ESPN’s historic deal with the NFL will change sports media for the long term. New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft made his stance clear on the groundbreaking move.

ESPN will have league’s official network fantasy platform and ever-popular RedZone channel transfer over to the ESPN offices. In exchange, the NFL will have a 10% stake in the sports organization, which Kraft was very positive about.

“I think we’ve hooked up with the best partners we can have,” Patriots owner Robert Kraft said in an interview with NFL senior national columnist Judy Battista. “That will help expose us to more homes, more of an international audience. Strategically, we have to grow our salary cap and can only do that by — if we want to keep labor peace, we have to grow our audience. This transaction helps us to do that.”

“They’re people we have confidence in. This is a way for us to broaden our audience. We’ve done so much. I don’t think there’s any company like Disney and ESPN in doing sports, all sports. We need to expose our product to more people and a greater variety of people.”

What’s next for Robert Kraft, Patriots

It’s clear that the NFL is taking a unique direction with their new contract with ESPN. As for Robert Kraft’s Patriots and the rest of the league, they will get enjoy the benefits of being under the bigger spotlight.

The Patriots begin a new era this season, having Mike Vrabel be their head coach. They went 4-13 in the 2024 campaign, firing Jerod Mayo after the season finale.

New England hasn’t had the same amount of success since the departures of franchise legends Tom Brady and Bill Belichick. They haven’t returned to the playoffs since 2021, knowing that they need a new leader at the helm to return to contention.

This upcoming season will have Drake Maye as the starting quarterback. He enters the second season of his career, showing flashes as a rookie as he looks to bring the Patriots back to the playoffs.