Soap operas, late-night snacks and naps: How NBA players get their rest

Basketball players criss-cross north America during the season. Getting a good night’s rest is vital if they want to stay on top of their games

IN FLIGHT: Boston Celtics player Larry Bird, right, sleeps on the plane back to Boston from Houston, as Celtics trainer Ray Melchiorre, left, holds the NBA Championship trophy on May 15, 1981. The Celtics beat the Houston Rockets 102 - 91, in the final game of the 1981 NBA Championships. Pic: Frank O'Brien/The Boston Globe via Getty Images

WHEN it came to George Gervin’s gameday routine, no one was going to mess with his soap opera viewing. Trashy shows helped the Hall of Famer relax so he could drift off into an essential pre-game nap. Without those two-to-three hours of slumber, the “Ice Man” may not have been able to lead the NBA in scoring in four different seasons. Indeed, naps, says Gervin, have been a part of NBA life for some time. Crucial in a profession that has players and coaches up at odd hours, working themselves weary.

“We’d have shootaround and then we’d come back, you eat lunch, and then I’d take a nap for a couple of hours,” Gervin tells the Guardian. “I did that most of my career. I got caught up in the soap operas back then.”