Did Asomugha’s Concerns Play Into Reid’s Decision?

When the media entered the locker room after Sunday’s loss to the Lions, Nnamdi Asomugha was still sitting at his locker.

He was the only player to still have his jersey and pads on, apparently needing some time to himself after the Eagles’ defense collapsed in the fourth quarter and overtime.

When Asomugha finally addressed reporters, he seemed to question some of Juan Castillo’s decisions at the end of the game.

Considering that Andy Reid fired Castillo the following day, it’s fair to ask: How much of an effect did the players questioning Castillo have to do with his decision?

“I didn’t go to the players with this,” Reid said. “That’s not what I did. I didn’t take that into consideration. Nnamdi told me what he really meant by it [his comments] and explained that before this ever took place. So I appreciated that. He was in favor of what we did [the play calls], and he liked it… That’s not where I went. This was something that I felt I needed to do what was best for the organization at this particular time, and that’s exactly how I went about it.”

Later, Reid said he made the decision on his own and told Jeffrey Lurie about it. No one else was involved in the process.

It’s worth noting that Asomugha seems to have an excellent relationship with Todd Bowles.

“He doesn’t just know secondary stuff, he knows entire defense stuff, so he kind of gets me ready for where to fit when I’m playing inside,” Asomugha said back in August. “He’s helped me out a lot with my inside game. Last year, that was completely new to me, playing dime, playing nickel. Juan’s keeping that going this year a little bit so that’s where Coach Bowles has come in a lot with me and he’s helped me out.”

The timing of the Castillo move also came into question during Reid’s press conference. Hadn’t he seen enough last year with the five blown fourth-quarter leads to decide whether to make a move before the 2012 year started?

“I thought we were making progress. I saw us making progress,” Reid said. “We made progress through the last four games. I kind of liked the direction that we were going. I thought we started off pretty good and then I started seeing some trends come back that I wasn’t real happy about. I just wanted to make sure that we took care of those. I’m not going to go into details. There were just things that I saw that I didn’t want to go in that direction, so tough call.”

Follow Sheil Kapadia on Twitter and e-mail him at skapadia@phillymag.com.