The grass used at State Farm Stadium in Glendale, Ariz. for Super Bowl 57 was heavily criticized as players were slipping all game.
State Farm Stadium, home of the Arizona Cardinals, was selected to host Super Bowl 57. Luckily for this home field, they were able to host a game between the No. 1 seeds in the AFC and NFC in the Kansas City Chiefs and Philadelphia Eagles.
While the first half of the game was all Eagles, given they had possession of the football for nearly 22 minutes, the talk on social media wasn’t about the game. Instead, the talk was about the grass used at State Farm Stadium, as players on both the Chiefs and Eagles were spotted slipping and sliding throughout the game.
So, why is the grass at Super bowl 57 slippery?
Why is everyone slipping on Super Bowl 57 grass?
Well, the NFL is using grass that was grown at a local sod farm in Phoenix for the turf. It was developed by Oklahoma State University, who took credit for it with a tweet before the game.
As Joe Pompliano of Huddle Up points out, the league spent two years preparing the grass to use on the field on the final game of the 2022 season, and it was installed two weeks ago. The total cost for preparing the field used at State Farm Stadium is $800,000.
The person who prepares the field for the Super Bowl is George Toma. In fact, Toma has prepared the football field for every single Super Bowl in existence. He was given the nickname, “The Sodfather.”
Ahead of the game, the 94-year-old told NFL Network’s Ian Rapoport and Tom Peliserro that this would be the final Super Bowl field he will prepare.
Players were spotted changing cleats to avoid slipping on the field. In fact, the grounds crew was checking out the grass after Rihanna’s halftime show.
The grass used in the NFL’s biggest game of the year became a major topic of discussion, and for all the wrong reasons.