FOXBOROUGH — Some quick notes on the Patriots’ Tuesday afternoon practice, which just wrapped up here at Gillette Stadium:

•Much nicer weather today — warm, but with a nice breeze. Players were in shorts and shells for a really temperate afternoon of situational football.

•By our count, the following players were not on the field for practice: wide receiver Brandon Tate, running back Sammy Morris, linebacker Paris Lenon, linebacker Tyrone McKenzie, offensive lineman Mark LeVoir, offensive lineman George Bussey, offensive lineman Sebastian Vollmer, tight end Benjamin Watson, tight end Tyson DeVree and defensive lineman Mike Wright.

Rogers had his first day in a Patriots' uniform Tuesday. (AP)

•We got our first look at new defensive back Roderick Rogers. Wearing No. 43, Rogers is a 6-foot-2, 187-pound DB out of Wisconsin. A 24-year-old who was recently cut loose by Denver, he played in three games for the Broncos last season, starting one and finishing the season with seven tackles.

•Cornerback Jonathan Wilhite was no longer wearing the red non-contact jersey, and appeared to be going full speed in drills with the rest of the defensive backs.

•One of the best catches of camp came early on this afternoon when Tom Brady found Randy Moss with a laser at the back of the end zone as part of a passing drill. Moss caught the ball with his right hand, making a one-handed backhand grab that you had to see to believe. It was like his glove was covered in Velcro — just stuck his mitt up there and he came down with it. Really impressive stuff.

•Maybe it was just me, but Brady seemed not to get a whole lot of reps this afternoon. I wouldn’t be surprised if he ended up playing less Thursday night against Cincinnati than he did in the preseason opener against Philadelphia. Nothing alarming — no injury concerns or anything like that, but Kevin O’Connell, Brian Hoyer and Andrew Walter seemed to spend a lot of time this afternoon with the No. 1 offense. While much of that was going on, Brady was off on the second practice field, working alone with Moss, Wes Welker and Joey Galloway. After what appeared to be an initial stumble on the part of Galloway, the two seemed to make a few nice deep connections. It was fascinating to watch the quarterback and the receivers work together.

•Moss had an interesting back-and-forth with the new DB. First, Rogers was able to deflect a deep ball from Brady to Moss, making a nice play to knock the ball away. Later on, Moss got his revenge with a nice reception over Rogers on a pass from Hoyer. (Moss also made a couple of really nice receptions working against Jamar Love in coverage.)

•Kick and punt return play was a focus of the afternoon – Laurence Maroney, Tyrone Wheatley, Julian Edelman and Darius Butler were all part of the kick return crew, while Edelman, Kevin Faulk and Wes Welker were all deep on punt return duty.

•The afternoon was a bit of a mixed bag for young wide receiver Terrence Nunn. First, he was upbraided for not being where he should have been at the end of a route. Later on, he dropped a ball in the end zone from Walter. He did rebound nicely later in the session with a nice catch off a deep ball from O’Connell with Love in coverage, and later beat Darius Butler to a deep ball.

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