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Even more changes are coming to the Philadelphia Eagles’ medical staff.
This news comes from NFL reporter Alex Marvez:
Some major changes coming on the Eagles medical staff. Multiple sources tell me Dr. Peter DeLuca (head team physician) & Dr. Gary Dorshimer (team internist) won’t be back for the 2018 season. Each was with the franchise for roughly two decades.
Earlier this week, the Eagles hired a new head athletic trainer from the Tennessee Titans: Jerome Reid. They also promoted Joe O’Pella to assistant athletic trainer.
Doug Pederson weighed in on those moves:
It was really great for Joe O’Pella, who’s been here, and a chance for him to really embrace leading that room, that training room down there and working with our docs and working with our team. And guys have a lot of respect for him. And at the same time, we’ve had a lot of good conversations, a lot of great athletic trainers, good athletic trainers that have been in here, and Jerome is a guy that really stood out to us, had a great conversation with him.
And for me, it’s just about -- the medical side, I’m not a doctor or anything like that, and I’ve never taped an ankle in my life, so really that part is great. But I want the relationship part; how did he and I interact and sort of a partnership there and the communication. Those are the things that stood out with me when I had a chance to visit with him. He’s going to work extremely well with our guys, and it’s -- maybe we’re a little bit further down the road than we’d like to be at this time, but we’ve got it behind us, and now we can focus on camp.
It remains to be seen what is driving these changes.
One unconfirmed thought is that this could be related to how former players have publicly ripped the Eagles medical staff. Former NFL linebacker Emmauel Acho said the staff isn’t “patient” or “good. He also called them “suspect.” Jordan Matthews, meanwhile, accused the staff of misdiagnosing two injuries he suffered.
No word on who will be replacing DeLuca and Dorshimer.