Playing Ball: Life Lessons from My Journey to the Super Bowl and Beyond

I remember Peyton [Manning] called me as soon as I got out to Denver. He started the conversation by asking me, ‘When did you get in?’ We mainly just talked to get familiar with each other.

Make no mistake: You will be challenged at some point in time. We all are. That’s just life.

My grandmother said, ‘It doesn’t really matter where you had to go, where you got the ring, or where you played the Super Bowl, all that matters is that you put in the work, you deserved it, and you earned it.

If you want to be great, you have to be a leader. You’ve got to listen to me, son. That’s what we brought you here to do, to be a leader. And you can do it.

You can be a natural athlete with terrible work habits, and that ends up wasting your gifts.

I stood up to go shake hands with him and I don’t remember anything else. What I do recall is the crowd yelling and me crying, while everything seemed to be moving in slow motion.

It doesn’t matter how smart you are or what you know; if you learn to put those two things together, to let your pain drive your talent, you can become the best at anything you do in life.

Making it to the Super Bowl is something few and far between. Many football players never get the opportunity to make it that far.

My mother—with all the embarrassment and hurt that she caused me in my youth—ended up giving me the drive and the fire I needed to be more and to do more.