In 2005, Robert Kraft said that he gave his Super Bowl ring to Russian President for life Putin at the urging of the White House. According to CBS Sports in 2013, he came clean and revealed that Putin stole it, but he took it back, or his spokesperson did. But that’s not the end of the story.
Kraft visited Russia in 2005 following the Patriots’ victory over the Philadelphia Eagles in Super Bowl XXXIX.
Kraft said he met with Putin during the visit.
Putin was interested in the ring and took it out to show him.
“I took out the ring and showed it to [Putin], and he put it on and he goes, ‘I can kill someone with this ring,'” Kraft said at an event this week, via the New York Post. “I put my hand out and he put it in his pocket, and three KGB guys got around him and walked out.”
The White House then intervened.
“It would really be in the best interest of US-Soviet relations if you meant to give the ring as a present,” Kraft said he was told on the White House call. “I really didn’t [want to]. I had an emotional tie to the ring, it has my name on it. I don’t want to see it on eBay. There was a pause on the other end of the line, and the voice repeated, ‘It would really be in the best interest if you meant to give the ring as a present.'”
Kraft is a patriot so he followed the White House’s guidance.
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After the talk with the White House, Kraft released a statement saying the ring was a gift, “I decided to give him the ring as a symbol of the respect and admiration that I have for the Russian people and the leadership of President Putin,” Kraft’s 2005 statement said.
Putin’s spokesperson Dmitry Peskov claimed: “I was standing 20 centimeters away from him and Mr. Putin and saw and heard how Mr. Kraft gave this ring as a gift.”
JUST A JOKE
Kraft told a crowd at the Waldorf the story about Putin stealing it. Putin denied it and then Kraft said that it’s just a joke he tells.
Stacey James, a spokesperson for the Kraft Group, the holding company for Kraft’s business ventures, including the Patriots, said that the Post article shouldn’t be taken too seriously.
“It’s a humorous, anecdotal story that Robert retells for laughs,” James said in a statement. “He loves that his ring is at the Kremlin, and, as he stated back in 2005, he continues to have great respect for Russia and the leadership of President Putin. In particular, he credits President Putin for modernizing the Russian economy. ”
The statement said, “an added benefit from the attention this story gathered eight years ago was the creation of some Patriots fan clubs in Russia.”
The Super Bowl ring is on display in the Kremlin library along with other gifts to the Russian leader, according to Peskov.
“And as he stated back in 2005, he continues to have great respect for Russia and the leadership of President Putin.”
Putin offered to give him another piece of jewelry.
SPOILER ALERT!
PUTIN STOLE HIS RING. Did you doubt it?
Then, in 2017, he told Fox News Sunday that he has an emotional attachment to the ring and hopes his friend Donald Trump can get it back for him.
“I do have an emotional attachment to that ring,” Kraft said of the $25,000 piece of jewelry the owner allowed Putin to try on after he admired it during a 2005 meeting.
He’s a patriot who wants his ring back.
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