Shane Ray lifted his hands from his hips, tugged on the dark blue gloves that covered both of them, and slipped his matching helmet onto his head Wednesday morning during Tennessee Titans practice.

The 6-foot-3, 245-pound outside linebacker then began to jog onto a practice field at Ascension Saint Thomas Sports Park. He was eager to go to work during his sixth day on the job, since the Titans signed him as a free agent July 25.

Then he heard the screams from an assistant coach.

"Not yet! Not yet! Not yet!"

Ray circled back to the sideline and waited for his cue, which he heard a few plays later via the sound of whistles and the same coach's voice.

"Twos! Twos! Twos!"

Ray, who is used to waiting his turn, hustled onto the field with the second-string players. There, he sewed his eyes to quarterback Mason Rudolph's, finessed his way around an offensive lineman and chased his target, a sequence he repeated several times.

The college All-American at Missouri, first-round draft pick and Super Bowl champion with the Denver Broncos hasn't played in an NFL game since Dec. 9, 2018.

He may get an opportunity to play some more, though, with Titans linebacker Arden Key facing a six-game suspension for violating the league's performance-enhancing drugs policy.

"I don't think there's been a whole lot of players who have gone through the path I've gone through," said Ray, who earned a tryout earlier this summer during rookie minicamp. "Where I started, and to have that much time off and fighting my way back to the league, it takes a lot of dedication, a lot of focus and a lot of love for this game."

Shane Ray's road to the Tennessee Titans

Ray's path has gone something like this:

• Bishop Miege High School in Roeland, Kansas, where he was all-state

• University of Missouri in Columbia, where he was an All-American and set the school's single-season sack record in 2014

• Denver Broncos, where he was a Super Bowl champion in 2016

• Baltimore Ravens, who released him during final roster cuts in 2019

• Toronto Argonauts, with whom he won a Grey Cup championship in 2023

• Buffalo Bills, who released him before the 2023 season began

There are 39 entries under the "transactions" on Ray's profootballreference.com page.

One common denominator on most of those professional stops?

Injuries.

Ray didn't participate in the NFL Combine because of a foot injury. The Broncos declined his fifth-year option in 2018 after Ray underwent his third wrist surgery. A torn bicep kept him out of the Grey Cup in 2023. The Bills released him five days after putting him on injured reserve in 2023.

He was all but certain his NFL career would be over after 49 games.

"There were days I thought it was over for me," Ray said. "Time periods that I'm working and striving with no guarantees. Those days are tough because you don't know if anything is going to come from that.

"I just knew what I had left in me."

Shane Ray sees light with Titans

With Key facing suspension, now is Ray's chance show what he has left. To prove all those days filled with NFL workouts but no NFL paychecks can pay off.

The fumble he forced in Super Bowl 50 and his scoop-and-score touchdown after a Von Miller forced fumble in 2016 will be a hard football memories to top, but Ray hopes to get the opportunity to try.

"It's always impressive when veterans like him ... come into minicamp, try out and practice their butt off and play hard because they love playing football," said first-year Titans coach Brian Callahan, who was with the Broncos when they drafted Ray with the 23rd overall pick. "A guy who has played a little bit of football in the league can help us."

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Ray reflected back to the days of being humbled by playing in the CFL, a decision he said was difficult.

He reflected back to the "dark days," when his mind and body weren't speaking the same language and football wasn't his full-time job.

"I had to turn to God, turn to my family," he said. "When you're gone for that long, the only person who believes in you is you.

"I don't think anybody believed I could be back in this position, with this opportunity to play. Even when it got dark, even when it got hard, I kept going."

Because of that, Ray's NFL career may see the light again.

Paul Skrbina is a sports enterprise reporter covering the Predators, Titans, Nashville SC, local colleges and local sports for The Tennessean. Reach him at pskrbina@tennessean.com and on the X platform (formerly known as Twitter) @paulskrbina. Follow his work here.

This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: Titans: Shane Ray aims to return to NFL after six-year absence