Watch: NFL Coach Mike Vrabel & Reporter Dianna Russini, Both Married, Speak Out After Vacation Pics Emerge
Just when it appeared that NFL coach Mike Vrabel was going to be hit with a major penalty—the New England Patriots’ leader was seen interlocking his fingers with married sports journalist Dianna Russini—he challenged the call on the field.
Yes, he and The Athletic’s senior NFL reporter visited a Sedona, Ariz., hotel at the same time, as seen in photos published by Page Six April 7, but they were huddled up with a whole squad.
“These photos show a completely innocent interaction and any suggestion otherwise is laughable,” Vrabel—married to college sweetheart Jen Vrabel since 1999—said in a statement to the outlet. “This doesn’t deserve any further response.”
Though his pal Russini, who shares two kids with Shake Shack executive husband Kevin Goldschmidt, was willing to provide an assist.
“The photos don’t represent the group of six people who were hanging out during the day,” she explained in a statement to E! News. “Like most journalists in the NFL, reporters interact with sources away from stadiums and other venues.”
But while The Athletic executive editor Steven Ginsberg initially defended her, telling E! News in an April 7 statement, “These photos are misleading and lack essential context,” Russini is now under investigation by her employer, sources familiar with the situation at The Athletic told E! News. (E! News has reached out ot reps for Russini and Vrabel for comment and has not heard back. The Athletic declined E! News’ request for comment.)
As for how the pair ended up playing defense? We’re breaking down all the Xs and Os.
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Who Is Mike Vrabel?
In short, Vrabel is the guy from the Patriots. A star during his college days at Ohio State University—a native of nearby Akron the defensive end twice received All-American honors and was named Big Ten Defensive Lineman of the Year in 1995 and 1996, later getting inducted into the Ohio State Athletics Hall of Fame—the now-50-year-old was selected by the Pittsburgh Steelers in the third round of the 1997 NFL draft.
Though he sported the black and yellow jersey for four seasons, he spent the bulk of his career suiting up for the Patriots. Tasked with forcing fumbles as an outside linebacker, he also occasionally lined up as a receiver, catching some 12 touchdown passes from then-quarterback Tom Brady.
Wrapping up his playing days with two seasons with the Kansas City Chiefs, the three-time Super Bowl champ announced his retirement in 2011 and a new game plan, joining the coaching staff at his alma mater.
In total, he spent nearly seven years on the sidelines with both Ohio State and the Houston Texans before scoring his first head coaching gig with the Tennessee Titans in 2018.
Photo by John Tlumacki/The Boston Globe via Getty Images
Given the chance to wear the headset for his former squad in January 2025, Vrabel truly ran with the ball. While he’d interviewed with the New York Jets and the Chicago Bears, he was excited to call plays for 23-year-old QB Drake Maye.
Thirteen months later, the two were huddling up at the 2026 Super Bowl.
Who Is Dianna Russini?
Like Vrabel, Russini is a major player in the world of sports. All-State in basketball, softball, soccer and track at New Jersey’s Northern Valley Regional High School, she spent four years on the pitch at George Mason University. (Though, as she noted in a 2017 interview with USA Today High School Sports, soccer wasn’t her “best sport in high school; track was.”)
Following reporting gigs in Westchester, New York City and Seattle, Russini, 43, was drafted to work as a sports anchor for NBC News, in West Hartford, Conn. and Washington, D.C.
Starting in 2015, she began suiting up as a SportsCenter anchor.
Asked her best advice for young reporters, she told SportsCenter’s Madelyn Burke in a February chat, “I would say to just be relentless. I think, when I look at the times that I really took a step forward, I always was uncomfortable. I was always uncomfortable and just kept going. I didn’t let anyone stop me.”
By making big plays, like the time she “cold called” NFL coach Bill Parcells, Russini continued, “If you just keep believing in yourself, people around you start believing and sometimes that can really help take you to the next place that you want to be.”
For Russini, that spot was on the roster at New York Times brand The Athletic, working as their senior NFL insider. One of the site’s highest paid writers, per NBC Sports, she also co-hosts Spotify’s Scoop City: Inside the NFL podcast with reporter James Palmer and former quarterback Chase Daniel.
