DHL Dan CCXXII - The Big Hurt

Who could've predicted Shank taking another steaming dump on New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft so soon?

Bob Kraft seems to be hurting his own cause with the Hall of Fame, and other thoughts

NEW YORK — Picked-up pieces while waking up in the city that doesn’t sleep . . .

▪ Patriots owner Bob Kraft has another chance to be elected to the Pro Football Hall of Fame later this season. Based on the team’s push to advance his candidacy, it’s pretty clear that the honor means a lot to the 83-year-old owner.

An exhaustive piece by ESPN’s Don Van Natta this past week demonstrated the “urgent and inventive” campaigning carried out by Kraft’s PR chief, Stacey James, over the last dozen-plus years.

According to ESPN, “No current owner has tried harder to get into the Hall — or been denied longer . . . In recent years, James has called, texted, dined, cajoled, and backslapped voters . . . James has emailed voters a six-page dossier that extolls Kraft’s many achievements as an NFL owner . . . James obtained a list of subcommittee voters. He phoned them, cornered them at Super Bowls, invited them to lunch or dinner or a visit to the owner’s suite, whatever it took to whip up votes.”

It's obvious (from this column and other reports) that Kraft's trying awful hard to get in; how many people he irritates and pisses off in doing so remains to be determined.