti, which the Ravens owner says were "told to someone and misquoted."

As CBSSports.com notes, the original ESPN story says Rice was "flabbergasted" because "one minute Bisciotti and the Ravens were essentially calling him a liar, the next Bisciotti was quietly offering him a job?"

The verbatim text message, according to Bisciotti, are as follows:

Monday September 8, 7:44 pm

Ray: I understand the decision but I am thankful for what you have done for me and my family. Me and my wife will continue to work on us and being better but I just wanted to say thank you for giving me a chance

Steve: I'm sorry we had to do this. I still love you and believe that you will be a great husband and father If you ever need to talk just call

 Tuesday September 9, 10:27 pm

Steve: I just spent two hours talking to Ozzie. It was all about you. We love you and we will always figure out a way to keep you in our lives. When you are done with football I will hire you to help me raise Great young men. I still love you!!!

Ray: I know it's a rough time for all of us I love all of you and that will never change for life!

Steve: I will help you make it a great life indeed. I give you my WORD

Ray: That means the world to me and my family we greatly appreciate you and thank you.

Some took these messages as Bisciotti essentially trying to pay off Rice, and Bisciotti addressed those claims in the press conference.

"If I cut a guy making $6 million a year - if I'm promising him to be by his side and hire him for $100,000 a year five years from now so he can help Harry Swayne in our player development department - if that is considered worthy of him going along, I find that rather absurd because it would take him 250 years to make back the $25 million that I took away from him by cutting him," he said.

At the end of the printed statement, the Ravens left the media and fans with the following message, "As always, we endeavor to keep you, the public and the fans, fully informed, and we promise to continue to do so. We may all wish this incident to be put behind us, to concentrate on how we can learn from it and apply the lessons to a more aware and sensitive society, but as it continues to warrant attention, we will address it with the utmost candor and openness. We hope to live up to the support you have given us."