Pittsburgh Steelers quarterback Ben Roethlisberger is 38 years old and coming off a season in which he missed 14 games due to a serious elbow injury.

Yet, there is a key reason to be optimistic about the two-time Super Bowl winner's health before his 17th NFL campaign.

Roethlisberger's throwing elbow is apparently pain-free—a feeling he didn't experience for years, long before tearing multiple ligaments in his right elbow in Week 2 of the 2019 season.

In fact, Roethlisberger said he has felt pain in his right elbow when throwing the ball for the majority of his prolific career with the Steelers due to a minor tear. Now, though, as his elbow has fully recovered, he is pain-free. And that non-feeling might take some getting used to.

“Oh yeah, I’ve been feeling this pain in my elbow for probably 13, 14 years,” Roethlisberger told Terez Paylor of YahooSports.com. “I’ve had a small tear in there the whole time . . . and I dealt with the pain and literally dealt with it in pretty much everything I do. You just kind of get used to it; I’ve had that pain for so long that every day, I keep waiting for it to come back like, where is it, where is it? And luckily, by the grace of God, it hasn’t come back yet. Hopefully, it never does.”

The Steelers star has also dropped some pounds for the 2020 season.

He said he hopes to write “a few more chapters” of his football career before hanging up the cleats.