ESPN Facing Heavy Criticism Over Mike Vrabel-Dianna Russini Report

The highly public scandal between New England Patriots head coach Mike Vrabel and NFL insider Dianna Russini took another turn on Friday.

ESPN's Ben Strauss dropped a report addressing the fallout from what's transpired in the days since the two were photographed together.

Strauss revealed Vrabel and Russini knew the Page Six story was going to drop well in advance, Russini contacted a crisis communicator to help her handle the aftermath, and Russini was asked by The Athletic to provide any evidence that her and Vrabel weren't having an affair (which she reportedly couldn't do).

And though Strauss gave a thorough and detailed report of the entire scandal, what readers in the comment section focused on was the fact that it took someone from ESPN nearly two weeks to address the Vrabel-Russini situation.

They also pointed out that neither the main ESPN X account, which has 58.2 million followers, nor the company's top NFL insider Adam Schefter, who has 11.6 million followers, so much as liked or retweeted Strauss' report, further maddening fans that the country's top sports media outlet refuses to make the Vrabel scandal front-page news.

"Hey Ben, quick question why would they have you released this from your following of 8000 instead of on their account with 54 million!?" one fan asked.

"Why ESPN have you drop the story with your 8.4K followers and no retweet from their biggest insider (Adam). Kinda wild how they are hiding this story still lmao," another fan questioned.

"How in tf did @espn decide to release this article only through you. They didn’t even put it on their main page!" a third noted.

"The fact that ESPN refuses to even mention this story on the air is pathetic. The network that once said they other political has turned as political as any network on the air, now says they don't get involved in personal lives while they talked about Coldplay concert," scoffed one user.

"@benjstrauss you probably don't want to comment on this but don't you find it weird that ESPN hasn't reposted this or featured it prominently at all?" remarked another user.

"What a Friday night hidden news dump by @espn. And it doesn’t get any better for Russini and Vrabel," one fan exclaimed.

"Nice to see ESPN stop pretending it doesn’t matter," one user replied.

While many prominent news outlets including Pro Football Talk, the New York Post, USA Today, Yahoo Sports, TMZ, and several others have reported extensively on the Vrabel-Russini situation, ESPN has notably remained silent until Strauss' report on Friday.

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This story was originally published April 18, 2026 at 1:56 PM.