It’s been about two months since Page Six first published the bombshell photos that set off a weeks-long news cycle about an apparent relationship between The Athletic NFL reporter Dianna Russini and New England Patriots head coach Mike Vrabel. Those photos would lead to an internal investigation by The New York Times, which owns The Athletic. Days later, Russini would resign from her post at The Athletic, but the internal investigation into her reporting continued.
Now, many weeks later, there has still been no public comment from the Times regarding its internal investigation into Russini. And it appears as if there won’t be any update into the findings of the investigation for at least several more weeks.
According to a new report in Page Six, The Athletic’s top editor Steven Ginsberg told staffers last week that the findings of the investigation will eventually be revealed, but it is still “weeks” away.
“It’s going to take a few more weeks,” Ginsberg reportedly said at a routine all-hands meeting with staffers. “There’s just a lot to go through, and we obviously want to take our time and be careful doing that. We will update everybody when we get to the end of that. We’ve also said that if we find anything that needs to be corrected, we will correct it along the way.”
Ginsberg initially defended Russini’s version of events, which claimed the photos taken of her and Vrabel were misleading because the duo was in a larger group of people. The top editor said in a statement, “These photos are misleading and lack essential context.” Of course, neither Russini nor Vrabel were able to verify these claims, and the preponderance of evidence that continued to trickle out painted a much different picture about the pair’s relationship, forcing Ginsberg to backtrack.
Parts of Russini’s past reporting have already been called into question as having potentially helped Vrabel during his previous stint with the Tennessee Titans. Of course, the Times investigation is designed to be thorough and provide a holistic representation of Russini’s reporting throughout her tenure, going well beyond the speculation that is already out there.
But for now, we’ll have to wait a bit longer to hear what the Times found.