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Dave Dombrowski on that Bryce Harper chat and the Phillies’ outside-the-box trade deadline

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It was nothing personal.

That was, essentially, the money quote when the two most visible faces in the Philadelphia Phillies’ cosmos — Bryce Harper and Dave Dombrowski — finally had That Talk last Friday night in Baltimore.

Or at least that’s how Dombrowski, the Phillies’ president of baseball operations, recounted it to me and Doug Glanville during his upcoming appearance on The Athletic’s Starkville podcast. The full show will drop Saturday morning, but you can hear Dombrowski’s take in the clip below.

Dave Dombrowski on his conversation with Bryce Harper

Jayson Stark

So why did Dombrowski and his biggest star even need to have That Talk? Let’s recap how they got there, for those who haven’t kept track.

Last fall, after the Phillies got bounced from the postseason by the Dodgers, Dombrowski publicly questioned whether Harper was still an “elite” player. Though Dombrowski said the two had a “good conversation” about it weeks later, the storyline has persisted. And, nine months later, Harper flipped that challenge back onto the shoulders of his boss.

On July 28, just a few days before their chat in Baltimore, it was Harper’s turn — to seemingly suggest it was time for Dombrowski to prove that he, too, was elite at what he does.

The Phillies’ soon-to-be right fielder stood at his locker after a painful loss in Miami. The trade deadline was less than a week away. His words were pointed: “I think we need some help,” he said.

Those words spent a few days ricocheting off every sharp angle in Philadelphia, from Independence Hall to the pizza ovens at Chickie’s & Pete’s. But three days later, Dombrowski sought out Harper after another difficult defeat, in the Phillies’ series opener against the Orioles. Here, Dombrowski said on Starkville, is how that conversation went.

“I talked to him on (Friday) night when we were in Baltimore, and just had a chance to chat with him,” Dombrowski said. “And he said, ‘Dave, I didn’t mean … that wasn’t a personal comment. I just felt we needed help.’ And I said, ‘You know, I get it.’”

Was that really how Harper meant those words? Was it really that easy for Dombrowski to accept that explanation? Only the two of them truly know. But Dombrowski used one adjective over and over to make it clear that he at least understands the context of Harper’s message:

Emotional.

“Because I’ve done it for a while, I think you learn that … that’s just today’s world,” Dombrowski said. “I mean, guys, when they say things, they’re so much more emotional.”

So when those words spill out, he went on, “you need to make sure that people aren’t saying it from an emotional perspective.”

Dombrowski is in tune with how emotional he is himself in the moments after a difficult loss, he said. So he “gets it,” that “sometimes people can say things, when they’re being interviewed or they’re texting something, that could be emotional. And I just want to always make sure that I confirm that with people, to make sure that’s the proper way they’re feeling.”

Their chat, at a makeshift dining table outside the visitors’ clubhouse, may not have brought them to a place of kumbaya. But it opened a critical line of communication.

And they needed it. Dombrowski made it clear that his exchanges with Harper, over the next few days, were a pivotal ingredient in the Phillies’ team-rattling trade to acquire second baseman Luis Arraez from the Giants before the deadline.

Dombrowski acknowledged that was not the deal he went into this deadline expecting to make. When he grabbed his shopping cart, he was looking for an outfielder who hits right-handed. He came out of it with the exact opposite: an infielder who hits left-handed.

It turned into one of the boldest, most outside-the-box trades Dombrowski has ever made. But “it started with Bryce Harper,” the veteran executive said.

Dave Dombrowski on Phillies’ position shifts for Arraez trade

Jayson Stark

Suppose we could poll all the two-time MVPs on Earth to see how many would willingly make a dramatic position change in midseason. Let’s just say if you started counting yes votes, you probably wouldn’t need all five fingers on your counting hand.

But Harper opened the door to the Arraez trade by telling Dombrowski multiple times he’d make that move, from first base to right field, if they needed him to. And when your team’s biggest star pulls up stakes and switches positions, the rest of the roster follows. Bryson Stott told the Phillies he was cool with moving from second base to third. Alec Bohm signed off on relocating from third to first. And the lineup’s spin through the baseball blender was complete.

So that’s how one huge piece fell into place to make that trade possible. Here are some of the other highlights from Dombrowski’s appearance on Starkville, which shed light on the other pieces. (Quotes have been edited for brevity and clarity.)

Why he passed on the right-handed bats: “When you look at a right-handed hitting outfielder, as far as an everyday guy that would be a force in the middle of the lineup, we could not find one out there,” Dombrowski said. “There were guys that we liked that we thought would make us better, but they were almost all platoon guys. … We just couldn’t find that guy. And then you start saying, ‘OK, well, how are we going to make our offense better?’”

