Patriots owner Robert Kraft admits he was ‘snookered’ by Aaron Hernandez but former tight end’s teammates reveal they were scared of him before his 2013 murder arrest
New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft admitted he was “snookered” by Aaron Hernandez when the former tight end insisted he was innocent of Odin Lloyd’s murder.
Former Patriots star Hernandez was found guilty of Lloyd’s murder in 2013 and took his own life in 2017 while serving a life sentence for first-degree murder.
The latest episode of Apple TV’s “The Dynasty: New England Patriots,” released Friday, provided a haunting insight into the franchise’s reactions to Hernandez’s time in New England.
His arrest seemingly took Kraft by surprise, with the franchise owner taking a parental approach to his player.
During the behind-the-scenes series, Kraft opened up about his close relationship with Hernandez, even revealing that he sought out the tight end to ask himself questions about Lloyd’s murder and offered to get him a lawyer.
New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft admitted he was ‘snookered’ by Aaron Hernandez
Hernandez was released by the Patriots after being charged in the 2013 murder of Odin Lloyd
‘Every time he saw me, he kissed me on the cheek. I mean, this is something I do with my sons,” Kraft recalled. “I think he saw me as a kind of loving father figure.”
‘I remember when my dear wife Myra died of ovarian cancer. Aaron presented me with a check for $50,000 for the fund we had set up in Myra’s memory. I said, ‘Aaron, this is very sweet. You don’t have to do this. You already have your contract,” Kraft said.
‘And he had tears in his eyes. “No,” he said. ‘This is very important to me. I want to do it for you.’ It really touched me. I felt he was what we wanted as the perfect Patriot player.”
However, Kraft went on to openly insist to Hernandez that he was innocent, claiming that this changed the way he viewed people for the rest of his life.
“I found out he was working out in the weight room. I immediately went downstairs and said, “Aaron, tell me, did you do this? Because if you did, I know you must have had a good reason. I’m going to get you the best lawyer we can get.” I’m going to do it at my expense,'” Kraft recalled. “And he looked me straight in the eye, without blinking, anything, and said, ‘Mr. Kraft, I didn’t do that. I was in Rhode Island,’ or something like that.” And when he said it, I believed him.”
‘He changed my life and the way I look at people because to this day I can’t believe that’s how I started playing snooker.’
The Patriots ultimately cut Hernandez on the same day as his 2013 arrest, but Kraft still admitted to poor character judgment.
“We made a mistake on this,” Kraft admitted. “For those of you who are feeling pain, I apologize.”
On ‘The Dynasty: New England Patriots’, Kraft opened up about his relationship with Hernandez
Although Kraft was taken by the star when he arrived in New England, the same couldn’t be said for his teammates.
Hernandez’s fellow Patriots were seemingly afraid of their teammate, while newcomers were warned to stay away from him in the locker room.
“During training camp, Wes Welker comes right up to me and grabs me by the shoulders,” Brandon Lloyd recalled.
“He says, ‘Brandon, your locker is between Gronk and Aaron Hernandez. Aaron, he’s going to fondle his genitals in front of you, he’s going to talk to his mother about baths, and you should just ignore it.’ as if Wes had seen a ghost the way he looked at me.”
“All the warnings were, ‘Don’t hang out with Chico (Hernandez),’” Lloyd later added. “Don’t hang out with Chico.” That was the code. “For your own safety, don’t associate with Aaron.” So something was known.’
Lloyd also shared a version of a walkthrough when Hernandez was laughing and calling Belichick “daddy” during drills. Finally, Tom Brady snapped and told Hernandez to “get the hell off the field.”
Hernandez’s fellow Patriots were seemingly afraid of their teammate in the locker room
Meanwhile, Deion Branch was the designated Hernandez whisperer, apparently the only one who could talk him down.
“Every time Aaron was cooking, Coach would always ask me, ‘Is everything okay? Is everything OK? Is everything OK?’ It was like, ‘Contact Deion.'”
And it’s clear from the episode that Branch was starting to wear out and he painfully blames himself for missing the signals.
“I hope people don’t take this the wrong way,” he says at the beginning of the episode. ‘You only know deeply what someone is, and you can only judge him by what you see. I have moments where I think, ‘You should have seen that. Well, Deion, you should have seen that.’