Last Sunday, Patriots coach Bill Belichick opted not to activate running back Kevin Faulk for the Super Bowl. It came as a major surprise, and disappointment, to a man who could have been suiting up for the last time.
“That morning when I got the word that I wasn’t going to dress -- wow,” Faulk tells NESN, via NFL.com. "[I] cried a little bit because 75 percent of me knew that this could possibly be my last game playing -- not playing just dressing. If I dressed there could possibly be that much of a chance that I could play, so that really crushed me a whole lot.”
Faulk, 35, has played only for the Patriots since entering the league in 1999. He tore an ACL in 2010, and he appeared in only seven regular-season games in 2011. He last played in the Patriots’ 45-10 win over the Broncos in the AFC division-round playoffs.
Many now believe Faulk will retire. “I know everyone speculated that I was going to make a decision [after the Super Bowl],” Faulk said. “It’s kind of early, and I don’t want to tie my emotions to what went on the Sunday that passed. What went on the whole course of the season.”
Faulk, Tom Brady, and Matt Light are the only three remaining players from the Patriots team that defeated the Rams in Super Bowl XXXVI.