- 2 months ago
The Athletic's parent company is investigating themselves about the hiring and employment of Dianna Russini. Pro Football Talk’s Mike Florio joins the show to talk about whether more negative Mike Vrabel news will be included when the details are released.
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00:00well one of the biggest stories of this nfl offseason wasn't a trade it was a scandal
00:06one between our own mike vrabel and diana russini the nfl insider and uh we all saw the pictures
00:13that came out we all saw the very strange boat rental where she was pregnant and they took
00:19pictures with people of all the pictures that came out the ones that made me like how could
00:23you just be so cavalier with this relationship it was a bonding exercise sure that sure that
00:29you just took photos just then don't tell anyone and of course everything breaks and then this all
00:33happens but a uh the new york times who is the parent company of the athletic which is of course
00:38where diana russini worked they put out an article uh yesterday and it was a pretty extensive article
00:44going through some of the new findings that they came up with that is really it seems to me like
00:51it's a teaser for when the actual investigation that the athletic is doing about diana russini drops
00:57matter of fact i don't really know what the purpose of this article was it did have some
01:01interesting things in it but a guy who's been on top of this entire story and we've had him on
01:04before
01:05to talk about it and amongst other things is the great mike florio from pro football talk uh mike
01:09thanks for joining us man we really appreciate it guys how's it going today good as always um all
01:14right so you know we were just talking about this what do you think the purpose of the new york
01:17times
01:17coming out with this article yesterday was when it seems like we're kind of on the horizon of
01:23the actual big drop that of the investigation that the athletic has about diana russini i think
01:29they felt compelled to engage in some form of journalism as it relates to the biggest
01:34off-field story that the nfl has had since the super bowl and my first thought when i saw it
01:41was
01:42the athletics report of its internal investigation must be coming soon and they wanted to get ahead of
01:49it and it may very well be the appetizer for what the athletic is going to eventually publish whether
01:54they publish it internally externally doesn't matter if they publish it internally somebody's
01:58going to leak it we're all going to see it at some point and my guess is coming next week
02:02maybe
02:02thursday maybe friday perfect midsummer bad news dump right before fourth of july right right like
02:09it's going to be thursday like thursday afternoon everyone's already got off on their vacations
02:14you know like you know you got the d team that's on like espn the next day so yeah i
02:19could totally see
02:21that happening but it is weird wasn't it uh mike when you when you're reading an article written by
02:27the parent company of the company that's doing their own investigation it seemed very strange because
02:34like are they going to tell you everything because if they find something bad that makes them look bad
02:41well and nobody from the times where the athletic would speak on the record about the situation to
02:48the new york times and you make a great point that was something we wrote today and i have found
02:54five six seven different items within this longer article that i think are interesting
03:00but they mention kind of in passing with just one paragraph the julio jones trade from atlanta to
03:08tennessee that happened in june of 2021 they don't mention that vrabel was the head coach of the
03:12titans at the time and there are some interesting aspects of her reporting from right around the same
03:19time that could be used to make the argument that something fishy was going on that there may have
03:23been an effort to help the titans get julio jones and to not mention any of that i feel like
03:31that at
03:31some level there's a desire to ensure that no one takes a step back and says what did the athletic
03:40know what should it have known about who they were hiring when they hired her in 2023 so i think
03:45that's
03:46out there too i think there's some not so subtle cya to avoid that question of why did the athletic
03:53hire her in the first place if there was evidence out there if there were rumors out there if whatever
03:59was out there what kind of a vetting did they do yeah because it seemed like they played dumb in
04:04the
04:04article too because there was there was a story that they mentioned that was on a podcast she was
04:09on i think she told the story was two gods and it was about how she got pulled over and
04:14to get out of
04:15a ticket she asked the officer who's your favorite football coach and she got him on facetime to get
04:20him out of a ticket and and and i believe that their quote was just like well we're just now
04:25finding
04:25out about this because she did not ask us to go on a podcast once again doesn't that also seem
04:31like
04:31like everything that's going to come out is just going to make the company that's writing the article
04:35look bad so i question how much they're actually going to release yeah what it means is they were
04:40paying attention to nothing that she was saying on any of these various platforms or if they were
04:45it never dawned on them that there was anything about it that seemed off base in any way and look
04:53it's one thing to not just pay the ticket but leverage a relationship with a coach to try to
05:00get out of the ticket but then to go talk about it publicly yeah i mean it's just judgment lapse
05:08on
05:08top of judgment lapse and yeah maybe the athletic knew about it and didn't think anything of it or
05:13they're hiding behind this clause in their contract and all those contracts have it in there you got to
05:17ask for permission and at the end of the day nobody does they just do whatever they do but what
05:20you say
05:21is out there anybody that wants to know about it wants to hear about it can find it easily
05:26well mike there was a lot of nothing in there but as you point out there are a couple things
05:30that
05:30you do pause like so she she emailed the publisher of the athletic and two senior editors at the times
05:36to ask to make a text that she had said to a reporter off the record that is kind of
05:41interesting
