Dallas - That speech didn't just come from the heart.
It also came from his leg.
And stiff shoulders, stinging knees, frayed hip. That damned toe.
But mostly from Charles Woodson's right leg, with the plate still there, the outline of it pushing out the taut skin and tight muscles.
Woodson addressed his teammates and it wasn't just the euphoria of winning the NFC Championship and going to a Super Bowl, his second.
Think of one - one mind, one heartbeat, one purpose, one goal, one more game.
It wasn't just that President Barack Obama was rooting for his Chicago Bears to get to the Super Bowl.
One, two, three, White House!
No, Woodson had to get up and talk to his Green Bay Packers teammates before all the adrenaline drained from his body. 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.
And 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, 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.
"I'm going to do whatever it takes. Throwing my body around - it's to win," Woodson said back in Green Bay the day before he left for Dallas. "That's why I play this game. I play it to win - and for no other reason. 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
This point, in snowy Dallas, also is Year 16 of Woodson's football career. And it started out just fine. Other than a knee injury at the end of his freshman year at Michigan, he was healthy. Same for the first four years in the NFL with the Oakland Raiders.
But 2002 was ugly. First Woodson hurt his shoulder, costing him five games in the middle of the season. Then he hurt the right leg and missed three of the four final games of the season. It was first reported as a turned ankle but it was a small bone broken in the leg. Woodson was walking around on a leg that just wasn't stable.
He could have shut it down. The paychecks wouldn't have stopped. He needed a steel plate on the outside lower bone of his right leg to bracket the thing together. His coach at the time, Bill Callahan, said he didn't know if Woodson would play. "I'm playing," Woodson declared.
Eight years later, he still remembers the injury.
"The decision was made to have surgery two, maybe two and a half weeks before the first playoff game," Woodson said this week. "I had a plate put in on the side of the leg just to keep it from moving. It was still broke but the plate kept it in place. The thought was I could go out and play - and not damage it anymore - and help the team."
In the AFC divisional game against the New York Jets, Woodson had three passes defensed and six tackles. But the thought of the pain makes Woodson whistle even after all these years.
"It was bad. It was bad," he said, shaking his head. "The first game I came back, I shot it up. That game I could get through it, it was kind of OK.
"The next two games were really unbearable. Anything I did, it hurt. I guess the thought that I couldn't do any more damage to it got me through it. But I mean, it was rough."
In that unbearable pain, he led the Raiders with eight tackles, beating Tennessee in the AFC Championship Game.
But 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. He had an interception and eight tackles. The Raiders lost, 48-21, on Jan. 26, 2003.
Every triumphant story needs a conflict and then cause. Woodson's mission began with a limp off the Qualcomm Stadium field in San Diego.
Hits, hurts keep coming
Woodson played three more years in Oakland and the wear and tear of throwing his body around started to catch up with him. He hurt his right knee, his hip and once again the same leg. He fractured it, this time in the lower right area, on Oct. 23, 2005. Oakland never got back to the Super Bowl, Woodson's relationship with Callahan soured and that was the end of Woodson's days as a Raider.
"You know, I'm a very loyal person, so I felt like there would be an automatic sense of loyalty to me after doing that. It wasn't there," Woodson said in 2008. "I thought, 'Man, I proved I would basically do anything to be on the field to try and win a championship.' And what I got was, 'Well, he didn't play that well.' I was slighted by that."
Every incredible story needs a twist of fate. Woodson was a beat up former Heisman Trophy winner who sought free agency and found out nobody wanted him.
Except Packers general manager Ted Thompson, who otherwise has never doled out the cash for high-profile, veteran free agents. It was the most unlikely of unions but Woodson packed his bags for hell as far as he was concerned.
"I didn't even want to go to Green Bay," Woodson said this week in Dallas. In Green Bay, at first he was quiet, he was good, he didn't question what anybody else was doing and didn't want to be questioned, either. You saw what you wanted to see in him, and he tried to act like he did not care.
Then Woodson warmed up to Green Bay. Coach Mike McCarthy showed respect for his work ethic and his ability and most of all listened. By his second year, Woodson was actually coming to the voluntary workouts. Even if he couldn't practice, because rest was best for his veteran body, he would be out there, watching, bonding.
