As the New England Patriots made their surprising run to Super Bowl LX during the 2025 season, the elite button-pushing of head coach Mike Vrabel was undeniable and fully on display for the NFL world to see. His ability to get everyone — fans included — to fully buy in and believe in the team’s new direction and identity was more than deserving of his 2025 NFL Coach of the Year award.
The Patriots need Vrabel’s elite messaging now more than ever. Unfortunately, 2026 hasn't exactly gotten off to a roaring start.
The team’s been in full damage-control mode for months over Vrabel’s alleged years-long affair with former NFL insider Dianna Russini. Among the more awkward moments was Vrabel calling an impromptu press conference on Day 1 of the 2026 draft to announce that he would be missing the final day — Rounds 4 through 7 — because his family needed him.
Speaking on Wednesday during Week 1 of OTAs, Vrabel was asked by Greg Bedard of Boston Sports Journal if he regrets stepping away from the draft while the team selected six players on Day 3. His response to that question lacked the polish fans have come to expect.
“No,” Vrabel said of any regrets. “Again, they moved around, they made some trades and, again, this draft was pretty unique. I don’t know if it’s really been talked about, but just the volume of players in the draft wasn’t what it normally is. And we saw a lot of players that went back to school that probably could have come out. I would imagine that it’s the NIL and their ability to go back and play for being compensated in college.
“So the numbers were down, the number of players in that pool was down. So I just felt like that was interesting. We moved around, you know, excited about the players we got. Studied most of them. They knew my affinity for some of the players that we took. And then, admittedly, I don’t know if I’m going to know the 300th player in every draft.”
Mike Vrabel would probably love to have one draft-related answer back
In regards to his personal situation, Vrabel has stuck with messaging like the team getting "the best version of me” going forward, while admitting to having some “difficult conversations” with his family. He had a chance to go back to that well on Bedard’s question. His decision to go in the other direction felt a bit off-brand and may not play well in the locker room.
As longtime Boston sportswriter and on-air personality Michael Holly put it on 98.5 The Sports Hub, Vrabel could end up wanting his dismissive comments on skipping an entire day of the draft back.
“No coach misses the draft. It’s a huge deal,” Holly said. “All drafts are unique. All drafts are like their own animals. They have their own personalities and their own identities. And it is your job to familiarize yourself with as many prospects as possible — even 300. That’s your job.
“The way to handle it is to say, ‘Hey, it’s important, and I can’t get around that. It’s important. It’s a big part of the job. But I had to do something away from football that took precedence for me personally. And I understand the optics, and I understand that it was a big miss for me not to be there, and I’m hopeful going forward this won’t happen again. But this is something I had to do.’”
There were other exchanges during that same OTAs press conference where reporters saw “Vrabel’s true personality” coming back out, as Mike Giardi wrote last week. Patriots fans can only hope we’re now on the other side of the Vrabel-Russini story and the focus can shift back to football again.
Time will tell if Vrabel’s biggest superpower shines through and a locker room full of new faces jells all over again in 2026.
It felt very anti-Vrabel, though, to make broad comments on the overall talent pool of a draft that saw his team select six players in Rounds 5 through 7 while he was away from the team.
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