The NY Times has a lot of opinion pieces, not all of them backed up by quality data and analysis. I suspect that someone there did publish something that said the current SCOTUS has been slightly liberal. However, the only piece that contained real data and analysis, by Linda Greenhouse, the NY Times SCOTUS expert, flat out showed that this court is and has been among the most right-wing in history.

Think about it. The assault on women's reproductive rights, minority voting rights, citizen rights versus search, seizure and execution (proof of innocence is trumped by process) and bribery could not have happened without a far-right wing block of Justices who put politics ahead of judicial ethics.