While the majority of sports media people among major outlets have failed to even acknowledge the ongoing controversy involving The Athletic's Dianna Russini and New England Patriots head coach Mike Vrabel, Dan Le Batard is finally speaking on the matter. But not in the way that many might hope.
On Thursday's edition of his show, Le Batard admitted that he's "really uncomfortable" to be addressing the topic at all. Le Batard said it feels unfair to have to address it because people are less inclined to address other blatant issues in sports journalism when they occur.
“Everybody’s asking me about Dianna Russini, wanting me to say something about Dianna Russini, and I’m like really uncomfortable,” Le Batard said, via Awful Announcing. “I’m really uncomfortable with all of this and sort of the dirtiness of what my profession has become. Where every time I’m talking about that (Adam) Schefter and Shams (Charania) are compromised, nobody cares. But then they do this, this thing that’s in public that I don’t want to give air because I haven’t talked to my friend.”
A tough spot
Nevertheless, Le Batard admitted that he's not entirely sure how to approach the situation with Russini - who he's been a friend of for many years. He praised Russini for being at "the height of sports journalism" and believes that there would be no controversy at all if she were a man.
“This woman is at the height of sports journalism,” Le Batard said. “She got there the right and the hardest way. Fighting the other information people to get to the top of information that is credible, that is rock solid reported, stronger than the opinion maker. She’s not an opinion maker. She’s a journalist. And she has good relationships in the business.
“I sound here like I’m simply blindly and emotionally defending and riding for a friend. I don’t know what the hell happened here, but this is a journalist who came by her credibility honestly. The hardest way and harder than all the other people that have to do this stuff of getting and fighting for the information, who don’t have to deal with this (expletive). This would not happen to Shams, this would not happen to Woj, this would not happen to any of these people. She doesn’t want to be at the center of this. This is not why she got into this business.”
© Kirby Lee-Imagn Images
Le Batard said that he doesn't want to give any more "oxygen" to the engagement on that topic or other instances of journalistic arguments that involve friends.
“I don’t want to go give oxygen to it. I don’t want to give oxygen to that (expletive) going on between Whitlock and Stephen A., and I could drive it for clicks all day,” Le Batard continued. “All day I could sit here and talk about all the (expletive) that happened between those two friends of mine. But they were trying to do something journalistically objective once upon a time, and the business distorted all of us, turned us into (expletive) preening peacocks. We are the news. We are the newsmakers. We opine on the news. And when you don’t talk about your friend, you’re a fraud.”
