admin Kids, if you want to be an All-Star and hit 30 home runs like Oakland A’s outfielder Brent Rooker, you need to practice proper nutrition. For Rooker, that means eating breakfast—and luckily for him, his job sends him all over the country’s biggest and brightest cities. That means ample opportunity to check out new restaurants, and Rooker kept a list of the ones that served him the most fire breakfasts. When Oakland’s season ended earlier this week, Rooker posted a thread of his favorites—and promptly went viral.
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Rooker has decamped to his home in Tennessee for the offseason, but got on a Zoom call to walk us through his caffeine consumption, favorite food cities, and a citrus drink he’d like to forget.
GQ Sports: As a fellow breakfast guy, are you as shocked and appalled as I am when people tell you they don’t eat breakfast?
Rooker: It’s not crazy to me. There are some times—like if we have a late arrival to a city—where I’ll sleep until 11 or noon and I won’t eat either. My first meal will be at the field at 1 or 1:30. But also, it’s a little bit different because we’re eating dinner at, like, 10:30 or 11pm. You shower, change. We’re eating so late that you can go the next morning without eating and really be okay. I obviously prefer to get up and go somewhere for breakfast. It makes me feel better and it’s just something I enjoy doing. But there are a lot of guys around the league—I think you’d be surprised—whose first meal of the day is at the field.
During the offseason, are you someone who needs to eat right when you wake up?
Yeah, during the offseason, first thing I do is eat. I get grumpy. If I don’t have something in my stomach right when I get up, I’m in a bad mood. It’s a physical feeling—lightheaded, a little sick. From a training perspective too, I think it’s important to get a little fuel before you start the baseball stuff. I normally eat bigger meals: eggs, bacon, toast. I think a lot of people who skip breakfast would honestly be surprised by how much better they feel if they would get up and eat something. People just have coffee in the morning and don’t eat anything until lunch. Then they wonder why they feel so tired!
Growing up, there was so much breakfast propaganda. We heard “most important meal of the day” so often. I don’t know what happened to get us to this point where so many people are skipping it.
There’s just so many fad diets, right? People are really into the intermittent fasting thing. They swear by it and really like not eating in the morning. I’ve never tried to go too deep into that. I just know that the few days I do skip breakfast, I’m not as energetic or clear-minded. I could never do (intermittent fasting). It’s not for me.
I noticed in your thread that you skew a little more savory and hearty. Are you anti-sweet breakfast?
Not at all! I do tend to prefer savory, salty, hearty over sweet breakfast. But there’s some pancakes mixed in there. I like French toast. If I see any pancakes or French toast, that’s usually my off-day breakfast. I’m not as worried about what I’m doing in the morning. But for the most part, I’ll normally go savory. Part of it is being conscious about sugar pre-game. Before a game, I don’t want to do anything cream-filled. The Blue Moon Cafe in Baltimore had a Cap’n Crunch French toast, which looked unbelievable, but I avoided it. Just got an omelet.
Of the ones you tweeted about, which ones were your favorites?
The lobster toast at Brass Tack in Chicago. Granted, it was like a $45 breakfast dish, so not really your standard diner breakfast. But it was unbelievable. Two pieces of sourdough toast, really soft scrambled eggs with truffles mixed in, lobster tail on top with hollandaise sauce. It was one of the best things I think I’ve ever eaten, breakfast or not.