What made him willing to blow up four positions to make room for Arraez? The Phillies knew they needed a difference-maker, Dombrowski said. But the more they explored their options, the more convinced they were that Arraez was the one bat who could give them what they needed.

“We just couldn’t find that guy that was available that we thought was a legitimate upgrade of our club — but we felt that Arraez was,” Dombrowski said. “And then how could we make it work? Well, that’s when all the other conversations came into play. But we really explored all of the different markets.”

Once they’d sorted through all the options, Dombrowski gathered opinions — from his front office and most trusted scouts, from his coaching staff, even from Harper and other impacted players. That, he said, is something he would never have done earlier in his career.

But he has done this a long time. So he knew that if his players and coaches weren’t all in, that would have been a problem.

“If somebody had jumped up and down,” Dombrowski said, “and said there’s no way that we would be willing to do this, you would then need to approach: Well, how are we going to go about doing it? Is it the right move to make? So there were a lot of steps and thought processes beforehand. And then I think, when push came to shove, when you’re talking about a hitter and what we needed with the Arraez situation, they all fell into place.”

The tense Sunday night when it all almost fell apart: By Sunday, the day before the deadline, Dombrowski and the Giants’ president of baseball operations, Buster Posey, were locked in conversation. But this was no peaceful sail in McCovey Cove. The deal almost didn’t get done, Dombrowski revealed.

“Sometimes, you have to make last minute-decisions,” he said. “With San Francisco, for example, I thought at … 8:30 (Sunday night) we were going to make a deal that was close to what we made. At 9 o’clock, when they got back to me, I didn’t think we were going to make that deal, and it kind of fell apart.

“And then Buster reached out to me once again and said, ‘Well, what about this?’ And I proposed something back to him. And then he said, ‘OK, let’s get it done.” And then … you’re talking 10:30, 11 o’clock on Sunday night.

“We have to exchange medicals. They’re on the West Coast. We just got back (home from Baltimore). I mean, our trainer’s fine (with the reports on Arraez and reliever Caleb Kilian), but you want your doctors to look at some things. And so there’s a lot of steps that are involved, and you’re always hoping that something doesn’t happen where all of a sudden, it doesn’t work.”

Weighing the risks: By the time we recorded this interview Wednesday afternoon, I’d done enough research to conclude that no team had ever made a midseason trade for any one player that forced that club to uproot nearly half the positions on the field in the middle of a race.

So I asked Dombrowski this question: “It feels like it could be a little scary to disrupt a team as much as you just did — but it can also be energizing. It’s like you’re basically challenging your players to win and play baseball in a whole different way. I’d be curious about how much you pondered both those aspects of this deal.”

He conceded that both of those elements were hot topics in the Phillies’ trade room.

“In our trade room, we talked about that a lot,” Dombrowski replied. “And there were some people that said, ‘Oh, we should not do that. We should just plug in an outfielder and just leave it at that, even if it’s a platoon outfielder.’

“I think a couple factors came into play in finally deciding it. One is, you watch your club play, day in and day out, and when I looked at the move, I don’t think it was substantially going to hurt us defensively at any of the positions that we’re moving players.”

He then explained why he felt that way. But was he also interested in challenging his players to make this work?

“I thought, you know what? In a way, with the club — and you would never do it for just this reason — it might be energizing, too,” Dombrowski said. “I mean, I watched them the first time they were all out there on Tuesday for their early work. I was sitting upstairs (in the executive box) like we do a lot of times, and there was a hop in their steps that I haven’t seen the guys have.

“I mean, it’s just, you know, you can get into that routine, especially with a veteran club, that sometimes a little bit of adjustment … maybe it’s a risk. I get it. But sometimes those risk-rewards are worth it.”

There was much more in our conversation. Dombrowski provided many fascinating insights into the things the Phillies did and didn’t do at the deadline:

  • Why they never made a trade for a veteran starting pitcher.
  • Why they never reeled in a proven set-up reliever to pitch in front of their All-Star closer, Jhoan Duran.
  • Other behind-the-scenes pre-deadline conversations with his coaches and players.
  • On the sense of urgency he feels to win a World Series with this group of players.
  • On why he thinks the Phillies can match up with the Dodgers if they meet in October.
  • On how much longer he wants to do this job.

It was as candid a conversation with a team’s chief decision-maker as I’d ever heard in the wake of a trade deadline that didn’t go the way anyone expected, including him. So I highly recommend you find this show this weekend on YouTube or wherever you get your podcasts.

