Lions deny organization tried to silence Levy for CTE remarks

The Detroit Lions released a statement Friday, denying that they attempted to silence former linebacker DeAndre Levy from speaking up about the risks of CTE.

Levy spoke to a congressional subcommittee, stating he was asked not to speak about the risks of CTE, a degenerative disease that has been found commonly in players, posthumously. CTE can only be diagnosed after a person dies.

The statement reads as follows:

We are aware of his comments and we strongly disagree with his claim that anyone from our organization tried to silence him.

Levy spoke about the culture of football and being persuaded not to speak about CTE, via Kyle Meinke of MLive.com.

The moment I said anything about it, I had two calls telling me I shouldn't talk about it. I don't know if it was because it was CTE, or if it was because it's just the general NFL rule of, like, only football. Only talk about football, only think about football. I posted simply the research ... and I was told not to talk about it the first day it was out. And I'm just, like, you know, it could have just been locker room culture. Nobody wants to talk about anything other than football. But it didn't sit well with me when I'm talking about brain injuries.

It's my brain. It's not my shoulder, it's my brain. It controls everything I do, it controls everything we think, everything we feel. And if I don't have the right to speak about that as a player, I think it really speaks about the culture of the NFL, of what those conversations are. I think that's indicative of the conversations that we don't hear. The closed-door conversations between owners. They still are trying to find ways to silence us.

Levy previously filed a grievance against the Lions in August for $1.75 million, a figure that was nullified by the team, despite the linebacker passing a physical in March prior to his release.