Bread makers? Skittles aficionados? The Phillies run the gamut, illustrating the divide that’s prevalent in sports between healthy eaters and junk food lovers.
Photo illustration by Eddie Guy
On any given day in the Phillies’ clubhouse, one of the more impressive juxtapositions in sports unfolds.
In one corner sits first baseman Bryce Harper, eating organic, pasture-raised beef from a local farm, cooked without seed oils, perhaps with a side of bread he made himself from flour from a small operation in Texas or raw milk from Lancaster, Pa. As a snack he might mash a banana with protein powder and cashew butter, or occasionally indulge in freeze-dried strawberries.
Across the room, ace Zack Wheeler is digging his pitching hand into a bucket of Popeye’s fried chicken.
And then Harper, 32, will go 2-for-4 with a double and a walk and Wheeler, 35, will strike out 10 over seven scoreless innings.
Many teams boast good players. It’s unlikely that anyone else juggles the range of dietary habits the Phillies do.
“You can’t possibly have a bigger separation than we do,” says catcher J.T. Realmuto.
It might seem indulgent to acquiesce to every player’s request for his favorite food. How many of us were told as children to eat what was in front of us? But health is the next frontier in sports, and although good nutrition cannot on its own prevent injuries, Phillies director of strength and conditioning/nutrition Morgan Gregory says, “If it can lower the risk of injuries that could be incurred from improper fueling, then the risk is much too large to take to not provide every resource possible.” (Even if one of those resources is fried chicken for their ace.)
The rest of the roster resides somewhere on the scale of “Bryce to Zack,” with some players covering the entire spectrum at once: “I’ve been on the raw milk, raw honey and all that, the ancestral liver and all that stuff,” says lefty Jesús Luzardo. “But at the same time, after a game, every once in a while, I just gotta get McDonald’s.”
Luzardo and his teammates neatly sum up the dilemma facing the modern major leaguer: They recognize that their body is their livelihood, and what they stock it with matters. And also they like junk food.
Athletes’ diets have always garnered attention
That they are even having these conversations would have shocked their forerunners. Yankees legend Babe Ruth is said to have downed a dozen hot dogs between games of a doubleheader. Boog Powell told Sports Illustrated in 1996 that as the first baseman for the Orioles in the ’60s and ’70s, he would send a clubhouse attendant to buy him two sausages during games in Milwaukee, then demolish them between at-bats. Yankees lefty David Wells famously pitched a perfect game in ’98 fueled by nothing but a hangover and a pancake.
Only in 2017 did the collective bargaining agreement require teams to have access to full-time chefs and dietitians, who quickly learned that corn syrup had become as much a part of the game as cans of corn. Clubs began swapping granola bars for chips and mixing in the occasional salad amid groans. But within a few years, something changed. In many clubhouses—such as Philadelphia’s—the players were suddenly the ones asking for healthier choices.
Many of them trace their interest in food to the pandemic, when they passed the interminable days at home cooking for themselves. Wait a minute, they started to think. What’s in this?
Around the same time, as they and the people around them became more active on social media, their algorithms fed them more startling information—some of it more accurate than others. (“I think a lot of diet talk is marketing,” says reliever Matt Strahm. “So I don’t even listen to it. Like, wasn’t oat milk the biggest craze? And now [people say] it’s cancerous.”) And once they started clicking, they couldn’t stop.
“I just think we’re more aware of it now than we were even three or four years ago,” says Realmuto. “And more people are talking about it. We’re realizing in America how much they’re throwing in our foods to be able to stay longer on shelves. I really think we were kind of dumb to it years ago. We just didn’t know how bad that stuff was.”
Bryce Harper takes his plate into his own hands
Harper had always tried to take care of his body—as the No. 1 overall pick at age 17, he envisioned a long career for himself—but he found his “eyes opened” when he started reading labels during the pandemic. And the products that seemed risky weren’t always the ones he expected. “Walking through grocery stores, if you look at the back of a thing, it could be organic—and the ingredients are absolutely terrible,” he says. “So there are just certain things that I look for: no seed oils, no preservatives, certain stuff like that, and I stick with the foods that I like to eat.” Never one to do something halfway, he decided he wanted to know where everything came from. And that meant everything.
“Detergent, sheets, home products, cleaning products,” he says. “We switched it all. If we can make it homemade, we want to make it homemade. If we can get it from [our home] garden, we get it from the garden.” When he cannot source an item himself, he looks for small producers who can explain their process to him. “He wants to know where that cow’s been,” jokes former Phillies reliever Jeff Hoffman, now with the Blue Jays. (The answer: Utah, which is whence Harper sources his beef.)
