Kraft doesn’t want any blame, but his fingerprints are all over it

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ORLANDO — Patriots fans and Bill Belichick supporters weren’t the only ones disappointed in the Apple TV+ docuseries “The Dynasty.” Patriots owner Robert Kraft said Tuesday at the NFL owners meetings that he wished the 10part series was a little more positive.

“I felt bad that there was so much emphasis on the more controversial, and let’s say challenging situations over the last 20 years,” Kraft said. “A little disappointed that there wasn’t more of a real positive approach — especially for Patriot fans who have lived the experience with us.”

Kraft seems to have heard and felt the criticism of the project, because his complaints echoed those being voiced by many Patriots fans.

“I wish they had focused more on our Super Bowl wins, our 21-game win streak,” Kraft said. “I felt bad there were players who gave hours and hours of interviews, and they only felt the negativity — players like Devin McCourty and Rodney Harrison and Matthew [Slater].”

If only there were someone powerful enough who could have stepped in.

Kraft’s comments gave the impression that he was an innocent bystander and had no role in the content of the series. A spokesman for Kraft has explained that Robert and Jonathan Kraft were just doing a favor for their friends Brian Grazer and Ron Howard, the executive producers of “The Dynasty,” and director Matthew Hamachek was the one pushing the controversy and negativity.

The spokesman also said that Kraft Sports Productions wasn’t involved in the project, and the “Copyright Kraft Dynasty 2024 that appears at the end of each episode doesn’t mean the Krafts had any creative control, but is just a way for the Patriots to protect the video footage they provided.

There’s an answer for everything. A lot of blame being shifted. And it’s all done with Kraft distancing himself from a project that he seems to have spearheaded.

The series, while fascinating, has not been universally embraced. Many Patriots fans are upset that controversies like Spygate and Aaron Hernandez got their own episodes, while some Super Bowl seasons were barely mentioned.

McCourty said he felt “duped” into participating. And a lot of people — Patriots fans, those inside the NFL, casual observers — seem to be put off by the depiction of Bill Belichick throughout the series, particularly in the final two episodes about Malcolm Butler’s Super Bowl benching and the departure of Tom Brady.

One executive at the owners meetings said he couldn’t believe how poorly

Belichick was portrayed, and another said he wouldn’t watch the series because of it. An NFL Films source said the company backed out of supporting the project because it was too slanted against Belichick, and indeed, NFL Films is not mentioned anywhere in January’s press release touting the series, after initially being listed as a contributor in 2022.

Kraft seems to want us to believe that he’s just as upset as anyone else about “The Dynasty” and that he had no control over what was presented. But even if we take the Krafts at their word, they certainly authorized the entire series.

Take the original press release from 2022 promoting the series: “The filmmakers have also been given access to the organization during the 2021 season.” The Patriots provided “thousands of hours of never-before-seen video footage and audio files from the Patriots organization’s archive.”

And remember, “The Dynasty” was based on the book by Jeff Benedict, who had “unprecedented access to the New England Patriots … two years inside the organization.” The Patriots gave Benedict’s book as a gift to season ticketholders, and invited Benedict, also an executive producer on the docuseries, to hold a book signing at the Patriots’ fan headquarters in Frankfurt, Germany, in November.

There’s also an interview Grazer did with Deadline in January that points to Kraft leading the project.

“So, in any event, someone else was going to do it, and then Kraft said, ‘Well, Brian, if you were going to do it then I would love to do this with you,’ ” Grazer told Deadline.

Another quote: “So even though [Kraft] did get some pushback in different directions, he said, we’re doing this and we’re doing it with cooperation from everybody . . . I mean, if we couldn’t get it done, Bob was there to push it over and make it happen.”

Hamachek has been taking some heat for the series’ focus on scandal and negativity, but he told MassLive, “In a lot of ways, we’re just asking questions and getting out of the way. People say it’s a rip job, but I don’t have a history with any of these people. I don’t have a favorite, or non-favorite. It’s really me just saying, I’m going to ask questions, people are going to give answers, and I’m going to listen, and this is the story people who were there told.”

We all know who does have a history with these people — Kraft. And who seems to be motivated to let the world know that Belichick is responsible for Brady leaving town and for the sorry state of the Patriots franchise.

If Kraft is upset about the negativity in “The Dynasty,” he doesn’t appear concerned that it crushes Belichick. Kraft was asked a follow-up question Tuesday about the portrayal of Belichick in the series, and he rambled through an answer that mostly focused on Brady’s induction into the Patriots Hall of Fame this June.

“I look forward to the privilege of putting Bill into the Patriots Hall of Fame one day in the future,” Kraft said, ignoring the original question.

“The Dynasty” does a commendable job of providing fresh insight into the Patriots’ 20-year run. And though it’s dripping with negativity, it’s not false. Players really were upset with Belichick for benching Butler. Brady really did grow tired of Belichick at the end.

Kraft just wants us to believe that he had nothing to do with “The Dynasty,” even though his fingerprints are all over it.