Wes Welker has caught 841 passes in his NFL career, plus another 79 in the postseason, and yet one of his most memorable plays was a pass he failed to catch.
That pass, a costly drop late in the fourth quarter of Super Bowl XLVI, a game the Patriots would go on to lose to the Giants, has haunted Patriots fans ever since. But Welker says it doesn’t haunt him, and he won’t be thinking about redemption when he plays in another Super Bowl on Sunday.
“You know what? I don’t even think about it,” Welker said when asked about it at Media Day. “The past is the past, what happened, happened and I’m just looking forward to this one and going out there and playing my best game and doing what I can to help my team win.”
Welker didn’t get much help from Patriots quarterback Tom Brady on the play in question: Welker was open enough that it should have been easy for Brady to hit him in stride, but instead Welker had to alter his route and reach back for the ball. Welker will be hoping that Peyton Manning throws him better passes on Sunday. And Manning will be hoping that Welker catches everything that touches his hands.
