Patriots’ Welker makes successful pre-season debut
Tom Brady tossed a touchdown pass, and Fred Taylor ran for another as the New England Patriots breezed past the Atlanta Falcons 28-10 on Thursday night’s preseason game at the Georgia Dome.
It was clear from the opening series that Patriots quarterback Brady was thrilled to get his two-time Pro Bowl wide receiver Wes Welker back on the field, and wanted to get him involved in the game early to shake off some of that rust.
Welker had surgery in February after tearing the anterior cruciate ligament in his left knee at Houston in the 2009 regular-season finale.
"Getting out there catching balls and getting hit was good," said Welker, the team’s leading receiver with 123 receptions last season."It's a step forward. I'm not sure I'm all there yet."
New England was being extremely cautious and did not want to rush Welker’s recovery timetable, but they finally opted to let him loose and he caught two passes for 20 yards on the opening drive.
Brady, who suffered an injury to his finger on his throwing hand during week one of the pre-season, was not bothered by the finger and turned in a 10-for-12, 85-yard performance before giving way to Brian Hoyer. Hoyer was solid, directing a couple of scoring drives.
While the Patriots were clicking on all phases, the Falcons were not and had trouble stopping New England’s offence on third downs. "I know it's only the pre-season, but we didn't play as well as we need to in all three phases," Atlanta coach Mike Smith said. "We've got a lot of work to do."
While that may be true, Atlanta’s quarterback Matt Ryan, entering his third season, said he's not concerned.
"We don't gameplan a lot for these games," he said. "We're just trying to improve on some different things, see what we like and don't like and what we want to take into the regular season."
With his toe injury behind him, Ryan can throw on the run and move outside the pocket if he feels pressure from defensive linemen barrelling down on him and that’s exactly what he did on a few plays.
Ryan went eight of 13 for 76 yards on his three possessions and effectively led his team down into Patriots’ territory. But a few miscues and squandered opportunities resulted in field goal attempts instead of touchdowns.
The Patriots are 2-0 this pre-season while the Falcons dropped to 1-1.
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