FOXBORO -- Patriots players didn't seem too excited about a report that the team will play an exhibition game in China next year.

Since the move -- first reported by the Tacoma, Wash., newspaper on Sunday -- has not yet been officially confirmed by the NFL, Rosevelt Colvin wouldn't say much: "That's light years away. I'll worry about that when it comes."

Mike Vrabel said the game would be "terrible" because it would disrupt the Pats' preseason preparation.

Outgoing NFL commissioner Paul Tagliabue said earlier this year that the league's next frontier would be China, the world's most populated country.

The NFL reportedly plans to have the Patriots practice in Seattle for a week, with a possible game at the Seahawks' Qwest Field. The teams would then head to China for more practices, public appearances, and a second game.

Beijing will host the Summer Olympics in 2008, and with NBC holding broadcast rights to those Games as well as NFL games, the chance to start the one-year countdown to the Olympics with the Pats-Seahawks tilt would be a bonus for the network.

The NFL has staged preseason games outside the United States since 1986. Last year Arizona and San Francisco played the first regular-season game in another country, at Mexico City's Estadio Azteca.

--SHALISE MANZA YOUNG