A new NFL season officially kicks off Wednesday night with a Super Bowl rematch between the New England Patriots and the Seattle Seahawks.

Meanwhile, arguably the biggest off-field story of the league’s offseason has returned to the forefront.

An internal investigation conducted by The Athletic found that former Athletic NFL senior insider Dianna Russini’s undisclosed relationship with Patriots’ head coach Mike Vrabel violated newsroom standards, but showed no clear signs of bias in her coverage of Vrabel and his teams.

The results of the months-long investigation were published Thursday by The Athletic.

“Russini’s relationship with Vrabel was in clear violation of The Athletic’s standards. Regardless of whether the relationship was romantic, it was a breach and should have been disclosed,” Mike Semel, the editorial director for standards and quality at The Athletic, wrote in the report. “Specifically, when it comes to The Athletic’s standards, Russini was noncompliant.”

Back in April, Russini resigned from her position with The Athletic one week after The New York Post’s Page Six ran photos of Vrabel and Russini interacting at a luxury hotel in Sedona, Ariz. The photos, which included the pair holding hands and hugging, suggested a romantic relationship between Vrabel and Russini.

“It also is a basic tenet of journalism to preserve detachment from the people we cover. We neither completed an investigation nor reached any conclusion about the nature of the full relationship between Vrabel and Russini, but the totality of the public photographs are enough to conclude a violation of company policy,” said Semel.

The report said that Russini acknowledged a close relationship with Vrabel when she was made aware of the impending Page Six article, but she stressed that it was strictly professional. The Athletic publicly supported Russini as it began its internal investigation on the matter, but Russini resigned from The Athletic on April 14, 2026.

“The Athletic ended its investigation into Russini’s personal conduct on that day because she was no longer employed by the company, but continued its investigation into her journalism because nothing is more important to The Athletic than its credibility and reader trust,” wrote Semel, who conducted the full investigation.

Semel reviewed 903 stories and 77 videos published on The Athletic site and app that carried Russini’s byline, co-byline, a contributor line or a mention of her reporting. He also reviewed 204 episodes of the Scoop City podcast, produced by The Athletic and co-hosted by Russini, and watched or listened to about 25 off-platform appearances or interviews for which she was in some way representing The Athletic.

Also, as part of the investigation, Semel interviewed approximately 14 Athletic staffers who had worked most closely with Russini at the publication. He also reviewed about 75 stories to evaluate how The Athletic’s coverage of certain events involving Vrabel or his teams compared to coverage in other publications.

The report found no inaccuracies from Russini in any story involving Vrabel or his teams.

Semel also reported that most of what Russini wrote about Vrabel or the Patriots was transactional and newsy and he didn’t find a clear link to conclude that Russini used her platform to help promote Vrabel or help his teams during her time at The Athletic.

“That said, there are examples of Russini writing glowingly of Vrabel that in hindsight are awkward or even uncomfortable,” Semel wrote.

Vrabel, of course, led the Patriots to the Super Bowl in his first season at the helm last year.