Speaking during his weekly appearance on WEEI, Tom Brady acknowledged that, indeed, there was a leadership problem in the Patriots' locker room. And he was fine with the assessment that losing guys like Rodney Harrison, Tedy Bruschi, Richard Seymour, Larry Izzo and Mike Vrabel was one heck of a contributing factor.

"We've all thought about that," Brady said. "Those are special players and special guys, and it's not the uniform that makes players play the Patriot Way."

Brady continued, saying, "Other guys have to step in and fill those shoes, and other guys here who were here with those guys have to take those lessons they learned from those guys and apply them. ... Obviously, the leadership on this team wasn't where it needed to be."

So where did that show up? Brady was pretty clear in his assessment. "The games, that's when it's easy," which implies the problem came in the team's preparation."

One more interesting thing to get to here. Brady was asked directly if Moss had given his all to help the team this year. He didn't directly address that.

"I have a lot of trust and confidence in Randy," Brady said. "Every team in the league game-plans around him. There weren't a lot of opportunities for him yesterday where he didn't have a safety over the top of him. That's good defense by them."