That was all fine at home—even Harper’s three children got on board once they learned that homemade macaroni and cheese is still delicious—but in-season, Harper eats most of his meals at work. So he approached the club’s head chef at the time, Keith Rudolf, about sourcing food. The team began stocking pasture-raised beef from Amish country, raw milk and Mountain Valley water in glass bottles. Harper says he received zero pushback about the cost: “[Owner] John [Middleton] and [GM] Dave [Dombrowski] are all about it if it’s gonna make us play better,” he says. On the road, Harper goes grocery shopping, hires private chefs or frequents restaurants whose ingredients he has vetted ahead of time.
He stays away from preaching to his teammates, but he says they often come to him with questions. “A lot of guys are 80/20, which is great,” he says. “I do a terrible job of being 80/20. I’m as far in as I am.”
That doesn’t mean he never eats anything a layperson might recognize. Digging through his locker, he pulls out a bag of potato chips and reads the ingredients: “Potatoes, 100% organic grass-fed beef tallow, Redmond sea salt.”
As for the raw, or unpasteurized, milk, he understands it’s a delicate subject. The Centers for Disease Control and Food and Drug Administration both strongly advise against its consumption, and 18 states ban its sale. (“While the perceived nutritional and health benefits of raw milk consumption have not been scientifically substantiated, the health risks are clear,” cautions the FDA, pointing to, among other conditions, the chances of contracting listeriosis and salmonellosis.) “There’s a lot of nutrients that are incredible—when it’s done right,” Harper says. “You have to understand you’re getting it from a small farm that does it right and processes it the right way. And what works for me might not work for some people. They think I’m crazy. That’s fine.”
He adds with a laugh, that every day his grandmother “smoked a 24-pack of Smokin Joe’s, no filter, and she lived until she was 95. So it just depends.”
Don’t worry, nobody’s forgetting the Philly cheesesteak
We would be remiss not to mention the cheesesteaks. This is Philadelphia, after all. Both the home and visitors’ clubhouse kitchens make them, but it’s the visitors’ version that has become famous. Asked on the eve of the National League Division Series what he knew about the Citizens Bank Park atmosphere, Dodgers two-way star Shohei Ohtani said he knew the fans were passionate—and he knew the clubhouse cheesesteaks were “really good.” Indeed, seemingly everyone who comes through town tries one, and many of them try more than one. The three-game series record belongs to Rockies strength coach Mike Jasperson, who took down 21 ½ in 2022, then added another 3 ½ the next day to capture the four-game series crown as well. He gained nine pounds and the place of honor on the video board in the cafeteria. (The one-day record belongs to Adrián Sánchez, who ate 10 ½ as a utilityman for the Nationals in ’21; the Mets combined for 103 in one day in 2014.)
The visiting clubhouse at Citizens Bank Park is known for its quality cheesesteaks. | Photo illustration by Eddie Guy
But perhaps an even more telling tribute to the visitors’ side sammies is that Phillies players indulge in them from time to time. Wheeler and Hoffman used to dispatch a clubhouse attendant to pick up an order, because they are bigger than the ones served in the home clubhouse. (Presumably the chefs are trying to slow down opponents.)
The ace who indulges in more than a cheat day
A cheesesteak before a game barely registers as indulgent for Wheeler, who astonishes teammates nearly as much by putting away food as he does by putting away hitters. “He eats a pack of Sour Skittles and then throws eight shutout [innings],” says third baseman Alec Bohm.
But they are quick to clarify: His diet cracks them up, but it’s not as bad as it looks. He has a private chef at home, and his wife, Dominique, keeps him under control.
“He only eats bad here,” says Strahm.
In an era when ballplayers are known for healthier eating habits, Zack Wheeler is a bit more old school, embracing his love of candy. | Eric Hartline-Imagn Images
But does he ever. The array of sweets on display in his locker would make a dentist cringe. (It often has the same effect on his teammates. “I cut out candy for the most part,” says Luzardo. “Seeing that in his locker gives me, like, PTSD. I want to relapse—but I won’t.” Outfielder Brandon Marsh agrees: “I can’t go over there. I gotta turn the other way.”) Before a start at home, Wheeler says he tries to limit himself to “a smaller sandwich or a cup of rice,” but afterward, he feels he has earned whatever he wants. Usually that’s a steak (at best) and fast food (at worst). And before a start on the road, away from Dominique’s supervision, Wheeler heads straight for Jack in the Box or Panda Express. “Kind of whatever sounds good that day,” he explains. When he hit 10 years of service time in 2023, his teammates threw him a party catered by McDonald’s. “They know what I like,” he said at the time.
