He had an interception and eight tackles. In that unbearable pain, he led the Raiders with eight tackles, beating Tennessee in the AFC Championship Game.īut in the most important game of his life, Super Bowl XXXVII against Tampa Bay, he discovered he maybe shouldn't have been playing on one leg. I guess the thought that I couldn't do any more damage to it got me through it. "The next two games were really unbearable. That game I could get through it, it was kind of OK. "The first game I came back, I shot it up. But the thought of the pain makes Woodson whistle even after all these years. In the AFC divisional game against the New York Jets, Woodson had three passes defensed and six tackles. The thought was I could go out and play - and not damage it anymore - and help the team." It was still broke but the plate kept it in place. "I had a plate put in on the side of the leg just to keep it from moving. "The decision was made to have surgery two, maybe two and a half weeks before the first playoff game," Woodson said this week. "I'm playing," Woodson declared.Įight years later, he still remembers the injury. His coach at the time, Bill Callahan, said he didn't know if Woodson would play. He needed a steel plate on the outside lower bone of his right leg to bracket the thing together. Woodson was walking around on a leg that just wasn't stable. It was first reported as a turned ankle but it was a small bone broken in the leg. Then he hurt the right leg and missed three of the four final games of the season. First Woodson hurt his shoulder, costing him five games in the middle of the season. Same for the first four years in the NFL with the Oakland Raiders.īut 2002 was ugly. Other than a knee injury at the end of his freshman year at Michigan, he was healthy.
This point, in snowy Dallas, also is Year 16 of Woodson's football career. That's why this is so special this year, having the chance to win it all, because you know throwing your body around contributed to get you to this point." It started out OK I play it to win - and for no other reason. Throwing my body around - it's to win," Woodson said back in Green Bay the day before he left for Dallas. No, that short, direct speech in the visiting locker room in Soldier Field to prep everyone for Super Bowl XLV against Pittsburgh came from Woodson's heart and soul but mostly from that leg. Because when it does, Woodson drags his bones home from work on Sunday night and spends the entire week recovering just to do it all over again.Īnd that plate, which still feels funny when he pushes down on it, is his permanent reminder of the time he was pieced together to play in the other Super Bowl, but came home with nothing more than a battered body. No, Woodson had to get up and talk to his Green Bay Packers teammates before all the adrenaline drained from his body. It wasn't just that President Barack Obama was rooting for his Chicago Bears to get to the Super Bowl. Think of one - one mind, one heartbeat, one purpose, one goal, one more game. Woodson addressed his teammates and it wasn't just the euphoria of winning the NFC Championship and going to a Super Bowl, his second.
#Charles woodson super bowl skin
That damned toe.īut mostly from Charles Woodson's right leg, with the plate still there, the outline of it pushing out the taut skin and tight muscles. Dallas - That speech didn't just come from the heart.Īnd stiff shoulders, stinging knees, frayed hip.
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