Second chance pays off
The Packers discovered not only the physical talent in Woodson but the incredible vision for the field and anticipation and feel for the game. It was remarkable to watch him step in front of pass attempts and break them up.
But even with a fresh start in Green Bay, Woodson had eight years in the league. The injuries would not stop just because the uniform had changed.
Woodson had a major shoulder injury in 2006 - but he played through it. In fact, he led the Packers with eight interceptions and 26 passes defensed that year, career highs.
In 2007, he played through a toe injury, painful and potentially debilitating, but he played.
In 2008, he played on a fractured toe that kept him out of practice for seven full weeks.
Somehow, for the last two years, Woodson has been spared any major injuries - despite the fact he still plays like a 24-year-old.
"He's fearless in terms of playing," said one of his Oakland coaches. "He has no regard for his health."
That arthritic, always-hurt, messed-up turf toe just won't let up, but on game day it's the only thing Woodson has to really manage. He tapes it together, basically. It'll probably bother him for the rest of his life. But he has earned widespread respect.
"He's very smart. He plays four positions on our defense. I think that tells you a lot about his ability mentally to operate in and out of schemes," said McCarthy. "Plays the nickel, the dime, has played safety, and is our starting corner in base.
"He's a tenacious player. He's always around the football. He's probably one of our best tacklers. It's nothing for him to go back and handle a punt or a kickoff in a tough situation, whether it's because of injury.
"He had a lot more to offer as a leader. The leadership of our football team wasn't where it needed to be. Charles was voted as one of the defensive playoff captains. I thought about it the whole week leading into the Philadelphia game, and I called the six captains into a meeting. I said before the game the captains are going to lead the team prayer and are going to give the final message before we go onto the field. You six figure it out. It's your message. I want it to come from the heart, and it was an opportunity for leadership to grow.
"The other five anointed him as the one to talk, just to watch him in that position, it's been special, and the football team has responded to it. He has a lot to offer. He has a big heart. He's played a lot of football. But he's a tremendous Hall of Fame football player in my opinion."
A warrior aches
But even though he looks healed, healthy and put back together at 34, there's a pain he manages for everyone one of those 13 years he's put into the league.
"You're feeling it after the game. Mondays and Tuesdays," said Woodson. "Wednesday you're kind of bouncing back - depending on how much I tackled or hit the previous week. If it was a lot, it can get well into Thursday when I'm still feeling it. You still feel some things Saturday, Saturday night.
"Just achy. I put some heating stuff on my back, shoulders, Saturday nights at the team hotel, just to have some heat all throughout the night."
It's not that he's never taken Vicodin or a painkiller. But now he doesn't use anything for pain management, not even simple ibuprofen or Tylenol.
"The hot tub is my best friend," said Woodson.
He's there every morning and afternoon. He could stay in there forever but has to come out after 20 minutes. "You get hot in there, you don't want to faint when you get out," he said, laughing.
He gives no indication otherwise of how much playing football hurts. A tight end or receiver would never see it on Woodson's face after a pad-cracking collision.
"Yeah, you make some tackles or you meet the ground and you feel the pain," said Woodson. "Ain't no question about it. Whether it is the shoulder, the back, making the wrong plant when you fall - yeah, you'll feel it.
"You get right up. You go back to the huddle. You can't show weakness out there. You try not to. You don't want to give a sign."
He can't even come home and flop into his favorite recliner on Sunday nights because his son, who just turned 2 years old on Monday, has got to have daddy time.
"He doesn't really care what happened in the game," said Woodson. "He wants to run and all that. It's hard to bend down sometimes but you've got to get on the floor and roll around with him. It's another game being played at home."
As far as his teammates know, Woodson just wants another shot at his Lombardi Trophy. They see Woodson's lethal chop at the ball, forcing fumbles 23 times, or the savant's 48 career interceptions. They see an ageless warrior.
A locker room legend.
Woodson has spent the last eight years fighting, scratching and clawing to get back to this point. Woodson said there will be no pregame speech this Sunday. He is healthy enough to give 60 more minutes of everything he has. There's nothing left to do but win the game.