"If this stuff is true, then I've been duped and our whole organization has been duped."
"You can be sure we'll be looking at our procedures and auditing how we do things. My heart goes out to the Lloyd family I feel bad that someone connected to our organization is connected to this. Following Aaron's arrest, I read a number of different accounts of how things transpired in our organization. Let me be clear: We decided the week prior to Aaron's arrest that if Aaron was arrested in connection with the Lloyd murder case that we would cut him immediately after. The rationale behind that decision was that if any member of the New England Patriots organization is close enough to a murder investigation to actually get arrested -- whether it be for obstruction of justice or the crime itself, it is too close to an unthinkable act for that person to be part of this organization going forward. When he was in our building, we never saw anything where he was not polite. He was always respectful to me. We only know what's going on inside the building. We don't put private eyes on people."
"He spoke to me about wanting to be a role model in the Hispanic community," Kraft said. "... I believed him. ... He knew how to push my buttons." ~ Bob Kraft to ESPN reporters today
On June 17th, a 27 year old semi pro football player named Odin Lloyd was found by a 14 year old jogger. Lloyd was hidden in an industrial park, covered in blood... and dead. As police quietly began to investigate the situation, a broken mirror traced to a car rented in the name of Aaron Hernandez began to beg the unthinkable. Was this "most likable young man," According to Patriots owner Bob Kraft, a murderer?
Well, at this point while technically, Hernandez is innocent until proven guilty, at least in the court of public opinion the answer to that question is yes.
Regardless of that after dropping Hernandez mere minutes after his shocking arrest back in June, speculation quickly arose mainly questioning how the Patriots were to deal with the cloud of animosity and confusion hurtfully gathering around their formerly admirable organization.
To answer that question I say well, nothing: sort of.
Within hours of Hernandez being dropped from the team, the Patriots quickly scoured their pro shop removing any and all acknowledgment of the former tight end ever being a part of the team. Yet that wasn't the last of the memorabilia saga. As we now know, at several different points between Hernandez' arrest and the present, the team would host "Jersey Exchanges" in which, owners of a number 81 Aaron Hernandez jersey could come into the pro shop and exchange their jerseys for either a Vince Wilfork, Tom Brady, or Rob Gronkowski shirt.
Now while that generous gesture did at least help further erase Hernandez' footprint in Foxborough it came with a cost, a pretty big one. A quarter million dollar one. According to Bob Kraft due to the teams decision to not only replace any Hernandez jerseys but also destroy anything emblazoned with the suspect's 9 letter name, they lost almost 250,000 dollars, but even that massive number is rendered mute by the one 40 times larger caused by a fight for closure on Hernandez' contract.
Fact is, the Patriots will never be ridden of the mark of their former tight end meaning that after doing nearly everything that they could do to lessen that mark, the time to break the silence had long come and was beginning to pass. Nevertheless, when Bob Kraft spoke today it began to give closure and began to make Aaron Hernandez seem less like a New England Patriot and more like the suspected murderer that he is.
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