Super Bowl ring


The Super Bowl ring is an award in the National Football League given to the winners of the league's annual championship game, the Super Bowl. Since only one Vince Lombardi Trophy is awarded to the team itself, the Super Bowl ring offers a collectable memento for the actual players and team members to keep for themselves to symbolize their victory. There are also rings provided to the runners-up team of the Super Bowl.
Rings are also awarded to members of the team who wins the AFC or NFC championship. The NFL also provides postseason pay to all players as long as they have spent at least three games on their team’s active or inactive list; the playoff bonus money is egalitarian within a team among starters, backups, and injured players.

Details

These rings are typically made of yellow or rose gold with diamonds. They usually include the team name, team logo, the phrase "World Champions", and the Super Bowl number. Many rings feature diamonds in the shape of the Vince Lombardi Trophy or a football, to illustrate the number of Super Bowls that the franchise has won. Also, the rings are customized with the player's name and uniform number. The NFL contributes up to $5,000 per ring for up to 150 rings for the winning team; any additional costs are borne by the team. Most rings are manufactured by memorabilia company Jostens.
The winning team can typically present rings to whomever they choose, including usually, but not limited to: players, coaches, trainers, executives, personnel, and general staff. Some teams have given rings to former players and coaches that were on the team at some point during the season, despite not having been on the winning roster for the Super Bowl itself. Sometimes a team will give rings to fans as part of a charity raffle. Teams can distribute any number of rings. A recent trend over the last 15–20 years has been lesser rings awarded to front office staff. These are commonly called "B" and "C" level rings and are smaller and contain fewer diamonds or contain faux diamonds. The first instance of this was the Redskins Super Bowl XVII ring when many in the front office received rings that were not solid gold and contained cubic zirconia stones. When Tampa Bay won Super Bowl XXXVII, the players and coaches received rings with a diamond-centered Lombardi trophy. Some staff received rings with a metal Lombardi trophy and real diamonds surrounding the trophy and the "C" level ring did not contain any diamonds.
The Green Bay Packers' Super Bowl XLV ring contained more than 100 diamonds. The Packer logo, in the center of the ring, made up 13 diamonds, one for each title the team has won, dating back to 1929. The New England Patriots Super Bowl XLIX rings reportedly cost $36,500 each, making them the most expensive rings Jostens had ever produced at that time, only to be surpassed by the rings awarded for Super Bowl 50 and Super Bowl LI. The New England Patriots' Super Bowl LI ring has 283 diamonds, to commemorate their comeback from being down 28–3 versus the Atlanta Falcons late in the 3rd quarter, about which Falcons owner Arthur Blank reportedly confronted Patriots owner Robert Kraft in August 2017 over his perceived "insult-by-karat". The Philadelphia Eagles' ring for Super Bowl LII contains 127 diamonds on the bezel, which is the total from the numbers of the jerseys of the three players who handled the ball after the snap on the Philly Special trick play—Corey Clement, Trey Burton and Nick Foles.

Value and resale

Replicas of the rings for various years are popular collectibles, along with genuine rings. Dave Meggett is known to have placed his ring for sale on eBay. Two Super Bowl rings from the 1970 Steelers sold on eBay for over $69,000 apiece in mid-2008. Patriots safety Je'Rod Cherry raffled his ring from Super Bowl XXXVI in November 2008 to benefit several charities working to help children in Africa and Asia. Tight end Shannon Sharpe, meanwhile, gave his first Super Bowl ring to his brother Sterling, who had his career cut short by injury.
In 2005, a minor international incident was caused when it was reported that Russian President Vladimir Putin had taken a Super Bowl ring from New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft. Kraft quickly issued a statement saying that he had given Putin the ring out of "respect and admiration" he had for the Russian people and Putin's leadership. Kraft later said his earlier statement was not true, and had been issued under pressure from the White House. The ring is on display at the Kremlin, along with other "gifts".

Most Super Bowl rings