“It wasn’t a situation where ESPN didn’t want me,” Russini stressed to NBC Sports of taking the gig in 2023. While she acknowledged, “It was a really difficult decision for me, for my family,” she felt there was no more room to run at ESPN.
But her team at The Athletic “just has an endless amount of roles and ideas for me.”
Photo by Cindy Ord/Getty Images for Fanatics
Who Are Mike Vrabel and Dianna Russini Married to?
Well before Vrabel was running with the ball for the Patriots, he caught the biggest pass of his life as an Ohio State University student. A member of the Buckeyes’ volleyball squad, Jen spied her future husband in a freshman time management lecture and, she detailed to The Tennessean in 2018, “found him funny enough to ask the professor for his phone number.” After her big play, she added, they “quickly became inseparable.”
Two years after his 1997 draft night (and one after she graduated with a dental hygiene degree) they tied the knot, going on to welcome sons in 2000 and 2001.
“I missed it, I was at practice, she was in Ohio,” he later said of his youngest child’s birth at a 2018 press conference. “He came early, he flipped, they had to take her. I showed up four hours late because I was playing football and she was having a baby.”
Photo by Kevin Mazur/Getty Images for Roc Nation
With their sons tackling their own athletic careers (after suiting up at Boston College, their oldest now serves as an assistant coach while his little brother played baseball at Volunteer State Community College and Tennessee Tech), the pair have said Friday date nights are a key play for their marriage.
Meanwhile, Russini found her MVP in Shake Shake senior manager Goldschmidt. Kicking off a romance in 2015, she and the Penn State alum wed in an intimate Covid-era ceremony on Sept. 26, 2020.
“2 years today was the best day of my life—when I married Kev in front of our family and dozens of friends over zoom!” she wrote in a 2022 Instagram tribute. “It’s you and only you, for me.”
Plus a few extra teammates, with the arrivals of their sons in 2021 and 2022.
Why Did Mike Vrabel and Dianna Russini Come Under Fire?
Fans threw a proverbial flag on the play when photos were released of Vrabel and Russini sunbathing, hugging and appearing to dance at adults-only resort Ambiente on March 28. While the two reportedly had breakfast, hung in the hot tub and caught a glimpse of the sunset from the roof, each claimed the snaps didn’t show the full picture.
While Russini was in Arizona with two friends for a hiking trip, Vrabel reportedly swung through between a scouting trip to Arizona State University and a meeting of the NFL Competition Committee, per Page Six.
Their friendship dates back to at least 2018, when Russini was covering the Titans for ESPN and Vrabel was named head coach.
For Russini, this isn’t the first time she’s had to field accusations of improper behavior. When she was covering Washington’s squad in 2015, Jessica McCloughan suggested she was having an affair with her husband, then-general manager Scot McCloughan.
Referencing a story that broke about Kirk Cousins replacing the team’s starting quarterback Robert Griffin III, she reportedly wrote in a since-deleted tweet, “I’m pretty sure this info is coming from my husband to his new side chick, Dianna.”
Later apologizing, she called the comment “unfounded and inappropriate,” adding that she had “the utmost respect for both the reporter and ESPN.”
The network chimed in with their own support of Russini, saying in a statement, “Dianna is an excellent reporter who should never have to be subjected to such vulgar comments. We are obviously extremely disappointed by today’s developments.”
Russini’s current employer similarly came to her defense on April 7. “These photos are misleading and lack essential context,” The Athletic executive editor Steven Ginsberg said in a statement to E! News. “These were public interactions in front of many people. Dianna is a premier journalist covering the NFL and we’re proud to have her at the Athletic.”
And Russini is hardly the first public figure to have to block rumors of infidelity. See which other stars had to weave, duck and dodge cheating accusations.
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including Alicia Cargile, St. Vincent and Stella Maxwell—before marrying Dylan Meyer in 2025.
As for Sanders, he and his then-wife, model Liberty Ross, divorced after 10 years and two kids in the aftermath of the scandal.
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