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FOXBORO - Large plastic trash-can bags were the hottest item in the Patriots' locker room Monday.

Some of the players used them for the trash they were ordered to empty from their lockers. Others used them as tote bags for personal belongings that would go home with them until the offseason conditioning program kicks in in March.

"Offseason" almost sounds like a dirty word in Foxboro at this time of year, but the Patriots were faced with having to cope with a different reality following the final week of the regular season. Out of the playoffs for the first time since 2002, despite an 11-5 record and the belief that they are fundamentally better than maybe half of the teams in the 12-team playoff field, the players could only accept their fate and hope to turn it into something positive in the future.

After the 13-0 win over the Bills on Sunday and the later news that Miami and Baltimore had won to shut them out of the playoffs, some of the players searched in their minds for the reasons why an 11-5 team was heading into vacation several weeks earlier this year.

"You can think about those things as short as the flight was home, I replayed pretty much every play in my head that I could have did better, plays that I saw, plays that I couldn't believe went our way and didn't go our way," cornerback Ellis Hobbs said. "Definitely, there were plays out there that were the difference between an 11-5 season and worse, or better. All you can do is think about those things, try to get them out of your head. "Fortunately, I'm a cornerback, so I'm used getting stuff out of my head," he said. "We'll eat it for right now, then try to enjoy this offseason and get ready for next year."

The Patriots obviously did what they had to do over the last month of the season, which was to win out. There should be more satisfaction over that accomplishment, linebacker Mike Vrabel said.

"You try to think that it's a pretty positive ending to a season, a good finish," he said. "You finish 11-5 and then you come in here and you realize that you're cleaning your locker out and you didn't make the playoffs. You're happy with the way you finished, but you're disappointed that you're not in the playoffs."

Defensive end Richard Seymour, who had to sit out Sunday's game with a bad back, said that he would have to be satisfied with the four-game win streak to end the season and the fact that this re-shaped and re-constituted team was playing its best when it was absolutely necessary for it to do so.

"We did the best that we could," Seymour said. "Obviously, we wish we could have had a couple of plays back in several of those games. I thought coming down the stretch we played our best football in December and I think that's what you want to do as a team - play your best football coming down the stretch.

"When you look at the playoffs, when you look at the teams that are in there, we lost to Indy, we lost to Pittsburgh and we lost to San Diego," he said. "So how mad at it could you really be? I felt like we could have played in those games and left ourselves in a better situation. I think in the past we've won those tough football games and this year we came up just a little bit short."

Quarterback Matt Cassel, whose substitute stint for the injured Tom Brady exceeded everyone's wildest expectations, said he would have liked to have a chance to further prove himself on the playoff stage.

"The fact that we were playing good football and that we felt that if we got an opportunity to get in the playoffs, we would have been a team that you would have had to deal with," he said. "Unfortunately, we didn't get that opportunity."

Personally, Cassel said he was satisfied with how he performed after Brady's left knee injury against Kansas City in the season opener.

"There's no doubt, this was a satisfying season for me," he said. "I proved a lot to myself and to a lot of others as well, that I can do it still. Or that I can do it now. It was a fun season in that regard, to finally get out there and have an opportunity to play after sitting for quite a long time." One topic Cassel wouldn't touch was his pending free agency, which could turn him into a very rich quarterback someplace else next year.

"I don't know it's one day after the season," he said. "So we're going to move forward and we'll see how it all comes about in the future. Probably, over the course of the next few weeks I will take a step back, be able to take a deep breath and reflect on the season, what's all occurred."

One by one they took their leave, until there were only a precious few remaining behind to complete the task of cleaning out their lockers.

"It's very frustrating to me," Hobbs said. "You hate to compare seasons because every season is different. But normally, if you'd tell me we'd be sitting at 11-5 and be the winner of your last game and you're going home, I'd think you were talking crazy. But that's the case, man, so we've just got to deal with it. You've got to eat it. You've got no choice."

MARK FARINELLA may be reached at 508-236-0315 or via e-mail at mfarinel@thesunchronicle.com. Read Farinella's blog, "Blogging Fearlessly," at thesunchronicle.com/farinella.