The ice apparently is thawing, at least a bit, between Patriots owner Robert Kraft and former Patriots coach Bill Belichick.
Appearing live with Rob Gronkowski and Julian Edelman for their Dudes on Dudes podcast at last month’s Fanatics Fest in New York, Kraft was asked to describe his best move during his 30 years as owner of the team.
“The one that got questioned the most was in 1999,” Kraft said, via Peyton Doyle of MassLive.com in an item posted on Friday. “I gave up a No. 1 draft pick for a coach that had only won a little over 40 percent of his games to get him out, I don’t know if there are any Jets fans here. . . .
“I think getting Bill Belichick to come to the Patriots in 1999 was a big risk and I got hammered in the Boston media, but he was with us for 24 years and we did OK.”
The candor is surprising, given ample evidence and rumor of rancor between Kraft and Belichick during the final years of his time in New England and thereafter. Remember the reporting that Kraft supposedly said some things to Falcons owner Arthur Blank that kept Belichick from landing on his feet in Atlanta?
And what about the notion that quarterback Tom Brady said to Kraft during training camp in 2000, when Brady was a sixth-round rookie, that picking him was the best decision the organization had ever made? Brady has since told Howard Stern that Brady didn’t say that.
Both moves turned out very well. The fact that Kraft opted to mention Belichick and not Brady suggests that perhaps the animosity lingering between Kraft and Belichick has begun to subside.
At least a little.
