For a long time, my expectations of Donald Trump have been that he will be worse than I think, just never in the way that I think. Say what you will about the man, he is full of surprises.
I assumed he’d make the country dumber, but I didn’t think he’d succeed at nixing the entire Department of Education. I figured he’d do his best to destroy the federal government, but DOGE really came out of left field. (Or should that be the far right field?) And of course I knew he’d raise tariffs, but I had no idea his administration would somehow cause Aiden and Carrie to get back together BECAUSE NO ONE WAS ASKING FOR THAT.
This ability to be terrible in new and alarming ways came to mind again when Trump attended the final match in this year’s FIFA Club World Cup—a global men’s soccer competition—last weekend. More specifically, he attended the Club World Cup final, got booed, said he might sign an executive order making Americans call soccer “football,” insisted on joining the winning team onstage to lift their trophy, and then was given his very own special big-boy gold medal.
It’s giving “two-year-old who has to get his own presents at his sister’s birthday party or he’ll throw a tantrum and ruin the whole thing” vibe. Except this toddler recently turned 79.
And his present? The real pièce de résistance was when Trump revealed that he kept the Club World Cup trophy for himself, forcing FIFA to give the winners—you know the ones who played the actual game—a replica.
If at this point you’re asking yourself “Why does Donald Trump need a soccer trophy?” allow me counter with an additional question: “Why did Vladimir Putin need a Super Bowl ring?”
Sit back kids, as I tell you the tale of a dictator who stole a Super Bowl ring and then everyone had to pretend it was a gift so America didn’t get nuked.
Picture it: the year is 2005. Tom Cruise jumped on Oprah’s couch. Meredith Grey just met her McDreamy and Brangelina were the hot new couple. The jeans were skinny, the tracksuits were Juicy, and the hats were trucker. Oh, and most relevantly, the New England Patriots had won the Super Bowl.
As Patriots’ owner Robert Kraft tells it, he had accepted an invitation to travel to Russia that June with a group of business leaders and meet Vladimir Putin. At a press conference there, he was encouraged by a friend to show Putin his newly-earned Super Bowl ring. He pulled it out to show off. Then, according to Kraft, this happened:
“(Putin) put it on and he goes, ‘I can kill someone with this ring.’ I put my hand out and he put it in his pocket, and three KGB guys got around him and walked out.”
Two things. First, “I can kill someone with this ring” is exactly what I intend to say the moment someone proposes marriage to me. And second, how dare you, Vlad!
It gets worse. In 2013, Kraft admitted that the White House called him shortly after his visit and, ahem, suggested he say that he gave Putin the ring as a gift. “It would really be in the best interest of U.S.-Soviet relations if you meant to give the ring as a present,” Kraft later claimed he was told. And he subsequently released a statement saying just that, and a little more brown-nosing still.
(A Kremlin spokesperson denied that Putin has nabbed the ring, asserting that Kraft had offered it up. The White House never addressed their involvement in the incident, per Kraft’s claims.)
The Super Bowl ring has remained with Putin ever since. That audacity is both horrifying and impressive. It’s like watching a guy walk into a wedding, kiss the bride, grab a fistful of cake and some gifts and leave—against everything you believe, but with a tiny part of you wishing you could be that person.
A tiny part of you, that is, but all of Donald Trump. It’s no surprise that Vladimir Putin is right in the center of Trump’s vision board. Even now, when Trump is bad-mouthing the guy, there’s an inkling of his admiration still there.
Now that he has a taste for trophies (and certainly trophy wives), Trump is unlikely to stop anytime soon. So don’t be surprised if you walk into the Oval Office to find a man—sitting there in a yellow Tour de France jersey, with a heavyweight title belt around his waist and a royal tiara atop his combover—unable to sign executive orders because his desk is covered in Best Supporting Actor Oscars and medals he stole from four-star generals. He’ll have Heismans on the coffee table and MTV Best Kiss awards in the cabinets. And he’ll be drinking Diet Coke out of the Stanley Cup.
In the meantime, I’ll stay away from windows. You know, just in case.
