FOXBORO � Before Stevan Ridley hopped on a plane and went home to Louisiana late last week, he made a stop at Gillette Stadium. Prior to leaving New England, he wanted to make sure his teammates knew they had his support.

FOXBORO � Before Stevan Ridley hopped on a plane and went home to Louisiana late last week, he made a stop at Gillette Stadium. Prior to leaving New England, he wanted to make sure his teammates knew they had his support.

So there, in the bowels of the stadium, he wrote a heartfelt note and stuck it on the white board in the running back room. Ridley didn�t tell anyone about it. When his teammates walked in the meeting room, prior to their game against the Denver Broncos, they were surprised, choked up and motivated.

The message was simple: Don�t give up, because I won�t.

�Rid was saying, don�t think for a second that he isn�t watching everything, every snap,� Jonas Gray said. �He�s praying for us, hoping the best for us and at the same time, he�s also grinding too. That was the message. It was that �Kid Rid� is still a part of this team.�

�I want you to know it choked them up a little bit,� running back coach Ivan Fears added. �You could tell it was really from his heart. That was neat. That was neat.�

Ridley, who suffered a torn ACL and MCL in Buffalo, left Foxboro last week so he could begin pre-op visits and tests on his right knee. He�s expected to undergo knee surgery before the end of this year, but the procedure hasn�t been scheduled yet.

When the fourth-year running back went down, it was an emotional experience for all the running backs on the team. Ridley has a personality that�s addictive as they come. The back was the type to get all his fellow backs on the team to wear onesies for kicks. During practice he�d come out with a pair of batman cleats one day, a Captain America pair the next and then fluorescent green cleats the following day.

The 25-year-old once wore rainbow moon boots in the locker room. And when he spoke, he talked with passion, from the heart.

�They miss him. We all miss him,� Fears said. �Rid was a real good guy. Hard worker. A character, but a hard worker. He had his moments. His personality was one that you liked being around him. A fun-loving guy, but serious when he had to be serious. On game day there was nothing like him. He was into it on game day. He was into it. You didn�t have to worry about him being psyched and ready to go.�

Without him, the Patriots� run game has been up-and-down. Against Chicago, the team (122 yards on 32 carries) ran the ball well. The Patriots averaged only 2.6 yards a carry against Denver (66 yards on 25 carries) and rushed for 63 yards on 15 attempts against the New York Jets.

Going forward, the group will have to continue to prove that they can move on without Ridley, who at one point this season was on pace to run for more than 1,000 yards. The past three weeks haven�t been easy without the back, but Fears said the group has responded positively without their friend.

�I think they�ve done a great job. Like always. Everybody has to step up,� Fears said. �When you get an opportunity, you know [it goes]. You�re sitting around watching the other guy play. You don�t want to wish anything bad, but when that happens, you�re ready to go. It�s your opportunity. They�ve responded very well.�

So far, the added responsibility has been placed upon the shoulders of Gray and Shane Vereen.

For Gray, it�s been quite the change after starting the season on the practice squad. He said he�s been texting with Ridley constantly since he left.

�He�s a positive dude. He�s a religious guy. He�s working hard,� Gray said.

For Vereen, there�s been added responsibility placed on his shoulders. Early in the season, he shared the leadership role among running backs with his fellow fourth-year player. �They were both two different kind of guys, different type roles. In their own way, they were leading by example,� Fears said. �Shane was always there. He was a guy, in our room, he is basically the meeting guy. He ran the meetings, the film sessions when I wasn�t there. That was his role. That�s who he is. He accepted that role long ago. Rid was his partner in crime. The two of them came in together. They were pretty close. I know he misses his presence.�

You can hear the emotion when Fears talks about Ridley, as you can with most of his teammates. Not only did this group lose a big piece of its heart, but there�s a possibility Ridley, who is a free agent at the end of the season, won�t be back in Foxboro again.

Although signing free agents is out of Fears� hands, he would love to have the man everyone calls �Rid� back with the Patriots next season.

�Of course. We love Stevan. We�re hoping the best. You never know,� Fears said. �All that stuff is out of my hands. I have no clue. I think anybody would love to have Rid a part of their program.�

But whether Ridley is in the building or at home in Louisiana, he�s still a part of the Patriots. And this position group won�t forget, either.

All they have to do is look up at that note.

�We walked into the room and looked at that note and were like, �That�s pretty awesome,�� Gray said. ��Let�s not take that down, let�s keep it up there and keep that same mentality, that no matter what happens, you keep on grinding.��