Jul 23, 2025; Philadelphia, PA, USA; Philadelphia Eagles wide receiver A.J. Brown (11) addresses media during training camp at NovaCare Complex. Mandatory Credit: Kyle Ross-Imagn Images
PHILADELPHIA - There was an interesting quote from a Philadelphia sports figure on Tuesday.
"I can't tell you that... as a general manager, I haven't had grumblings. It comes with the territory. Sometimes you hear about it. Sometimes you don't hear about it. I'll tell you there's never been a (team) I've had that hasn't had it. That's just the way it is. Sometimes it gets out and you deal with it more. It's part of it."
Stopping the quote right there, it's hard to determine who said this, or what team or player is being talked about.
Could it be Daryl Morey talking about Joel Embiid? Might it be Howie Roseman discussing A.J. Brown? How about Danny Briere talking about Alex Bump being surprisingly sent to the Phantoms on Tuesday?
(O.K., that last one is completely ridiculous, but I couldn't come up with a real world possibility for the Flyers, and didn't want to exclude them. Sorry for the reach).
Joel Embiid to @NBAKrell, on why he chose to be so open in @YNGNKL’s July ESPN feature:
No, it was Dave Dombrowski answering a question about how the organization decided it was better to go into an outfield platoon, even at the sake of creating a situation where a player like Nick Castellanos would be unhappy with his reduction in playing time.
“From the first conversation, I felt like it was genuine… for the first time, it wasn’t about trying to get clicks off me, it wasn’t about trying to find a quote.”
(via @sixers) pic.twitter.com/CHV6AQOZti
There's more to the quote, which we'll get to later, but the reason I shared it at the beginning of this story, without attribution or context is, it could have been anyone saying it, right?
And maybe not even in the world of sports. Maybe it's your boss at your job saying he hears grumbling all the time. No work place is perfect. Some are better than others, sure, but this kind of workplace disenfranchisement happens daily, everywhere.
And, so maybe that's what I'm trying to get at.
Is it possible we make way too much of these things?
I'm not trying to whitewash responsibility for Brown, Castellanos or Embiid for publicly airing their grievances. They are all smart guys who knew exactly what they were doing.
So, they have to sleep in the bed that they made. That's on them. I'm 100 percent certain Phillies executives aren't happy with how Castellanos went about it and while I don't have direct knowledge, I'm pretty sure the Eagles and Sixers aren't happy about Brown or Embiid's posts and comments.
That's not the point here.
Instead, the question is, do the rest of us - and as much as you may not want to believe it, fans and media are linked arm and arm in this - take this too seriously?
I listened to a lot of conversation in the past few days about how what's going on with the Eagles and Brown is bad. Is it?
Or is it no different than a problem you have at your job, or your neighbor has at theirs?
And is it only bad because it got out? What about the stuff that doesn't get out? Is that worse? Is it not as important because someone didn't leak it to a reporter, or because a player didn't let his emotions get the best of him and post it on social media?
That's where Dombrowski's quote continues:
"Guys that are used to playing every single day, all of a sudden, they're not playing," Dombrowski said. "They're not playing quite as well. Somebody's coming back from an injury and they want to come back (quickly) and sometimes the guys are at a different stage of their career and they're not quite at the same point to be able to do that. They're never happy about it.
"And I get it. You wouldn't want people in a position where they're just jumping up and down saying, 'Oh, good, I'm not going to play every day.' That's not how you want them to be. That's just part of the way we do it. Sometimes it probably gets out more publicly than you would choose. In fact, a lot of times I'm amazed it doesn't get out more because we deal with so much of it. It's not just here. It's been my whole career."
Brown came out and admitted his emotions got the best of him on Sunday.
Eagles WR A.J. Brown takes full accountability for his cryptic social media message and postgame frustrations:
“Obviously, Sunday after the game I let my frustrations boil over...That's on me. I take full accountability on that...My message on Twitter wasn't directed at anyone… pic.twitter.com/O40Dsv5cb9
He said his social media post wasn't directed at anyone in particular. Whether you want to choose to believe that part or not, that's up to you.
But the reality is, he's a competitor driven by emotion. He said he wants to be in Philadelphia. He called it his "home."
"Unfortunately, I did (this) to myself. But this is my home," he said. "I love it here. But you just see frustration because we want to be great and most definitely, I want to be great as well."
Even though these are handsomely paid athletes, we need to remember that they are human and they have emotions. too, just like you and me.
Max Kepler said it best to me in a story I wrote on Tuesday about conversations he had with Dombrowski about his struggles and lack of playing time.
"It was essential for me and it's great awareness on his end too to understand that guys in this clubhouse have emotions and feelings and they sometimes need to be calmed.," he said.
These guys aren't selfish. They aren't cancers. They aren't pariahs.
Did they handle their public comments the right way? No. They didn't. But if that's their crime, so be it. You want to criticize them for taking their gripes public? Fine. I'm right there with you. But to assume that what they are doing is a detriment to their team without knowing the context of how they are received in their clubhouse may cross the line.
It's possible that you would be right, and it has a negative impact, but it's also possible that it doesn't have a negative impact at all. And if that's the case, the big to do we make out of every gripe isn't fair to the player or the team - more because these guys are just like you and me. They are human. They make mistakes.
The sooner we all realize that, the better.
