Return relationships in Laravel show route - php

Question

When I create a CRUD controller, this is the show route created by default:
/**
* Display the specified resource.
*
* #param \App\Team $team
* #return \Illuminate\Http\Response
*/
public function show(Team $team)
{
//
}
$team is an object here, an instance of Team. If I do this I have the correct object passed to blade:
public function show(Team $team)
{
return view('admin.teams.show', ['team' => $team]);
}
But, Team has a many-to-many relationship with another model called Player, and this relationship is defined as such from the Team side:
public function players() {
return $this->belongsToMany(Player::class);
}
In my show method, I'd like to return the $team with its related players. But since $team is already an object and not a query builder, it's too late to do something like
$team->with('players')
So how do I get the related players here? I know I can do something like:
public function show(Team $team)
{
$team_extended = Team::where('id', $team['id'])->with('players')->first();
return view('admin.teams.show', ['team' => $team_extended]);
}
But it feels like hacking a functionality that should be there by default. Is there a built-in Laravel way to do this or am I just inventing hot water and should take the approach I used in my solution above?

Answer 1

If you've already got your Team model loaded, you can load a relationship without having to completely re-create it using the ->load() method:
public function show(Team $team){
$team->load("players");
return view("admin.teams.show", ["team" => $team]);
}
Note however, this isn't required unless you need to modify the default content of $team->players. When you trying to access $team->players say in your admin.teams.show view, if that property doesn't already exist (as it would using ->with(["players"]) or ->load("players"), Laravel will load it automatically.