05:41that they put that in there what do you read from that what's that mean for the next wave well
05:46anybody who
05:48is in the media business who is engaged in any type of reporting who has gone to journalism school
05:54and i didn't but i've kind of learned over 25 years what the rules of the road are if you
05:58just
05:58talk to a reporter anything you say is on the record you've got to say off the record and they
06:03have to agree to it before anything you say is off the record and there have been people within the
06:09nfl ecosystem that have gotten in trouble with that whether they knew or should have known better
06:13sean payton a few years ago if you remember he said a lot of stuff about the broncos and
06:17former coach nathaniel hackett to jared bell of usa today and it made a big uproar and the reality is
06:22he just forgot to say off the record before he talked to jared bell he intended it to be off
06:27the
06:27record but somebody who's been doing it for as long as payton has should know to say this is off
06:31the
06:31record and russini should have known or did know that you have to say off the record you don't just
06:37start responding to a reporter who's asking you for an interview and then at the end of the text message
06:43try to say don't use any of this in your story so that was just kind of odd and we've
06:48seen this
06:49you know this effort to kind of go around and go over people's heads and complain to people and i
06:54i mean there's a level of of aggressiveness that comes through that makes me wonder what's going
07:01to happen if and when the athletic releases its report is there going to be something in there
07:06that causes her to take some sort of action against the athletic i think that's part of what
07:10the times company the athletic and the new york times are trying to balance here oh wow so you
07:15think that she like from what comes out of this she could probably try to like sue them for like
07:21what would she sue them for i i mean because obviously they're probably not going to release
07:25anything unless it's well researched i i i gotta think of the new york times they've been through
07:29things like this before well a defamation of character case would be very difficult for any public
07:34figure to make because the standard is much higher than what it would be for someone who isn't a
07:39public figure but when you consider that all she's said so far other than what she told the reporter
07:46before she tried to take it off the record is that nothing happened there's nothing to see here this is
07:50all something that the media made up that is unmoored from the facts that was from her resignation
07:55letter and she hasn't said anything since then so if she insists that there was nothing there and
08:00these reports and these comments and whatever the athletic may find that she did however they characterize
08:05it nothing stops her from doing it it may go nowhere but nothing stops her from doing it what
08:10do you believe diana racini's next move is i think she's going to resurface somewhere as a podcaster a
08:17radio host an opinion maker and i think there will be an element of reporting that maybe trickles into
08:25what she does even though she won't be a reporter there's plenty of radio hosts who quote unquote know
08:29people and who quote unquote hear things and share them and you know if it's right hey i'm right and
08:36if it's wrong oh it's just what i was hearing from somebody i know so if she's able to maintain
08:40a
08:40network of people who talk to her she'll be able to weave some reporting into whatever it is she does
08:45but i suspect at some point and i don't know where it will be but at some point at the
08:50right time
08:50she'll resurface with even if it's her own podcast that she starts from her house i don't think
08:55she's going to go away forever we know no matter how and and i'm not trying to say this is
09:01worse
09:01than that or that's worse than this but for pretty much anything once enough time passes everybody
09:05forgets about it and moves on and people who go away for a while they come back and it's like
09:09it
09:09never happened do you think if she because i was thinking at first that she'd have to address this
09:15at some point like she would have to break the dam like her first big appearance she would have to
09:20address it but then i was thinking she's paid off she doesn't have to address it she can just kind
09:25of
09:25move on do you think that that's realistic that potentially she could be paid to not say anything
09:32well i think that there's always a chance that she's going to agree to sit down with someone
09:39and do an interview as long as the interest lingers to interview her to get her story that
09:45possibility is going to be out there and one of the things i've been saying about the patriots week
09:48one game at seattle wednesday september 9 tuesday night september 8 would be the perfect time
09:53for her to sit down with oprah or whoever and tell her story i don't know that anyone's going to
10:00care by september but look here we are two and a half months removed from it and it's still
10:04a big deal so i've thought at some point that's one of her options to tell her story whatever her
10:09story may be nobody knows what her story is because she's hardly said anything about it that may be her
10:14way to kind of get back into the mix depending upon how compelling the story is depending upon whether or
10:20not it generates any sympathy or people understand her side of it again we're just guessing because
10:25we have no idea what she would say if she would do an interview like that but to me before
10:30the times
10:30report came out i thought there were two ways that this story could get more oxygen one the athletics
10:37report of its internal investigation and two when she tells her story wherever she tells her story
10:42were you surprised mike that the patriots did get that opening game
10:49yeah yes and no i know the nfl's position is it was too hard to resist having a super bowl
10:56rematch
10:57right out of the gates but they've had super bowl rematches before that weren't right out of the gates
11:02it's only the third time it's ever happened dating all the way back to after the vikings and the chiefs
11:07played in super bowl four so it was surprising i don't know that the average football fan has the
11:13appetite to tune back in for the first game that they'll watch after the super bowl and see the same