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NASCAR Iowa takeaways: Ty Gibbs holds off Christopher Bell on late strategy call

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August 10, 2026

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NEWTON, Iowa — Propelled by a late strategy call that vaulted him ahead of Joe Gibbs Racing teammate Christopher Bell, Ty Gibbs held off the charging Bell to win Sunday’s NASCAR Cup Series race at Iowa Speedway.

The pivotal sequence of the race came as Bell and Gibbs, in that order, each came down pit road with 60 laps remaining for their final scheduled stops of the day. Bell’s crew chief, Adam Stevens, opted for a four-tire stop, while Tyler Allen, Gibbs’ crew chief, elected for just two tires with the intent of leapfrogging Bell for the lead.

Allen’s call worked. When the pit stop sequence concluded, Gibbs was in the lead — a lead he wouldn’t relinquish. The grandson of team owner and three-time Super Bowl-winning head coach Joe Gibbs led the final 20 laps to earn his second-career win.

“Everybody has been doing a great job, and it’s been fun to work with everybody and everybody has been so encouraging,” Ty Gibbs said. “Made some big strides from last year, obviously, and (it’s) super fun.”

Bell finished second. Ryan Blaney finished third, with Josh Berry fourth and Denny Hamlin, another JGR driver, in fifth.

Bell’s runner-up finish on Sunday marked the seventh time he’s placed in that position this season. Afterward, Bell’s frustration was palpable, both with the fact he’s yet to win this season and that his team didn’t make the same strategy call as Gibbs’ team. He referred to his latest runner-up finish as a “bad second-place finish.”

“Yeah,” Bell said when asked if his team should’ve gone with the same strategy as Gibbs. He also noted how he was able to maintain speed earlier in the race after both stopping for two tires and not stopping for tires at all.

“We saw guys stay out all day and were fine,” Bell said. “I took two tires at one point, felt fine; I stayed out, felt fine.”

Standing a few feet from Bell on pit road, Stevens’ disappointment was just as palpable. The crew chief described the call as “50-50” on how many tires to make, but said he stood by his decision, noting that he believed it put the team in the best position to win. He also didn’t think the final 132 laps would go caution-free.

“I thought that was the right move,” Stevens said. “Obviously, none of us knew it was going to stay green the rest of the day. And once (Blaney) took four (tires), which we expected him to because he did right (side tires) at the stage (break), and seeing how he fell off, I didn’t think that that was the winning move. I knew the only car that could pass us with two was (Gibbs’), everybody else, if they chose to take two, would still come out behind us. So we tried to open up the biggest gap we could, knowing that we would come out in proximity even if he did take two.”

— Jordan Bianchi

Reddick slumps further

As great as Tyler Reddick’s first half of the season went, the second half has been decidedly less stellar, with Sunday bringing yet more frustration. The 23XI Racing driver, who won five of the first nine races, spun four laps into the race and made heavy contact with both Erik Jones and the outside wall.

Reddick finished 36th on Sunday, marking the sixth time in the past nine races he’s finished 25th or worse. The team hoped that coming off an off-weekend would allow a good opportunity to reset, but it wasn’t the case. Adding salt to the wound: Reddick took out Toyota teammate Erik Jones, who’s fighting for a spot in the Chase playoffs.

“For us to take ourselves out is one thing, but to take out a fellow Toyota teammate when they are racing for the Chase — pretty much ended their day as well,” Reddick said. “It is the type of stuff you don’t do to yourself, and you don’t do to a teammate.”

That tailspin has cost Reddick dearly in the standings, erasing his once sizable points lead. He’s now all but eliminated from winning the regular-season championship as he trails leader Denny Hamlin by 120 points with three races left before the Chase begins.

— Jordan Bianchi

Jones takes huge points hit

There was optimism that bubble-driver Jones could have a solid day and stay in the Chase race with four races remaining until the cutoff, but the early wreck with Reddick ended his chances of a good weekend — and maybe finished off his postseason hopes in the process.

Jones was an innocent bystander when Reddick slid up the track and took him out, dooming his hopes with a 35th-place finish after qualifying a strong 10th.

Jones went from 44 points below the cut line to 50 points back, one day after saying this: “One more bad week when we lose any ground and it’s going to be pretty insurmountable, so we need to have a great weekend. … Hopefully we can stay in it, but I think it’s kind of one more (bad) week and it’ll be a tough hill.”

That hill now seems Everest-like with only three races remaining until the Chase field is set.

