Mr. Kraft Teabagged Goodell and All the "Haters" on "Real Sports" Last Night

NYDN  – If you’re a Patriots fan, you’ll love it. And if you can’t stand New England’s scandal-plagued football dynasty, you might relish hearing Robert Kraft call you what you are:

One of the “haters.”

Kraft, the outspoken Patriots owner who stuck it to NFL commissioner Roger Goodell after his team’s incredible Super Bowl LI comeback win on Feb. 5, is the subject of an HBO Real Sports profile that aired Tuesday night. …

“What do you say to the critics who label the Patriots as cheaters?” Kremer asks.

Envy and jealousy are incurable diseases,” Kraft responds. “The haters still hate. And I understand it, and we’ll do our best to keep them in that position.” …

Kraft threw a dig at Goodell on stage holding the Lombardi Trophy in Houston after Brady engineered the comeback for his fifth career championship. He tells Kremer why:

“I go back to my dad and he said, ‘The most important thing you can earn in life is a good name.’ … That is impacting our good name or our reputation. And it wasn’t something that I appreciated.” …

“And then the President invites you to dinner with the Prime Minister (of Japan),” Kraft adds.

Ah, Mr. Kraft. One minute he’s offering Andrea Kremer little affirmations about believing in yourself and never giving up on your dreams. And the next he’s coming guns blazing at the ones who did him dirty. He’s like part Miyagi, part John Wick. He’ll teach you life lessons, then he’ll snap your neck without changing his expression. He’s not the Boogeyman. He’s the one you sent to kill the fucking Boogeyman.

And the best part of this is that he’s still holding onto the resentment. That victory hasn’t made him content. All is not forgiven. Bygones have not gone by. Those five trophies symbolize success, but also the “envy and jealousy” of all the “haters.” Which is exactly how I want him to look at it. I need the Krafts to see those LomBradys as standing atop a pyramid made of the skulls of all the resentful nobodies who tried to ruin their family name and dismiss everything their team has ever accomplished. Especially that soulless, gutless, ballless commissioner whose league Mr. Kraft saved on more than one occasion.

Of course Mr. Kraft the elder was right. But there’s another old saying my father taught me: “The best revenge is living your life well, while sitting down to a steak dinner with the Prime Minister of Japan and the President of the United States and then going home to your five Super Bowl trophies.” No one can argue that.