September 14–21, 2000

city beat

Rolen Out the Options

An all-dirt infield at the Vet may prove to be the best compromise to ease the pain of players like Scott Rolen.

by Noel Weyrich

The worn and rock-hard AstroTurf at Veteran’s Stadium, voted years ago by NFL players as the worst surface in the league, was singled out once again for ridicule by CBS sportscasters during Sunday’s Eagles-Giants game. But city and team officials are now pondering a replacement for the artificial turf by next spring, and although a grass surface has been all but ruled out, several options under consideration could make the field look and feel much better during what may be the stadium’s last days.

The makers of AstroTurf say that since the Vet was last fitted for a rug back in 1995, they have made a number of player-friendly improvements to their assortment of playing surfaces, generally making them softer, spongier and less abrasive.

"There’s been some advances in the padding systems," says Troy Squires of Southwest Recreational Industries, parent company of AstroTurf. A new double layer system of foam padding over rubber is both softer and more shock absorbent, he says. "Something spongy doesn’t usually absorb shock all that well, but because we laminate one to the other, we kind of get the best of both of them."

Football players claim the hardness of older artificial turf results in more career threatening concussions and torn ligaments, and in a 1997 poll, nearly three quarters said they were less likely to consider joining teams with artificial turf home fields. Among baseball players, Phillies All-Star third baseman Scott Rolen in particular routinely complains he gets disabling back pains only after playing a series of games at the Vet.

For Rolen’s sake, at least, one attractive option might be to lay out a new artificial surface differently, so that the basepaths in the "infield arc" between first base and third base is completely dirt, just as it is on grass fields. Right now, the infield is all AstroTurf, except for dirt "cutouts" around the bases. A dirt infield arc would be softer on the knees of infielders and baserunners alike, and would even help improve the Vet’s aesthetics

Mike DiMuzio, the Phillies stadium operations director, confirms that dirt for the infield arc is being discussed, but cautions that it would present some logistical problems during the overnight switch from baseball to football. To make the field ready for the Eagles, all the infield dirt would have to be removed and scraped flat so that an artificial turf insert would be level with the rest of the field.

"Given the time constraints of an overnight conversion, the question is, can you do it?" he says. DiMuzio recalls that Busch Stadium in St. Louis once had a dirt infield arc, but switched to Vet-style base cut-outs to ease the baseball-football conversion process.

The Vet is fast becoming one of the last of the double-duty stadiums, and as such, says Squires, any artificial turf will take a particularly harsh pounding there.

"It’s really asking a lot from a field, with the weather up North, converting between sports," says the Texas-based Squires. "That field is used for a lot of different activities. It’s a real throwback to the days when artificial turf was first introduced."