Championship rings are unique to North American sports. You’ll find farmers, bankers, doctors all over the U.S in possession of a Championship ring, holding onto former glory perhaps even from their High School days as State Champions. A Championship ring, usually awarded to each player, member of staff and executive on a team symbolises a team’s victory akin to medals awarded in sports outside of North America - such as the Premier League. Rings are highly customisable and typically feature a team’s logo, name, choice of stone colour, cut and more. While a high school Championship ring may range between $30 to $200 per item, the always-glamorous Super Bowl Champions of the NFL command a larger budget to commemorate their victory: the average cost of an NFL Super Bowl ring, currently, is $36,500 (£27,700) per item. To put that into perspective, the average cost of an engagement ring in the UK is £1,865.
The NFL contributes up to $5,000 for each Super Bowl ring. Teams have approximately 150 rings made and cover the rest of the costs themselves, with the total cost of a set amounting to somewhere in the region of $5,000,000 . Minnesota-based jewellery and memorabilia maker Jostens have crafted 35 out of the 53 Super Bowl rings to date, other designers include Tiffany & Co and Balfour. Reportedly, the process of designing, creating and distributing the rings takes around four months. Most designs include the phrase ‘World Champions’, the number of the Super Bowl in Roman numerals (required by the NFL) as well as the game score, season record and an individual’s name and jersey number. The rings will typically be presented in an elegant presentation case with glass windows and likely contained in a safe at one’s home.
The losing Super Bowl team gets a ring, too. It is not a ‘Super Bowl Losers ring’ but instead a conference title ring having represented the AFC/NFC in the title game. The Pittsburgh Steelers broke tradition, however, after Super Bowl XLV - electing to award watches to their team and staff instead of rings. It’s speculated that a small AFC Championship ring would have dwarfed their huge Super Bowl XLIII ring from two seasons before, cheapening their award from the Super Bowl XLV loss. The avoidance of disappointing players was based on former Steelers teams being unhappy with the size of their Super Bowl XL ring, weighing 53 grams featuring five large princess cut diamonds. This was significantly smaller than other rings during this time period, as the New England Patriots were the team to first introduce ‘big’ rings after the 2003 season, weighing over 100 grams after
Super Bowl XXXVIII.
Designed by Vince Lombardi, legendary coach of the Green Bay Packers, the Super Bowl I ring contained a rather modest one-half carat diamond set in a globe of white gold. The glitz and glamour of Super Bowls only increased since the first of its kind in the 1966 season, so in turn the elegance and cost of rings did the same. For decades, rings were primarily crafted from gold and diamonds until the 2010 Green Bay Packers opted for a platinum ring - the only team to ever do so. It contained more than 100 diamonds and featured the franchise logo in centre, made up of 13 diamonds referring to each title the team has won dating back to 1929. Other rings of the past decade, like the New England Patriots’ of Super Bowl LIII, have been crafted in 10-karat gold with 20 blue sapphires and an immense 400 diamonds. Heavy. The largest Super Bowl ring, however, belongs to defensive end William ‘The Refrigerator’ Perry of the ‘85 Chicago Bears. Jostens claims that his size 25(!) band was so large that it required multiple machines to construct. If you want to see a ring for yourself, you can view selected rings at the Pro Football Hall of Fame in Canton, Ohio or the NFL offices at Park Avenue, New York City.
Rings are the goal. So desired, you’ll find older players around the league who haven’t won yet begin ‘ring-chasing’ by joining more competitive teams for less money than they would make elsewhere. Like Bruce Arians so elegantly put in his first meeting with his 2016 Arizona Cardinals: “As far as goals: we have one: Putting a f------ ring on our finger. Not a Super Bowl, a Super Bowl ring. You go to win the B----”. However precious, some have shown that these rings don’t become priceless. One deep-pocketed fan acquired a widely coveted ring after placing a winning bid of $1.025 million on Patriots owner Robert Kraft’s Super Bowl LI ring featuring 283 diamonds, 5.1 karats in weight crafted with 10-karat white gold. It is inscribed with ‘Greatest Comeback Ever’ in honour of the team’s 28-3 comeback in the second half against the Atlanta Falcons. The fan’s money went to a good cause - aiding several charities among the Covid-19 pandemic.