Given that routine, Realmuto acknowledges, Wheeler might be the most impressive athletic specimen on the team.
The rest of the Phillies don’t really chew from one of those two extremes
Then there’s everyone else, the ones who don’t use the term “endocrine disruptors” or eat a handful of gummy worms on the way to the mound. For the most part, they cut out sugar and preservatives whenever possible. They have learned to cook or hired private chefs rather than turning to fast food. Sometimes that works better than others: “On the rare occasion I am cooking for myself, it’s pretty barbaric,” acknowledges right fielder Nick Castellanos. “The one thing that I’ll make over and over again is I’ll do just, like, a case of ground beef. I’ll make it in olive oil. I’ll put some rosemary, salt, some garlic, and I’ll just eat that in a bowl with a banana. I could have that every day for the rest of my life and be happy.” (“That sounds terrible,” says Wheeler.)
Bohm summarizes like this: “If it lived on the earth or grew out of the earth, I’m probably O.K. eating it.”
At first, many of them found the new routine hard to keep. But the results made it worth it.
“I could just feel I had more energy,” says Realmuto. “I had more mental clarity. It was almost within days of doing it.”
And with enough practice, they get used to it. “My taste buds have kind of changed,” says Bohm. “I don’t really crave sugar or whatever.” Harper says that any time he misses a food, he recreates it using approved ingredients to scratch the itch. He made homemade cheesesteaks for the Super Bowl—bread from scratch, rib eye from the farm, onions and peppers and cheese from small producers—and pronounced them “absolute fire.”
Indeed, sometimes watching what you ingest just tastes good. Righty Aaron Nola is partial to an Australian water brand whose name he will not reveal for fear of creating a shortage. “It’s [already] hard to get the water,” he explains. “I like the water a lot.”
Castellanos tries not to forget how unusual he and his peers are. “People that have resources, people that are rich, are able to do something about [food quality],” he says. “Because, unfortunately, unless you’re just buying raw vegetables, eating clean is a delicacy. Hopefully it gets better, but I think you just have a lot of very health-conscious individuals that have money in this room, so they’re able to do something about it.”
Most of the players try to keep things in perspective. Glass bottles are good, but there’s more to life than avoiding microplastics. Marsh says he drinks out of plastic to preserve the glass for his teammates who feel more strongly about it; he doesn’t want to be the reason someone goes 0-for-4. And reliever Tanner Banks is skeptical that a beverage or two can have much impact anyway.
“You get significantly more microplastics from your clothing,” he says, pointing at his polyester jersey.
Many of them are fathers, which means eliminating desserts entirely would not be a popular choice at home. Nola, a Louisianan, might be disinherited if he gave up king cake. “I was at my most strict at 25,” says Castellanos. “It’s funny—this is before I met Jess, my wife. When I was single, there’s no comfort. Comfort is the enemy. Now I’m happily married, have a family; we want to go get ice cream or we’re at a restaurant and we have dessert. I’m not G.I. Joe. I have some wiggle room. But I think I give myself that wiggle room because I stay active and 90% of it’s clean.”
He adds, “I feel like if you dig and dig and dig and dig, you’re probably not gonna love what you find on everything. So I have a little bit of faith that if a major league organization is getting these ingredients from somewhere, it’s probably O.K. I trust people to do their job. And I’m not afraid to pick up a garden hose and take a drink now and again, because it’s probably good for my immune system.”
Even Bryce Harper occasionally reaches for fast food. | Photo illustration by Eddie Guy
But even Harper can’t stay away from fast food forever
Harper would probably eschew the hose. But a rumor circulates among his teammates about his behavior at Wheeler’s party. The allegation is so out of character that it feels impossible. The man hasn’t eaten fast food for the better part of a decade. He makes his own cheeses with cream and rennet. On the rare occasion that he hasn’t grown the fruit or vegetable himself, or know the person who did, he soaks it in baking soda and vinegar to remove trace pesticides. Did Harper really permit himself a McDonald’s French fry?
“I did eat it,” he acknowledges with a grin. “It was great.”
