I would say the biggest problem with pages like this is that it "jumps" around as content is loaded. The fact that ads are lazy loaded is not bad (probably good actually!).
This is easily fixed by simply having the container set to exact width/height so that it doesn't mess with the rest of the page when it loads.
CNN also has a sidebar that pops in with other stories. Don't do that. Render it on the server.
Just a couple of fixes like this and the page would be fine, even if some extra stuff takes a while to load. They key from the user perspective is that the article should immediately be readable when the page loads.
The fact that ads are lazy-loaded can be a big performance problem if it's implemented with a method that causes browsers to turn off async pan/zoom. Especially sad is when images are loaded this way, because most browsers will load images on scroll automatically, so this technique of "lazy loading" ads for "performance" actually cripples scrolling performance with no benefit.
This is easily fixed by simply having the container set to exact width/height so that it doesn't mess with the rest of the page when it loads.
CNN also has a sidebar that pops in with other stories. Don't do that. Render it on the server.
Just a couple of fixes like this and the page would be fine, even if some extra stuff takes a while to load. They key from the user perspective is that the article should immediately be readable when the page loads.