TAMPA, Fla. -- Steelers wide receiver Santonio Holmes made a surprising confession just days before the Super Bowl in Tampa.

He said he sold drugs as a youngster in his small rural south Florida hometown.

He chose to make his admission at the Super Bowl, knowing millions of impressionable youngsters will be closely following the game and its players.

By revealing his secret, Holmes hopes he may persuade other at-risk youth to choose a path that leads to the athletic field and a classroom, not to a detention center or a jail cell.

"I've only told three or four people about it," Holmes said Wednesday. "I feel it's time to share things. I'm on the biggest stage, everybody's going to be watching. I'm pretty sure some kids can get a feel for changing their lives and not doing those type of things, and can get an opportunity to get out of the ghetto, the 'hood, to be successful."

Holmes, who initially made the admission in an interview with the Miami Herald, became exposed to the lifestyle while growing up in Belle Glade, Fla.

Some family members and friends made money selling drugs, he said, and he found it an easy way to make money, too, though he didn't specify exactly what he sold.

He and his family didn't need the money for food or essentials, and he used it mostly on gifts for himself, like shoes.

"My friends were always doing it and I felt comfortable doing it at the time," Holmes said. "As the years grew older, I just felt like that wasn't what I wanted to do. I wanted to play football. I don't want to end up like a lot of my friends, in jail, standing on the corner, not going to school."

Several pivotal events turned Holmes away from selling and pushed him to football, where he starred as Glades Central High won Florida state titles during his sophomore and junior seasons and went 12-1 during his senior season.

Holmes credits his family moving to a new home as saving his life.

"It made me who I am today. If I had continued down that path, I wouldn't be here," he said.

After high school ball, he starred at Ohio State for three seasons before being the Steelers' first-round draft pick in 2006. Holmes has been one of their key offensive players this season, making 55 catches for 821 yards and five touchdowns. He has two touchdowns in two postseason games.

In October, Pittsburgh police cited Holmes after they found three marijuana cigars in his SUV following a traffic stop near Mellon Arena. He was then benched for a game against the Giants.

Holmes said that incident doesn't signal a return to his past.

"It happens, being in the wrong place at the wrong time, not being responsible, being around people that aren't responsible enough to respect what I do," Holmes said. "I knew what my path was like before, and I didn't want to go down that path again."