"For a while there, Laurence Maroney was inching closer, ever closer, to being dismissed as a draft pick that just didn't work out. He was going to be one of those guys who would move on, after which we'd put his name up there on the bulletin board with Eugene Chung and Chris Canty and others from the recent and long-ago Patriots past under the heading: "Guys Who Didn't Cut It."

But then Fred Taylor and Sammy Morris went down, and that's when the Patriots stuffed a football into Laurence Maroney's belly and said, "Run."

No, he has not suddenly morphed into The Greatest Running Back Who Ever Lived. But we've been seeing a healthy, contributing Laurence Maroney over the past month, inspiring many Pats followers to stand up and say, "It's about time!"

He has rushed for a total of 248 yards in the Pats' last three games, all victories, and in each game he has scored a touchdown. Against the Dolphins last Sunday, he carried the ball 20 times for 82 yards. On a team whose primary weapons are a couple of lads named Tom Brady and Randy Moss, Maroney did what he's supposed to do: He contributed.

"Laurence has run the ball pretty well all year," Pats coach Bill Belichick said the next day.

Well . . . no. But he has carried the ball pretty well lately, and that's a good sign. It means he's not moving toward Canty, Chung and those guys, but away from them. He has a place on this team.

If there are still doubters out there who don't buy all this - and, to be honest, part of me is in that camp - then Sunday night's hugely hyped game between the Patriots and Indianapolis Colts offers a Perfect Storm of an opportunity for Maroney to show what he's got. Yeah, yeah, yeah, this game is all about each team's dashing, Hall of Fame-bound quarterback - the Patriots' Brady vs. Indy's Peyton Manning - but how about a comparison of each team's running back?

Anyone up for a Laurence Maroney vs. Joseph Addai debate?"