Naps might be the secret to this slugger homering in the postseason
I firmly believe that we as a society would operate so much more efficiently if we all had a collective naptime. Remember preschool and kindergarten? You were forced to take a nap, even if it was on some tiny piece of rug that had been sitting in a closet.
You might not have been tired, but afterward, you still felt rejuvenated and ready to do some Picasso-esque finger painting. It was the best.
Nelson Cruz gets it. Daily naps are an essential part of his daily routine at the ballpark and have been so since his days with the Mariners and Orioles. When he signed with the Twins, a nap room was quickly added at Target Field.
The Twins have added a nap room to Target Field at the suggestion of Rocco Baldelli and its most frequent visitor, Nelson Cruz. “We’ve been doing it since we were kids. The science is there. That’s why we let the kids sleep.” More: https://t.co/tSgqLlxvLh
— Betsy Helfand (@betsyhelfand) April 25, 2019
Cruz will work out, hit in the batting cage and then go nap for up to an hour.
Laugh if you want. The man has 401 career home runs to his name, and that's not including the 16 he had hit in postseason play entering Friday night. He knows what he's doing.
Cruz hadn't appeared in a postseason game since 2014, but as the Twins learned, his pregame rituals do not end when October comes around.
Nelson Cruz did get his pregame nap in today. #MNTwins
— Dan Hayes (@DanHayesMLB) October 4, 2019
Rested and ready, Cruz took Yankees starter James Paxton deep in the third inning of the Twins' ALDS opener.
Boomstick. Bat drop. 💣💪#CruzControl | BombaSZN pic.twitter.com/2oyZLSbhDq
— Minnesota Twins (@Twins) October 5, 2019
If that's not an endorsement of the virtues of napping, then nothing is.
We should all aspire to Cruz's sleep schedule. We might not hit over 400 dingers, but we'll be more productive.
Andrew Mearns is a writer for Cut4 whose baseball obsession was born from the shattered dreams of Mike Mussina's perfect game attempt in 2001. He has a startling memory of World Series highlights that barely functions as a party trick.
