The Mike Vrabel situation has dominated much of the attention being paid to the Patriots over the last few weeks, but tight end Hunter Henry said in a Tuesday press conference that the players have been focused on football while in the building for the last two weeks.

While that might provide a respite for what's going on outside the walls, it also means a return to thoughts about the last time the team was on the field. That was a 29-13 loss to the Seahawks in a Super Bowl that felt like a bigger blowout than the score would indicate, which is likely part of the reason why Henry said that the loss is still a sore point for the team.

Henry also explained that he thinks that can be a positive because of the desire to avoid another ending like the one the team had in Santa Clara.

“I watched a little. It still stings, to be honest with you," Henry said. "Obviously, we didn’t play to the capability that we wanted to play at all on the biggest stage, and that was very disappointing and hard to process for a while. Definitely has taken a while. It still stings, but I think that is good. That’s good that it stings. It’s good. It makes you want to work a little harder. To get all the way to the end and then not achieve it was hard. There was a lot of positives when you really step back from it and able to really look at the full picture. I mean, making it all the way there is obviously a blessing. It’s really, really hard to do. Obviously getting there was big, but we didn't make it all the way."

The 2026 season will be the first chance for the Patriots to show that they've built a sustainable winner rather than a team that flashed while playing a fourth-place schedule and seeing some other AFC contender's chances deteriorate thanks to injuries and other reasons. History has examples in both directions and the answer in New England will help determine the way the conference stacks up beyond the coming season.