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Michael Lewis hasn't played professional football since 2007, and he hasn't played in the Louisiana Superdome since the year before that.

Yet the former return specialist and wide receiver still wears the Saints' black and gold and received a fleur-de-lis-adorned Super Bowl ring following his former team's 31-17 win against the Indianapolis Colts this past season.

That's because Lewis is now a team ambassador for the Saints, bringing New Orleans' team directly to its fans.

"I'm pretty much the face of the organization," Lewis said. "I do a lot of stuff in the community, and I deal with junior training camps. We're at a lot of corporate events — whenever something is going on, I'm pretty much there. I love it because I'm still with the organization, plus I get to be in the community as well."

Lewis, a former Budweiser truck driver, was the return specialist for his hometown team from 2002-06.

After a year with the San Francisco 49ers, Lewis was set to play for the New Orleans VooDoo, but when Benson canceled the arena league's operations he was given a front office position.

With all the time he spent in the NFL, Lewis said he knows how special Saints fans are.

"We've always been real close to the fans, but now you have a winning organization and the fans have something to be real proud of," he said. "When the Saints won the Super Bowl, the whole city, the state and the whole Gulf South region had a lot of burden lifted off of them. It gave us something to brag about as well."

The Saints are a unique organization in the NFL in that they keep very close ties to many of their players.

Former running back Deuce McAllister was released by New Orleans in February 2009 to free up cap space.

But after a year away from football he was re-signed by New Orleans in January so that he could retire with the team with which he set the all-time rushing touchdown record. He was the honorary team captain in the Saints' divisional playoff game against Arizona, and when he announced a permanent retirement a week later he said he planned to stay with the organization in some capacity.

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