“It’s a huge mountain now (from) here on out to get to the Chase, so we will see,” Jones said after the wreck.

— Jeff Gluck

SVG spin hurts Chase cushion

Though Trackhouse Racing’s cars showed speed on Sunday, that did not include Shane van Gisbergen.

The New Zealand driver known as “SVG” was struggling with his car’s handling early in Stage 2 and then spun out while running 31st, ultimately finishing 30th.

Though van Gisbergen came into Iowa with a 57-point cushion to the cutoff line, that was whittled to 47 points. The 10-point chop could have been much worse had Ryan Preece finished better than 20th, but it still leaves SVG in a more precarious position with two more short-track races ahead to survive before unpredictable Daytona ends the regular season.

Meanwhile, van Gisbergen teammates Ross Chastain (seventh) and rookie Connor Zilisch (11th) had two of their best runs of the season.

— Jeff Gluck

Preece slightly gains ground

Short-track ace Ryan Preece finished a disappointing 20th at Iowa, but he took advantage of Austin Cindric’s poor day (29th) to gain a key nine points to the cutoff line.

Preece is now 29 points behind Cindric with three races remaining, including two more short tracks.

“From a points perspective, everybody worked hard to make the car better, so I’m thankful for that,” he said. “But if we’re going to make the Chase, we’ve got to be better on short tracks. Richmond, New Hampshire — these are all places we’ve got to work hard on. … We’ve got a lot of work to do.”

Preece noted RFK Racing co-owner Brad Keselowski is “a very influential person in our organization,” and he trusted Keselowski to push the team toward a better direction on short tracks in the next two weeks.

“I feel really good about us working hard and finding a good direction for Richmond and New Hampshire,” he said.

Cindric was visibly upset after the race, which saw other teammate cars show top-five speed. He sat on the pit wall and stared off in the distance for several minutes afterward, then joined his team to push the car back to the garage — a rarity for Cup drivers.

He then disappeared inside the team’s hauler. A reporter from The Athletic waited outside for more than 30 minutes until Cindric sent a polite text message declining comment on his race.

— Jeff Gluck

Iowa Speedway’s rebirth

Not long ago, Iowa Speedway was on the brink of shutting down.

Flash forward a few years and the mood surrounding Iowa is far different after the track, nearly 40 miles east of Des Moines, finally landed a long-sought Cup Series date in 2024. That inaugural race was sold out, and so have the two subsequent races. This support has prompted NASCAR to shift next year’s Iowa race to the Fourth of July weekend.

Quite a remarkable transformation.

“We’ve gone from not being on the Cup Series schedule to hosting a marquee race next Fourth of July,” Iowa president Eric Peterson noted in Sunday’s pre-race driver’s meeting.

Further adding to the sense that Iowa is now firmly entrenched on the Cup schedule, NASCAR and the state are combining to contribute $20 million towards facility upgrades that include a repave of the entire racing surface. It’s a level of commitment that strongly signals NASCAR will be visiting Iowa for many years to come.

— Jordan Bianchi

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Cavan Sullivan, 16, scores and assists in Philadelphia Union’s Leagues Cup win

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August 10, 2026

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With a bit more playing time and a lot more productivity, the substance is beginning to match the hype for Cavan Sullivan.

The 16-year-old Philadelphia Union rising star, who already has a deal to join Manchester City when he turns 18, scored and assisted in his side’s 3-1 Leagues Cup win over Liga MX’s Necaxa Sunday night, continuing a surge in form that has come with greater first-team opportunity. Sullivan has started 10 of the Union’s last 11 matches in all competitions, including all five since the World Cup break under interim manager Ryan Richter, and he has two goals and four assists in that time to show for it, including his contribution on Sunday.

Sullivan wasted little time vs. Necaxa, surging into the center with a stepover before slotting out a pass wide right for Nathan Harriel, who scored the opener in the third minute.

He then got his own tally, just the fourth of his career in all competitions, by chesting down a cross from Indiana Vassilev at the back post and quickly scoring with his left off the bounce in the 53rd minute. It was his first Leagues Cup goal, to go with two in the Concacaf Champions Cup and one in MLS, all this season. He exited the match in the 60th minute, with the result well in hand.

Given the headlines generated by his early Man City commitment and the expectations bestowed upon him as a “next-big-thing” prospect as a result, the onus has been put on Sullivan at an early age to deliver when given the chance. He did so Sunday, though it’s not likely to be enough to prolong the Union’s stay in the competition, following the club’s 1-0 loss to Cruz Azul to begin the opening phase.

