The best owners in sports are the ones who mostly stay out of dealing with roster situations.

They can discuss with the decision makers they put in charge whether they can afford to put in more money, but the more they sit back and let the on-field decisions be made by general managers and coaches, the better things are for a franchise.

It always seemed like Robert Kraft was one of those owners. Since the man at the helm of the Patriots hired and gave power to Bill Belichick, it always seemed from the outside like he simply let Belichick execute “the Patriot Way” without much input.

That is, until you read the explosive new report from ESPN’s Seth Wickersham. The focus is on the tension between Tom Brady, Bill Belichick and the Pats organization as a whole, but there’s this part on Kraft and how Jimmy Garoppolo ended up traded to the 49ers:

Two weeks before the Nov. 1 trading deadline, Belichick met with Kraft to discuss the quarterback situation. According to staffers, the meeting ran long, lasting half the day and pushing back Belichick’s other meetings. The office was buzzing. The meeting ended with a clear mandate to Belichick: trade Garoppolo because he would not be in the team’s long-term plans, and then, once again, find the best quarterback in the draft and develop him. Belichick was furious and demoralized, according to friends. But in the end, he did what he asks of his players and coaches: He did his job. … Brady, though, seemed liberated. Kraft hugged Brady when he saw him that week, in full view of teammates. A few days later during practice, some players and staffers noticed that Brady seemed especially excited, hollering and cajoling. Brady was once again the team’s present and future. His new backup, Brian Hoyer, was a longtime friend and not a threat. The owner was in Brady’s corner. “He won,” a Patriots staffer says.

That sounds extremely problematic for the Patriots. Even if Belichick and the Pats do what they always seem to do — find a diamond in the rough in the draft and develop him — it’s a bad sign that this report painted a picture of Kraft forcing Belichick’s hand.

Now, look at what’s ahead for the Patriots: A possibility that Brady’s age catches up with him (there’s notes of that in Wickersham’s piece as well) and the contingency plan that was Garoppolo is gone. Jimmy G., meanwhile, just finished an incredible post-trade end-of-season with the Niners and is in line to be their QB of the future if they hand the free agent a lucrative contract.

Yes, there’s the fact that keeping Garoppolo would have been a complicated mess that also might have hurt the Patriots’ salary cap — Wickersham reports New England “repeatedly offered Garoppolo four-year contract extensions, in the $17 million to $18 million range annually that would go higher if and when he succeeded Brady.”

But if Kraft had to jump in and side with Brady, there’s a complicated mess brewing in Foxborough anyway.