The Chargers, having unofficially appointed themselves the boundary line for insult comedy as it pertains to NFL schedule release videos, put themselves in a position Thursday where it would have been a bigger story if Mike Vrabel–related jokes were avoided than actually executed. The Chargers play the Patriots in Week 12.
The Chargers have, in the past, taken on subjects like the two dozen sexual assault and harrassment complaints filed against Deshaun Watson. So, saying that a coach’s seemingly inappropriate relationship with a reporter is out of bounds would have put the team in its own optical crosshair. Other teams on New England’s schedule, like the Chiefs and the Jets, opted to take the high road.
Given that only one team decided it was fodder for entertainment purposes, it ended—I hope—the public humiliation phase of one of the strangest sports stories I can remember. This is not me taking the high road. I undoubtedly got in my shots at the expense of Vrabel over the past few weeks on a number of podcast appearances, and still feel like the findings of a formal investigation into the relationship between Vrabel and a national insider covering the sport for the Athletic are relevant. While we all have our biases, certain relationships have the power to influence league events. When the time comes to review those specific findings and formulate an opinion, the spectrum of what’s fair game will become wide open again.
The reason we should all be calling for a general ceasefire at this point, though, is because the shrapnel has strayed far beyond Vrabel and Dianna Russini. Lost in our caloric snacking of each post that is rooted in hypotheticals based on a blurry photograph of the pair together is the fact that Vrabel is not taking the most significant hit, even though he should be.
He is still the Patriots’ head coach—a job that, even on its worst day, places an American man as close as one can be to a walking deity in this country. Vrabel still has power. He still has an escape. He is still extraordinarily wealthy and has the backing of a multibillion-dollar corporation.
We cannot say that about Vrabel’s and Russini’s spouses and children, who, if you pour into any dark corner of the internet, are the subject of wild speculation. Vrabel’s wife and Russini’s husband were both photographed by tabloid outlets as the thirst for story development grew deeper and wider.
It’s for that reason that we need to call a timeout. They specifically have been robbed of the chance for normalcy in the near future. The Watson story was deemed fair game for schedule-release fodder, but bringing up his repeated behavior and disallowing it from getting buried underneath the salve of football was a way to acknowledge the trauma of Watson’s victims. For the large portion of us who don’t cover the NFL or aren’t journalism wonks, the Vrabel-Russini story barely rises above the same stories of suburban intrigue you’ll hear about neighbors at the bus stop. And in those situations, don’t we almost always consider those who were collateral damage first and foremost?
Maybe the disappearance of this story will simply happen on its own. We tend to tire of these cultural phenomena after a certain amount of time—and, really, by the time the comedically stale NFL reaches a joke, you know it has almost passed its way through the zeitgeist. Russini, too, has yet to speak on the matter since publicly releasing her resignation letter from the Athletic. Her decision to speak, or not to, is really the only one remaining that could breathe new life into this story outside of the results of a formal investigation by the New York Times, which owns the Athletic.
Otherwise, we are taking our collective curiosity, animus and outrage and directing it toward the very people who did not ask for it. Silent partners in a public life that had little to no choice in being here and enduring this. That’s hard to deny when we read countless reports about Vrabel being his old, animated self on the practice field. I am not here to psychoanalyze whether he is “fine,” nor do I really care. He is an adult who made a series of choices that have led to this moment. But I do care—we should care—about what the innocent parties are enduring in the world we cannot see. In the world where all of this internet regurgitation lands on their phone screen today, tomorrow or 15 years from now. What does it say about us if we keep going? Who are we really getting a pound of flesh from?
Again, this is not to claim a high ground of morality. I promise. I have personally approached the story over the past five weeks from comedic angles, and in the scope of how it affects the NFL, journalism and the Patriots. This is simply a realization that reacting to another photo, reacting to another cheap joke, reacting to another breaking news update, which is neither breaking news nor an update, is beyond the act of kicking someone while they are down. And by someone, I mean the people not routinely appearing in the photos at all.
The Chargers didn’t include any photos. They did not include any references to spouses or children. By referencing the New York Post specifically, it was drawing from the most basic understanding of the event. To me, that seemed like the behavior of a team that felt it had no other choice.
But, starting today, we do. It’s not about choosing to be a Patriots homer or choosing to circle the wagons and defend journalists of the same lot. It’s about defending those who have no defense, especially as the story passes on from being pertinent to being harmful in a way we may not have—but should—consider.
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CONOR ORR
Conor Orr is a senior writer for Sports Illustrated, where he covers the NFL and cohosts the MMQB Podcast. Orr has been covering the NFL for more than a decade and is a member of the Pro Football Writers of America. His work has been published in The Best American Sports Writing book series and he previously worked for The Newark Star-Ledger and NFL Media. Orr is an avid runner and youth sports coach who lives in New Jersey with his wife, two children and a loving terrier named Ernie.
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