The top four of the 18 MLS teams competing advance after the three-game stage, leaving Philadelphia needing a lopsided win in its group finale and a whole host of help, with six points being highly improbable to be enough to secure a quarterfinal berth.

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Hezly Rivera repeats as U.S. gymnastics champion; Frederick Richard headlines men’s Worlds team

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August 10, 2026

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On Day 1 of the women’s U.S. Gymnastics Championships on Friday, Hezly Rivera launched herself off the bar, reached out to grab it — and fell. The 2024 Olympic gold medalist entered Sunday’s competition in fourth when she tried the skill again, caught it, and rode that momentum to her second consecutive national championship.

No woman had pulled off that large of a comeback for the all-around title since Courtney Kupets in 2003.

“I wasn’t looking at the scores, I wasn’t looking at the scoreboard, I was just focusing on myself and my gymnastics and what I have to do, so it was actually stress-free,” Rivera told NBC after winning the competition by 1.15 points. “I took all the pressure I could off myself, because it’s no fun when you’re stressed or nervous.”

Rivera, 18, made a name for herself by winning gold as a member of the 2024 U.S. Olympic team as a first-year senior. Two years later, she won her second straight national all-around title, along with gold on beam and silver on floor. The win comes two months after she withdrew from the Pan American Championships with an injury.

Claire Pease led until the second half of Sunday’s competition, when two out-of-bounds landings on floor dropped her to a silver medal in the all-around. First-year senior Charleigh Bullock, 16, finished third, with Reese Esponda fourth and three-time Olympic medalist Jade Carey fifth.

For the men, 2024 Olympian Frederick Richard won his first national championship Saturday night, clinching an automatic spot on the men’s World Championships team. He will be joined by 2020 Olympian and 2024 alternate Shane Wiskus, 2025 pommel horse bronze medalist Patrick Hoopes, 2025 Worlds team member Kameron Nelson and first-year senior Danila Leykin.

“I strived my whole life to get here; it took 20 years, four championships later as a senior, but we’re here,” Richard told NBC Sports. “It shows the hard work is paying off.”

Richard returns to Worlds after being left off the 2025 squad. He posted a dominant all-around performance this week, beating Wiskus in second place by more than 2 points and winning floor. He claimed bronze in the all-around and with the U.S. team at Worlds in 2023.

Frederick Richard competes on the rings in the U.S. Gymnastics Championships.

Frederick Richard competes on the rings in the U.S. Gymnastics Championships at Mortgage Matchup Center in Phoenix on Saturday. (Chris Coduto / Getty Images)

Hoopes joins the team as a pommel horse specialist, the only event he competed in at championships. He beat out fellow specialist Stephen Nedoroscik, who found fame at the 2024 Games by nailing the event in a high-pressure moment and helping the U.S. secure bronze. Nedoroscik fell on pommel horse Saturday night, landing in fifth.

The men’s field was missing core members of recent Olympic and Worlds teams, with Brody Malone, Asher Hong and Donnell Whittenburg not competing. The American squad will look to Nelson to bolster the lineup after he secured silver on rings, clinched the vault title and showcased a high-difficulty floor set. Wiskus and Leykin, second and third in the all-around, round out a team looking to build on Olympic bronze in 2024, the U.S. men’s first team medal since 2008.

The women’s team will be announced after the World Championships selection camp Sept. 29 to Oct. 1. Rivera is looking to make her first Worlds team as a senior, after withdrawing from selection camp last year with an injury.

The team will take into account results throughout the season, which means athletes out of the top five, such as two-time Worlds medalist Skye Blakely, remain in the mix. Blakely tied with Pease for first after Day 1 on Friday, before falls on floor and beam Sunday dropped her to seventh. The team could also include athletes such as two-time Olympic alternate Leanne Wong, who withdrew from U.S. Championships with a knee injury but could still petition to the selection camp.

Next year’s U.S. Championship and Worlds field, at that point one year out from the 2028 Games in Los Angeles, will likely look a lot different. Six-time Olympic medalist Suni Lee announced in July she is launching a comeback for 2028. Simone Biles and Jordan Chiles have not ruled out a return to competition, either.

Joscelyn Roberson, another former Worlds team member and Olympic alternate, also plans to continue her elite career, but she is not competing this season to focus on recovering from injuries. Six-time Worlds medalist Shilese Jones, considered a top contender for the 2024 squad before an injury during Olympic Trials, said Sunday she plans to return to competition next summer.

“I’ve battled through so much, and there’s been so many injuries,” Jones told NBC. “The story still continues. I just want to prove myself.”

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