Good morning all --

In a surprise move for us in the media, the Patriots had open locker room access today, and will have practice later this afternoon.

It was fairly quiet in the locker room, as many of the players were just filtering into the building for the day when we arrived at 10:45 a.m., but Randy Moss (another surprise), Matthew Slater, and Rodney Harrison accommodated the small Sunday media crowd.

Slater, who seemed like a good bet to make the roster, clearly was taking nothing for granted as to whether he'd make it or not. He said he and his father, Hall of Famer Jackie Slater, spoke for a while yesterday when the news came in, and the father was nearly more excited than the son -- "it was emotional for him. It was like he made the team," Matthew said.

I can't tell you at the moment what Moss said, as I was talking to LaMont Jordan at the time. It was relatively brief, but no doubt interesting, as he always is.

Here's a sample of Moss, thanks to my friend Erik Scalavino at Patriots' Football Weekly:

On Tom Brady returning to the field: "I don't think just me, but the whole team is ready for Tom to come back. I think that he's the leader of this team and he does some great things out there on the field with that ball. He really wasn't out there with us in pre-season. I guess that's a good thing, but we'll see Sunday."

Harrison touched on a variety of topics. When he was asked if he was surprised that Fernando Bryant was released, Harrison said it was the first he'd heard of the move, then paused for a few seconds, clearly taken aback by the news. "That's not something I can control," he said.

With the veteran Bryant gone, Harrison said the team "has to" have confidence in rookies Terrence Wheatley and Jonathan Wilhite at corner, and that the difficulties the Pats' had against the run in the preseason just come down to tackling and wrapping players up.

As for some clues as to which released players may be back on the practice squad -- Matt Gutierrez's locker was moved, but there was still a number 7 practice jersey hanging at the ready. It was much the same for Jonathan Stupar.