11:19thing that they saw from santa clara because that's the reality and we always remind ourselves of
11:25this at nbc since we have the first game every year there's a lot of people are going to tune
11:30into that
11:30game on wednesday september 9 who have been paying attention to not very much at all and i don't know
11:36how many of those people are going to be thrilled now i i still think there's a chance the patriots
11:40could win the game but the fact that the super bowl itself just felt like one of those old 70s
11:45style suffocation super bowls yeah it's it's it's easy to make the argument that there are more
11:52compelling opponents on seattle's home schedule mike there was something in this article that i want
11:58to ask you about i totally forgot about because i don't know how odd this is and there was a
12:02god i wish
12:03i had the article in front of me on how they worded it but it was something along the lines
12:07of
12:07when vrabel had was done with the titans that she was basically someone helping guide his career like
12:16she was a helper maybe keeping him in contact with the powers that be it almost sounded like she was
12:22acting somewhat as like a mini agent for him uh do you have this right oh you have it right
12:27here
12:27um it's like an unofficial advisor yeah that's what it was like an unofficial advisor to mike vrabel
12:33does that happen with insiders or is this something completely out of bounds one of the realities of
12:39this entire situation and i know that the people who are quote unquote insiders get nervous about this
12:45it does expose a lot about how that business works and i've written about it i've spoken about it when
12:51we see insiders breaking transactional news when someone signs a contract it happens all the time
12:58now an agent will send out a text message to multiple people at the same time and then it's a
13:04race to see who can be the first one to copy it paste it and post it on twitter it
13:09happened yesterday
13:09with brendan strange's contract because i don't try to get those anymore because number one my audience
13:16doesn't care that that someone else had it before this other person right right i don't want to play
13:23this game where i've got to in order to be at the front of the line i've got to make
13:31sure i name the
13:32agents and put the twitter handle of the firm and i got the text yesterday on brendan strange and i
13:39sent
13:39it to my staff and i said you watch and see how many people tweet exactly what was texted and
13:44at least two
13:45of them dead yeah yeah yeah so i was just that was a weird thing in that article i didn't
13:50really
13:50understand what they meant by that that they were you know like she was helping them out that way it
13:55was kind of wild how many titans games she covered as a national reporter like it was like half a
14:00season
14:00essentially it was down there it's like now that you see all this stuff it's like how many people
14:04must have known right i mean i don't know how you can do what they did and people around you
14:09just not know what was going on and i think this is the core issue as it relates to the
14:14new york times
14:15and the athletic the times has a very high bar when it comes to journalistic standards but i think
14:23when you're hiring someone who's covering the nfl in that insider role you just want the information
14:30there are certain things you don't care about if you're the producer if you're the editor if you're
14:36the network and you could argue that if this story had emerged while she was working for
14:43any other company and i'm not going to name any i'm just saying anyone other than the new york times
14:48where that bar is lower maybe they just kind of turn a blind eye to it because at the end
14:53of the day
14:54it's effective it works it gets you news that's why they're there and i think there's plenty of people
15:01in management positions that don't care how they get it as long as they get it yeah exactly and and
15:08the the the one thing that's going to get them i think in the most trouble is if they find
15:12out
15:12that there was some sort of way that the trade market was manipulated because of her relationship
15:18like that julio jones thing is interesting i mean that that truly could have could i mean and we don't
15:23even know what else there could be i mean that's like the first one that you see in the obviously
15:26the
15:26most obvious example but if there comes out proof that you know their relationship manipulated that
15:32the times could be in legitimate trouble well and i know a lot of eagles fans were upset about the
15:37perception that there was reporting that potentially impacted the aj brown trade to the patriots that
15:45maybe the patriots got better terms because of some of the reporting so i would expect that the athletic
15:51is taking a close look at everything she has reported that relates directly or indirectly to mike
15:56variable during the three years that she worked for the athletic i don't know that espn is doing
16:02anything i reached out to them once we saw the photos that the new york post published right before
16:07the draft of rabel and brissini at a bar in new york city which i think those photos were a
16:14lot more
16:15we know what we see here than the original photos that came out i reached out to espn to see
16:21if they
16:21were doing anything and they aren't saying anything about this i think from their perspective they don't
16:25want to dredge up any of this but you raise fair questions what do people know when did they know
16:29it
16:29and ultimately do they care if there was anything going on that maybe wasn't something that
16:36satisfies strict journalism standards do they really care or do they care about
16:42getting these stories before anyone else does well we will find out when the investigation is released
16:47at 5 p.m on july 3rd right when everyone obvious though right i think it's going to be thursday
16:55because friday would be too obvious and i could see the athletic talking themselves into doing it
17:00wednesday because thursday would be obvious that you were trying to avoid friday so maybe it's going
17:05to be wednesday july 1st i like it place your bets we'll see who's the closest all right well uh
17:10great
17:10stuff mike flory we love having you on profootballtalk.com and obviously all over the the interwebs uh
17:16thanks for coming on mike we appreciate it thanks guys
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