Why NFL players are pushing the league to bring back grass fields
A look at the #WorthTheCost movement, talking with sports chiropractor Dr. Michael Sheps and San Francisco 49ers tight end George Kittle about why players say the league's synthetic fields are putting them at greater risk.
Why NFL players are pushing the league to bring back grass fields originally appeared on NBC Sports Bay Area
Video Transcript
This summer, players watched their own stadiums rip out the turf and roll in real grass for the World Cup.
We're gonna bring in grass for people all over the world, but not do that for the players here, you know, in our country- Yes and the athletes here that provide for our great sport.
That's when players started asking why the league would do that for soccer and not for them.
I would say- Right 90-plus percent of players that I talk to are like, "Oh, dude, give me grass every single day of the week."
And #worththecost was born.
Football's at its best when its best players are playing, and its best players wanna play on grass.
To find out whether the players have a real case, we went to Dr. Michael Scheps, a Brentwood-based sports chiropractor who has spent nearly three decades treating professional and Olympic athletes.
The ground force on the artificial turf is much too hard, and you're prone to all kinds of acute injuries, as well as chronic injuries that I see in my practice every day.
Well, the statistics are showing about a 30% increase on artificial surfaces.
I think it's more than that, under-reported.
A lot of the injuries are chronic.
You're having pulling on some of the ligaments.
Essentially, it's loosening the jar for that injury.
For Kittle, none of this is an abstract argument.
He has lived it.
And the thing I get too is like- Right "Oh, you tore your Achilles on a grass field."
Well, yeah, but the week before I, like, tore two ligaments in my ankle on a turf field.
Injuries do happen, but they happen less on the grass field.
Dr. Scheps says it comes down to rotation or the lack of it.
What happens to the athlete, they m- might make a move where they plant their foot, and the foot is unable to rotate.
And w- when it stays planted and the body or the knee or the extremity moves, it has the potential to tear ligaments, joints, cartilage, muscles.
They don't like to be twisted, and that's exactly what happens when they plant and try to change speed, direction on the artificial turf.
Grass gives a little on impact and lets the foot release, and Dr. Scheps says that difference is showing up in patients who shouldn't be dealing with these injuries at all.
I have, athletes ranging from, juvenile all the way up to professional athletes, and they're all having injuries that we, I didn't see in my first 10 years of practice 40 years ago.
Young athletes are getting Achilles ruptures, which we just don't see at that young age.
To tear a Achilles tendon at such a young age is, is unnatural.
And it isn't only the acute tears that worry him.
Kittle says turf leaves a mark on his body for days after the final whistle.
What I've learned from turf is that I am significantly more sore the day after.
Your feet, your ankles, your knees, your hips, everything's just more sore.
Right.
And it takes you a couple more days to bounce back.
Like, when I play on grass, yeah, I'm still sore from the game.
Like, yeah, you get hit, feels like a car crash, whatever that is.
But, like, you don't have that ankle stiffness, those knees, the hips.
Short of ripping out every turf field in the league tomorrow, Dr. Scheps thinks there is at least a way to catch these injuries before they happen.
There's a new technology coming down the pipe, and it's called ShearWave ultrasound.
The images rival that of MRI, and it could identify injuries that are becoming chronic from training on this hard surface.
Kittle believes the science alone won't change anything.
It's going to take the league's biggest names speaking up.
It all depends on the star power of the NFL.
If our best players, specifically the quarterbacks- Right Patrick Mahomes and Josh Allen, Matthew Stafford, Lamar Jackson, if you have the main guys speak up about it, there, there'll be an issue, and th- it'll help.
But I will continue to, you know, be a voice for my players, and I'm gonna try my best to do it.
This summer showed the league that real grass is possible.
Now it's up to the owners to decide if it's worth the cost.
