All Aboard
After the league cleaned up in the early 2000s, baseball had no choice but to embrace the concept of eating to win, Bonci said. “It really forced the teams to take a good hard look at themselves and realize – I guess hot dogs and PB and J won’t do it all the time, we’ve got to up the ante,” she said. “The supplement absence forced a focus on food, which was a great message to finally have.”
She saw a change of focus by the players, too.
“They went from – well, I just have to get up to the plate and hit and as long as I’m a power hitter it doesn’t matter, to realizing that, whoa, you want to have endurance. It became about a lot more than just how hard you swing the bat,” she said.
That shined a light on the correlation between food and performance. “Strength and conditioning took on more importance. As a result, now you have players that are more sculpted. Now, not everyone is built like Starling (Marte) and Andrew (McCutchen), because they are definitely a different lot, some are more doughy. But players are all healthier, leaner, and they’ve all taken some interest in nutrition. They care.”
[perfectpullquote align=”left” cite=”Leslie Bonci” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=””]“Strength and conditioning took on more importance. As a result, now you have players that are more sculpted. Now, not everyone is built like Starling (Marte) and Andrew (McCutchen), because they are definitely a different lot, some are more doughy. But players are all healthier, leaner, and they’ve all taken some interest in nutrition. They care.”[/perfectpullquote]So what do the Pirates eat? It all starts with Bonci and Chef Tony Palatucci setting some ground rules.
“We provide a performance kitchen,” the energetic Bonci said. “To that end, the food that we serve in our kitchen serves the purpose of strength, speed, recovery and injury prevention.”
That means that players are provided with foods that generally fit into healthy guidelines such as lean meats/proteins, fresh vegetables, good sources of carbohydrates and healthy fats. They aren’t restricted in what they can and can’t eat, Bonci explained, “but if there are particular foods that are their indulgences, be they wings, pizza, beer, Cheetos, cheese sticks, whatever, they are welcome to eat them, we just aren’t going to make them an option here.”
Players are provided with meals and snacks in the players’ dining room at the ballpark when they are there for work. Generally, for a day game that means breakfast and lunch for early games and lunch and dinner for night games, she said, although some players may eat as many as six meals a day depending on their nutritional needs.
To help guide their understanding of what foods they should be eating for maximum output, Bonci created what she calls a “Performance Plate.”
The basic guidelines are simple, every meal should include: a hand-sized amount of protein (including breakfast); two “fists” of produce, which can come in many forms including raw or cooked vegetables, or even a smoothie (the Pirates have a smoothie machine in their dining room); some form or carbohydrate on the plate, like a small potato or a bit of rice with stir-fried veggies, “it’s never carb devoid, they need those carbs for energy,” she said; and finally the equivalent to two thumbs worth of fat, which can include butter, salad oils or the very popular avocado.
Drinks are typically water, naturally flavored water, fruit-sweetened teas, and cow’s milk and nut milks. Sports drinks and sodas are available, but not encouraged. “We really tried to cut it back. Mostly, now it’s just the coaches and not the players who are drinking the soda,” Bonci said.
The performance kitchen works well when the players are at their home ballpark. They simply eat what is provided. But when they are on the roadtrips, things get a little more difficult. The team can control the meals players are served on the plane, and the hotel generally offers enough menu or catering options to give the players healthy choices. The biggest issue lies with the workplace itself, she said.
“On the road it’s really more of an issue with visiting clubhouses because they’re not all equipped. And if you don’t have a sink or cooking facilities, well, you’re doing pizza,” she said. And pizza isn’t exactly the right fuel for elite athletes.
Another hazard of the road is alcohol. When players are eating in the Pirates dining room there is no temptation to have a pre-dinner cocktail or beer or wine along with a meal – all empty calories that can wreck a healthy diet. But when they’re traveling, and eating out at restaurants, it’s easier to get off-track.
That isn’t to say she believe in denying players their indulgences, though.
“These guys, they’re adults. They don’t want to be policed, and we don’t want to create a police state,” she said. “I’m a big believer in either the 70/30 or 80/20 rule. If you’re doing what you need to do 70 – 80 percent of the time, the body can take care of some indulgences and indiscretions 20 – 30 percent of the time,” she added.
Plus, society has ingrained in us the idea that food is more than just fuel, she said.
“Food is supposed to be comfort, and there are a lot of things about baseball that’s not comfortable. It’s not comfortable to play 162 games a year. It’s not comfortable when you’re in third place and your chances of moving up are pretty negligible. It’s not comfortable when you’re playing with injuries. It’s not comfortable when you’re away from your family,” she rattled off. “So that piece of chocolate cake is a helluva lot more enjoyable than kale. That’s just the reality.”
One way the Pirates have started to “tighten up” the food players are served while traveling is by using Whole Foods catering. The strength coach and Bonci pre-select dishes from the menu in select cities and have it delivered to the clubhouse. Additionally, the Pirates order meals for some players for delivery through FITzee Foods while on roadtrips, she shared.
Teams visiting PNC don’t have to worry about meeting their nutritional needs too much, she said, because Chef Palatucci provides meals for visiting teams as well. “So the people who come to us eat really well, but when we go to other places, it’s just not the same.”
There Is No Off Season
As the regular MLB season winds down in September, Bonci heads out to work with young players just cutting their teeth in the Instructional League. She gets a bit of a break from late November and December, which are generally quieter months for baseball. January starts with mini-camps for her teams and she finds herself in Bradenton, meeting with invited players to address any last minute issues and checking in on their progress.
In the offseason, she also consults with Pirates players who are looking to stay on track with their nutritional plans while training or incorporate nutrition in their injury recovery plans.
Once Spring Training starts back up, she and Chef Tony meet with each player to discuss their nutritional needs, training plans and any new health concerns that might need nutritional support. They also specifically ask about any new foods the players have tried, what their nutrition was like in the off-season and if there are any new foods they would like to have included in the program for the season. New players to the team are sometimes thrilled to be asked these questions, Bonci said.
“I like to give the new guys the lay of the land as far as what we have because I’m not always sure of how things were where they’re coming from. It may be the Yankees – who might spend more money, but I don’t think their food is any better, to a team that hasn’t doesn’t done much with food at all,” she said. “The typical reaction is ‘Wow, this is really awesome, your chef is just really cool.’”
This isn’t a one and done consult, though. Throughout the season she encourages players on all levels to reach out to her with questions, and they do by phone, email and text. “I want them to see me as a resource and use me for that,” she added.
During the regular season, Bonci visits the team during every homestand to ensure things are running well and to help answer any questions. She also works with all of the minor league affiliates, as well as the Academy in the Dominican, and their players, to ensure the ideas instituted at the top make their way down the ladder. She recognizes that there are limitations, and hopes that one day there can be a system like the one at the major league level at every level within the farm.
As a pioneer in the field of sports nutrition, Bonci, who scoffs at that title, is pleased with the way in which teams and the individual players have come to embrace the idea of food adding that X factor to competition, and proud to be a part of the revolution.
“I can go to sleep at night knowing that what we have provided to our players is the best possible food for them to eat to optimize their performance. That is never ever a question in my mind,” she said smiling. “I’m not at the plate with them, I’m not out in the field with them, but in the back of my mind, I just know, that that little piece of information they got maybe helped them get better for the season.”
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