He doesn't fit the image of a football player. He's not macho or loud. He's not quick with words. Although he has the body fat of a brick, he doesn't intimidate with his physical presence or a cold stare.

He rarely wears T-shirts or sweatshirts, shorts or jeans. After a game, he'll put on a loud suit he often helps design. In big stripes and 1960s fedora, you could see him with Frank Sinatra and the Rat Pack. He'd be the one that didn't talk.

"Ken is very interesting," Carolina Panther receiver Muhsin Muhammad said. "He's easy to get along with. I'll say he's very analytical. He's a thinker.

Lucas, 29, considers himself an introvert. But when he came to the Panthers from Seattle as an expensive free-agent in 2005, he knew his role would change. He was a veteran and although uncomfortable with the media, he felt compelled to represent the team.

But there were better and quicker quotes, and his profile simmered until the sucker punch with which Steve Smith broke his nose in training camp. Only then did Lucas begin to attract a crowd.

If he had the personality of former Panthers safety Mike Minter, a natural leader, we'd be outraged that Lucas was not in the Pro Bowl every February. He's that good. But we know as little about him as any four-year starter on the team.

Mr. Lucas

To learn more, he and I talked twice last week. Call his cell phone, and you get a two-word message: "Mr. Lucas."

Before he responds to a question, it's as if he arranges the words and thinks about how they'll sound before he sets them free.

"I'm so big on perception," Lucas said. "I like attention, but I don't like attention. If that makes sense."

It might if he wore something other than a suit with baggy pants and a garter around the sleeve of your arm. You think he might be noticed when you walk into Chili's on Rea Road, plop his expensive clothes on a bar stool and sip water?

"I'm a loner," Lucas said. "I don't have to fit in with others. I've got a swagger when I'm by myself. People see that and know I'm confident. I dress like I want to dress and can sit and drink water or sit on somebody's floor. I'm from Mississippi."

If there's a contest between liking attention and not liking attention, liking is running up the score. His silver Rolls-Royce Phantom almost ensured it. Strangers tend to stare.

"Especially in Charlotte," says Lucas, almost exasperated. "People would slow down and look. 'Who's driving that car?' "

To avoid the curious, he dumped the Phantom and bought an upscale SUV. Nothing about it stands out except, perhaps, that it is extremely orange.

"Coming from Cleveland, you know, once you get a little money, you can get nice things," said Panthers guard Keydrick Vincent, who played with Lucas at Mississippi. "He's not boastful; he's not arrogant."

The big mask

And he isn't always introverted. Before Kansas City's first possession at Bank of America Stadium last week, Lucas jumped and pointed and exhorted the crowd. And he didn't care who saw him.

Told this, he laughed. "We get to change our personality when we're on the field," Lucas said. "When I put on that football uniform and helmet, I feel like I'm wearing a big mask. I could be like Sir Purr [the team mascot] and do what he did as long as you couldn't see my face."

When he entered Mississippi in 1997, the upperclassmen didn't see his face. They saw his hair. And they told him they were going to remove it. They were going to shave the heads of all the freshmen. Keydrick Vincent submitted. What was the alternative? Run, and they'd shave your eyebrows, too.

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