Why does Jeremiah Trotter Jr. frequent the medical tent? He pees a lot.
Nature calls Trotter frequently, and the linebacker and his teammates understand why.
When approached after an early-October practice about the subject of this story, Eagles linebacker Zack Baun seemed at least a little bit surprised, and even somewhat complimentary.
“That’s good journalism right there,” Baun said.
The topic on the Tuesday before the Eagles played the New York Giants in Week 6 was not how the Eagles were going to deal with dynamic rookie quarterback Jaxson Dart or to rehash what happened in the fourth quarter during a loss to Denver two days earlier.
The good journalism Baun spoke of: What’s up with how often Jeremiah Trotter Jr. goes to the bathroom?
“How do you know about this?” Baun asked.
This isn’t the work of a gumshoe. This isn’t investigative reporting by a journalist who sussed out the story by cultivating sources in the Eagles’ locker room to whisper about the second-year linebacker’s active bladder. No, this stems from the incessant need to track player movement throughout training camp, the limited window in which practices are open to reporters, and during games in an era in which injury information and depth chart ordering is hard to come by.
Trotter’s movements are easy to spot.
Like clockwork, the South Jersey native and St. Joseph’s Prep graduate will trot over to the portable toilet before Eagles practice begins, and that restroom is right next to the gate where the media enters every day. Trotter also frequents the blue medical tent during games. It is not because the special-teams ace is oft-injured. It’s because he has to urinate.
“I do drink a lot of fluids,” Trotter said.
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There’s a story behind the why. It was the first or second practice of training camp last season, and the rookie fifth-round pick cramped up. He missed the rest of the session.
“‘Yeah, that’s not happening again,’” Trotter said he told himself. “So I make sure I overhydrate, and if I got to use the bathroom, I got to use the bathroom. It is what it is.”
It has led to some ribbing from his teammates.
“Just go before you go out,” Baun said. “He’s probably going to say, ‘I do.’ And he’s probably going to say, ‘I’m hydrated, man.’”
Baun wasn’t wrong.
“I try to drink a lot of electrolytes,” Trotter said.
Right now, one of his staples is LEVELEN, an electrolyte mix he gets at the NovaCare Complex. The reason he is cautious about cramping, Trotter says, is because he sweats a lot.
“When you’re one of those types of athletes, have to make sure you overhydrate,” he said.
Which leads to having to empty the bladder a little more than others. Baun has even mastered Trotter’s routes at the facility throughout the day.
“We start with the team meeting in the morning, and then he’ll hit the bathroom by the cafeteria,” Baun said. “Then he’ll go to the defense meeting after that, and after the defense meeting, he’ll slide down the hallway on our way to individual meetings and hit a bathroom next to the weight room. Then, usually, during our individual meetings [linebackers coach Bobby King] will give ‘us’ a break, but it’s really just like, ‘Trot, you got to go?’ Or, ‘Trot, go ’head.’
“It’s not a bad habit, but it’s a habit.”
“They make jokes about it and things like that … while they use the bathroom,” Trotter said with a laugh.
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When this habit started, though, is up for debate. Trotter attended Clemson with Will Shipley, and the running back recalled warmup sessions at the Tigers’ practice facility. The defense would warm up and stretch on one side, and the offense on the other, similar to how the Eagles get ready before practices. By the time the two were sophomores, they were starters and near the front of the line, getting ready across from each other.
“Eventually,” Shipley said, “it got to the point where I was like, ‘I’ll see Trot in a minute coming from the bathroom.’
“To me, he definitely didn’t start last year.”
Said Trotter: “I got more serious about it as I got older.”
There was at least one question left that needed an answer: What do players urinate into in the blue medical tent during games?
“I’ve actually never used the restroom in there,” Shipley said. “There might be pee bags.”
No, Trotter said, “they usually give the players canisters, basically just like a bottle.”