http://www.baltimoresun.com/sports/f...34,print.story


His knees ache with pain so intense that he says he is unable to stand for more than a few minutes.

"I look silly at cocktail parties. I'm the only one sitting down," said former Ravens defensive end Michael Mc- Crary.

He is 36 years old.

He has taken a blizzard of medications for chronic pain and depression, casually rattling off the names as if they were afternoon snacks.

"I've been on Percocet, Percodan, OxyContin, oxycodone, three different psychiatric medicines," he said. "I had a fentanyl patch; that's like heroin. I'm on methadone now.

"You know when people said it was crazy, all that stuff that Anna Nicole [Smith] was taking? Man, that's the same stuff I take."

McCrary, a member of the Ravens' Ring of Honor, has a 3-year-old daughter and is less than five years removed from the NFL's playing fields. At a glance, he is still physically imposing.

But he needs two knee replacements.

"When people think of broken-down football players, they imagine old guys, not people like me," he said. "But I'm pretty messed up."

Few who entered the National Football League after last weekend's draft want to hear about the physical damage that playing their game can cause, said Mc- Crary, who played for Baltimore from 1997 to 2002 and for the Seattle Seahawks from 1993 to 1996.
Pretty good Article detailing the physical impact of the sport.