FOXBOROUGH — The Patriots just wrapped up their Sunday afternoon session here at Gillette Stadium, and here are a few notes worth passing along:

•It was a mainly overcast afternoon session, with the rain holding off. It was slightly on the cool side, and good weather for football. The team was in pads — the 13th time in 18 overall practices they have been in pads for a practice session.

•By our count, the following guys were not out there: wide receiver Brandon Tate, cornerback Shawn Springs, linebacker Tyrone McKenzie, linebacker Tedy Bruschi, offensive lineman Rich Ohrnberger, offensive lineman Mark LeVoir, offensive lineman George Bussey, tight end Benjamin Watson, defensive lineman Le Kevin Smith and defensive lineman Mike Wright. (Yep, you read that correctly — linebacker Shawn Crable was in attendance, as well as defensive linemen Richard Seymour and Ty Warren.)

•New outside linebacker Derrick Burgess and fellow OLB Crable, as well as Warren all drew big media crowds as soon as practice was completed. We’ll have something on Burgess and new quarterback Andrew Walter later today.

•The Patriots opened by focusing on various end-of-the-half and end-of-the-game scenarios on both offense and defense.

•Burgess drew limited snaps on the outside, and it appears they are working him into the rotation very gradually. It does sound like he’s going to stick with No. 49.

•Running back Laurence Maroney showed some good burst on a handful of runs in 7-on-7 drills, but struggled at times in the passing game, a series that included a bad drop on a pass from quarterback Brian Hoyer.

•Another guy who struggled at times was kick returner Matthew Slater, who simply dropped his first attempt as a kick returner. (He followed that up with a clean catch and return, which — we believe — drew mock cheers from the fans in attendance.)

•Quarterack Kevin O’Connell got some good reps today, but had some bad overthrows in red zone work. He overthrew Kevin Faulk on one play (which was a clear miscommunication on someones part), but bounced back on the very next play with a laser to wide receiver Joey Galloway. However, later on in practice, he had some overthrows to tight ends Alex Smith and Dave Thomas. (Smith did shine later in practice when he was the recipient of a sweet catch, beating Adalius Thomas in coverage.)

•The play of the session was likely a long-distance strike down the sideline from Tom Brady to Randy Moss. Darius Butler was in coverage and appeared to be running stride for stride with No. 81, but he just got turned around by Moss, who made an excellent catch in stride for a ball that would have easily gone for a touchdown. (Looked an awful lot like the record-breaking pass from Brady to Moss that broke the record in the 2007 regular-season finale against the Giants.)

•Julian Edelman had a nice punt return. His words from a week or so ago — “I’m about a thousand punts away from where I want to be” — have really rung true lately. (Maybe he’s trying to get all thousand in before the start of the preseason schedule.) He was one of the first position guys on the field at the start of practice, taking punts from veteran Chris Hanson.

•At the end of practice, it looked like the offense and defense switched roles, with the defense trying to score on the offense. It appeared — we were blocked in our line of vision — that Jonathan Wilhite led the offense to a pair of scores as the quarterback, leading to big cheers from the crowd on hand. That left the offense running a lap at the end of practice.