New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft insists he’s no longer angry about Deflategate, which cost his team two draft picks and his star quarterback four games. Two Super Bowl titles in three years are enough to put a smile on anyone’s face.
But the 18-month-long scandal has not left Kraft’s mind, as he reminded a crowd of business leaders earlier this week at the Bloomberg Breakaway summit in New York.
“Well, I don’t hold grudges, but I also don’t forget anything,” Kraft said Tuesday, via USA Today. “Envy and jealousy are incurable diseases. I’m going into my 24th season as an owner. I’m passionate about owning a football team in my hometown.
“If I hadn’t won, I would be so angry at our folks and thinking about what we’d have to do (to win a title). So, our competitors, I understand how they brought pressure on the league office to be very strong and (lobbied) not to compromise on an issue that was nonsense and foolishness.”
The last three months have been a prolonged victory lap for Kraft. He used the “envy and jealousy” line both before and after Super Bowl LI, which New England won in historic fashion over the Atlanta Falcons, implying his fellow NFL owners tried to railroad the Patriots because of the team’s prolonged run of success.
New England’s next goal? To win back-to-back Super Bowls, which hasn’t been done since the early-2000s Patriots prevailed in Super Bowls XXXVIII and XXXIX.
Thumbnail photo via Robert Deutsch/USA TODAY Sports Images
