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By STEVE SOLLOWAY MaineToday Media, Inc. 01/19/2008

"I would be the first to tell I'm not at the beginning of my career anymore. I'm in my 12th season now and how many more can you possibly play?"

He didn't say he was walking away from the Patriots after the season ends. He probably wasn't hinting. He was deviating from Bill Belichick's script of keeping eyes on the prize to give context to his own career. Bruschi has earned that right, don't you think?

Some three years ago he had a hole in his heart. He had three Super Bowl rings. The price of a fourth seemed too high.

Bruschi turned a deaf ear to voices urging him to retire, that he had nothing left to prove or gain. Now he's two victories away from an incomparable season.

"One thing you learn as you get older and experience season after season after season," Bruschi said, "is that the bigger the games get, the better feeling when you win them because you don't know if you'll be back."

He was a kid in 1996, a 23-year-old rookie linebacker who had two sacks in Super Bowl XXXI against the Packers in New Orleans. The Patriots lost, but young Bruschi wasn't worried.

"You come away from that game feeling like, we're a great organization, I'm part of a great team, we're going to go far," he said. "All of a sudden we're looking for a new head coach, we go on a downward spiral until we turn it around again."

Pete Carroll followed Bill Parcells and then Belichick arrived. The Patriots returned to New Orleans to beat the St. Louis Rams for their first Super Bowl victory and now Bruschi had perspective. So this is how it's done.

Bruschi turns 35 in June. Some days he can look weary.

"I guess when you're a rookie or second-year player, toward the end of the year, you sort of still feel like a young man. But as every player gets into double-digit years, it gets tougher and tougher toward the end of the year, yes. Come Friday, Saturday, you start to feel good again and get ready to do it on Sunday."

Four times this season he led the Patriots in tackles. Against Dallas, in that big 48-27 win in October. Against Baltimore, in that emotional 27-24 win on a Monday night. Against Pittsburgh, when the Steelers believed they would be the team to derail the Patriots but instead lost 34-13.

Big games challenge good players and Bruschi has never played small.

"I think this is my sixth AFC Championship. You realize it's a big game, it's the game that gets you to the game that you want to be in," Bruschi said.

"You really try to break down the biggest games to the simplest forms. You learn how to prepare from your own experience."

His experience includes the stroke that might have killed him in February 2005. He doesn't play that card when he talks about football. That was an intensely personal experience and maybe the ultimate distraction. Who among his teammates didn't hold their breath when he returned to the lineup to make 10 tackles against Buffalo in late October?

He smiled Friday when someone asked why the Patriots are so good at dealing with distractions.

"You know, I hate to say it, but we are sort of used to it. We sort of feed off it," Bruschi said. "Whoever is being scrutinized, whoever is the target for any type of criticism, we rally around that person, whether it is our head coach or our all-star wide receiver or whoever it may be. We become stronger for it."

Tedy Bruschi is a football player, a linebacker. He hasn't talked publicly about what he'll do after the tap on the shoulder points him in another direction.

He'll be ready for that, too.

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