Welcome tothe NFL 100,The Athletic’sendeavor to identify the 100 best players in football history. You can order the book versionhere. Every day until the season begins, we’ll unveil new members of the list, with the No. 1 player to be crowned on Wednesday, Sept. 8.
Charles Woodson is enjoying the final leg of the trip to Canton, Ohio, all while making promotional stops for his new batch of bourbon.
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The former Raiders and Packers defensive back could probably do something in the salt business as well.
“I always considered myself like seasoning salt,” Woodson said in a recent Hall of Fame video call. “You can put seasoning salt on anything and it’s going to make it better.”
Players in the NFL look up to Woodson — just ask Jalen Ramsey — and there is no secret to his success. As Woodson gets ready for his induction to the Pro Football Hall of Fame next month, he shared how he was able to be a defensive player who shined on offense in college, then spent 18 years as an impactful cornerback and safety in the NFL, even making the Pro Bowl in his final season at age 39.
“I was a guy each and every week who gave it all I had,” Woodson said. “It didn’t matter if I was healthy or not. Broken leg in the playoffs. Dislocated my shoulder in the opening week of my 18th year and playing a full season. I left it all on the field. That’s what I want people to remember and say about me — there’s a reason he’s in the Hall of Fame.”
Woodson might even raise a glass to himself when he looks back at the offseason of 2006. He had been the defensive rookie of the year with the Raiders in 1998 and was first-team All-Pro in 1999 and 2001 and looking forward to being wooed and thrown money at in free agency, despite missing 10 games the previous season with a broken leg.
“Of course my thought is I’m going to have people crawling over each other trying to get to me,” Woodson said. “I thought I was that type of player, (but) I really didn’t have anybody checking for me, and that stung a little bit.”
Green Bay called.
Green Bay is also really cold and in the middle of nowhere. And Woodson said he had heard from other Black players that it wasn’t a great city to live in year-round.
“That’s not the team I wanted calling,” Woodson said. “It just got to a point where the writing was on the wall, where if you wanted to play, you’re probably going to have to go to Green Bay. That was a tough pill to swallow.
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“So when I got there, I just had that reluctance in my heart and in my spirit, and I just couldn’t believe I was in Green Bay. It made me combative off the bat, with really kind of everybody.”
The NFL history books clearly show that Woodson settled in, winning the NFL Defensive Player of the Year award in 2009 and a Super Bowl ring the following year. He would set a team record of nine interceptions returned for a touchdown.
“Once I started playing, got into a few games and started getting my hands on the ball, things kind of settled down for me,” Woodson said. “I just think the football guys I had around me, Al Harris, Nick Collins, Tramon (Williams), and these guys, they made it work for me.
“I just felt we had a great group and through time I was able to work through that thing. I’m here, I’m making plays, you’re going to be all right. It got to a peaceful point to where I thought I was going to retire there.”
That didn’t happen, but Woodson did get married in Green Bay and started a family.
“That was really a time in my life when I was growing as a person,” Woodson said. “There was a transition that happened there that was a beautiful transition, if you will, so that time was very special.”
Woodson was able to close out his career back in Oakland, where he was able to instill young players with the same edge that legendary former players such as Willie Brown, George Atkinson and Cliff Branch had given him.
“I really didn’t understand what it meant to be a Raider until I got out there,” Woodson said. “My first memories of going out to the facility was hanging around older guys like Willie Brown. Willie Brown was a guy who made sure you understood what it meant to be a Raider.
“The first thing he would always tell us was there were 31 other teams and then there was the Raiders. … I knew very early on what I had to bring to the table as a young player, and I had to bring it — by being a tough, physical, fast football player.”
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Those traits are obvious when you watch Woodson play, and many of the NFL’s young stars want to be just like him.
Ramsey recently said he could see making a switch from cornerback to safety down the road, just as his favorite player did.Woodson made the switch at age 36, though he had always moved all over the field. He can definitely see it in Ramsey.
“Jalen Ramsey is at the top of the list in terms of kind of playing the game the way that I played the game,” Woodson said. “If you watch him on the field, you’re not going to necessarily know where he is going to be each and every game.
“There are going to be games where he is going to be on the No. 1 receiver, but there are going to be games where they don’t feel like they have to game plan for a certain guy so you might see him at the nickel, you might see him at dime, you might see him at linebacker or playing the deep half or something. And those were all things I could do as a player.”
Ramsey told the “Million Dollaz Worth of Game” podcast that he thinks he could dominate just like Woodson did.
“I like Charles because even though I say Deion (Sanders) is the best corner to play the game, Charles is the best defensive back to play the game because he played multiple positions in the secondary,” Ramsey said. “He played corner, he played safety, he played nickel.
“He did a bunch of different stuff, and he affected the game in so many different ways.”
(Illustration: Wes McCabe /The Athletic; photo: George Gojkovich / Getty Images)
Vic Tafur is a senior writer for The Athletic covering the Las Vegas Raiders and the NFL. He previously worked at the San Francisco Chronicle and also likes to write about boxing and mixed martial arts. Follow Vic on Twitter @VicTafur