It seems like just yesterday we wrote about some of the strangest superstitions to grace the baseball community.
Superstitions may seem completely bizarre and wild but once you find yourself getting out of a slump and attribute it to a particular switch in your day-to-day life, then you bet you’re going to do all you can to maintain that streak no matter how quirky it may seem.
So as any player would, Dansby Swanson set his mind on cleansing both himself and his team of any negative vibrations, doing so by burning sage before the Braves game against the Chicago Cubs.
It's definitely not as extreme as other rituals we’ve seen in the past, as we’ve seen other athletes adopt this practice before some of their big games, such as Kyrie Irving.
Whether it was the sage or more of a mental note for the Braves crew, the smudging definitely worked as the Braves won 8-7 over the Cubs, with Swanson himself hit an opposite-field home run in the bottom of the third, while also hitting a single in the bottom of the sixth.
Following the game, Swanson touched on how he’s practiced using sage before with his significant other and U.S. USWNT forward Mallory Pugh and how he went into Monday’s game.
“All year, I've been like if it gets to a point, I'm bringing sage in here -- and I think yesterday was finally to that point," Swanson said. "I pretty much walked every bit of area you can find in this place, I went into. It was fun."
If smudging allows Swanson and the rest of the Braves to get out of their slump, then so be it, it’s a pretty normal ritual to follow, especially compared to some of the completely insane rituals we’ve seen before within MLB.
