FOXBORO, Mass. — Cornerback Charles Woodson wants his Super Bowl ring back.
Woodson, you may recall, stripped Patriots quarterback Tom Brady of the football during the famous "Snow Bowl" game in the 2001 playoffs, but referee Walt Coleman cited the tuck rule, deeming the result of the play as an incomplete pass. And, of course, the Patriots beat the Raiders in overtime and won their first of three Super Bowls in four years.
To make matters worse for Woodson, who will return to New England this weekend with the Packers, he was Brady's teammate at Michigan. There's just no escaping it.
"Yeah, he did steal my ring," Woodson said Wednesday. "I'm still waiting around to get mine.
"I've had that flashback more times than I would like. I catch that game on the classic football channel sometimes. That’s a bad memory for me, but it is what it is."
Woodson said he always knew Brady would be a good NFL quarterback, although he couldn’t have predicted the whole story, but he just hoped Brady would get a later start to his career. You know, because of 2001 and all.
"Brady, in college, was a guy that worked hard," Woodson said. "You knew he'd be good, but who knew he'd be where he is now. He was a guy that always worked at his craft. You knew what kind of competitor he was. He was a guy that, whether we were getting ready for practice, he was trying to lead the offense. Or whether we were at a rec center playing basketball, he was a competitive guy, so you knew he had that in him as well. Over the years, he's just continued to get better. That’s what you have to do in this league, and he's done that."
Woodson also didn’t understand the critiques in Brady's game that forced him to fall all the way to the 199th pick of the 2000 NFL draft.
"I thought he'd be good," Woodson said. "He's always had that command for the huddle, so I think guys respected him, first and foremost. He was a guy that was always comfortable in that pocket and could make all the throws. Coming out, I think there was a misconception about him throwing the ball, and he couldn’t throw deep and all these type of things. But that’s not what we saw. We saw just a young guy that was waiting around for an opportunity, and it didn’t come around for awhile. Then he ended up having to split time [with quarterback Drew Henson] his last year there, which I'm sure he didn’t want to do, but he did it. [Brady] finally got his opportunity in the NFL, so he's run with it."
Woodson called Brady the best passer in the NFL and said he's "deadly accurate,' and Woodson likened him to Joe Montana, who by many accounts is the greatest quarterback ever.
"Joe Montana was 'Joe Cool,' and Brady is no different," Woodson said. "There's no panic in his game, and he's a winner, and Joe was a winner as well. I guess that’s the greatest comparison between the two."
