{"id":626973,"date":"2026-04-24T02:35:11","date_gmt":"2026-04-24T02:35:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/626973\/"},"modified":"2026-04-24T02:35:11","modified_gmt":"2026-04-24T02:35:11","slug":"new-england-patriots-coach-mike-vrabel-to-sit-out-nfl-draft-as-he-seeks-counselling","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/626973\/","title":{"rendered":"New England Patriots coach Mike Vrabel to sit out NFL Draft as he seeks counselling"},"content":{"rendered":"

The New England Patriots say they are being respectful of Mike Vrabel’s personal life and support him seeking counselling and not being with the team for day three of the NFL Draft following the publication of photos of the coach and longtime NFL reporter Dianna Russini at an Arizona resort.<\/p>\n

“The New England Patriots fully support Mike Vrabel’s decision to prioritise his family first, as well as his own wellbeing,” the team said in a statement released before the draft’s first round.<\/p>\n

“Mike has been open with us about his commitment to being the best version of himself for his family, this team and our fans, and we respect the steps he is taking to follow through on that commitment.<\/p>\n

“We are confident in the leadership and communication Mike has established with our personnel staff throughout this pre-draft process.<\/p>\n

“While he will not be present at the facility on Saturday, we know the draft evaluations are complete and Eliot Wolf and his personnel staff are prepared to execute our draft as planned this weekend.”<\/p>\n

Vrabel said at a news conference earlier this week that he’d had “difficult conversations with people I care about”, including his family, coaching staff, team officials and players, following the publication of the photos by the New York Post<\/a>.<\/p>\n

He followed that up by announcing that he was undergoing counselling.<\/p>\n

\"Mike<\/p>\n

Mike Vrabel led the New England Patriots to the Super Bowl this year. (Getty Images: Kevin C Cox)<\/p>\n

“As I said the other day, I promised my family, this organisation and this team that I was going to give them the best version of me that I can possibly give them,” Vrabel told ESPN.<\/p>\n

“In order to do so, I have committed to seeking counselling, starting this weekend.<\/p>\n

“This is something that I have given a lot of thought to and is something I would advise a player to do if I was counselling them.<\/p>\n

“I have always wanted to lead by example, and I believe this is what I have to do to be the best husband, father and coach that I possibly can be.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“This is not an easy thing for me to admit, but it is one that I know will make me a better person. I appreciate the support that everyone has given me and promise a stronger resolve as a result.”<\/p>\n

ABC Sport Daily podcast<\/a><\/p>\n

ABC Sport Daily is your daily sports conversation. We dive into the biggest story of the day and get you up to speed with everything else that’s making headlines.<\/p>\n

The photos of Vrabel and Russini were taken in Sedona before the annual NFL meetings that began in Phoenix on March 29, according to the Post.<\/p>\n

The NFL has said it was not investigating Vrabel’s behaviour. Vrabel and Russini are both married. Russini resigned from The Athletic last week.<\/p>\n

Vrabel declared his intension to sit out the final day of the draft in a late-night statement on Wednesday (US time).<\/p>\n

The Patriots entered the draft holding 11 picks. That includes the Super Bowl runner-up’s one scheduled pick (No. 31) in Thursday’s first round. They have one pick each in rounds two and three on Friday.<\/p>\n

But the bulk of their selections will be on Saturday when Vrabel won’t be in the draft room.<\/p>\n

That’s when they are scheduled to select twice in the fourth round, once in the fifth, four times in the sixth and once in the seventh round.<\/p>\n

AP<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The New England Patriots say they are being respectful of Mike Vrabel’s personal life and support him seeking…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":626974,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[64,63,151324,3263,42502,1231,593,3778,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-626973","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-sports","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-dianna-russini","11":"tag-draft","12":"tag-mike-vrabel","13":"tag-new-england-patriots","14":"tag-nfl","15":"tag-photos","16":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/626973","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=626973"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/626973\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/626974"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=626973"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=626973"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=626973"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}