Giants gamers ideally would love grass at MetLife Stadium, not the “new synthetic surface” that stadium officers just lately promised to put in in 2023.
Some gamers additionally imagine they need to be consulted in regards to the deliberate turf turnover that impacts them greater than anybody.
“One hundred percent,” mentioned vast receiver Sterling Shepard, who tore his left ACL this season on a non-contact play on the turf. “I mean, we’re the ones that are playing on it. So it definitely should be something they approach us about and see our thoughts.”
Good information: Giants co-owner John Mara advised the Daily News this week via a staff spokesman that he expects to seek the advice of his gamers in the course of the course of.
“The next field in the stadium is the subject of ongoing discussion between the Jets, the stadium and us,” the spokesman relayed on Mara’s behalf. “John has heard from the gamers and different consultants about enjoying surfaces as a part of his roles on the participant security and well being committee, competitors committee and administration council.
“He expects to have conversations with our players as we move along in the process of selecting a new field,” the assertion added.
Mara’s plan to solicit gamers’ perception is noteworthy as a result of that isn’t required protocol for one of these resolution.
An NFL gamers’ affiliation committee is at all times concerned in these conversations. And groups’ union reps are stored within the loop (the Giants’ is security Julian Love).
But particular person gamers historically will not be major voices in these discussions, and so they actually don’t have approval energy or sign-off to dam a call.
A number of events will likely be concerned on this upcoming MetLife Stadium floor change. Stadium officers, the Giants and the Jets keep concerned collectively.
Still, gamers’ complaints across the league about turf – and the MetLife Stadium turf particularly – have reached a deafening crescendo.
“Billion dolla business, can’t buy grass,” Baltimore Ravens receiver Rashod Bateman tweeted, with a clown face emoji, after Giants rookie Wan’Dale Robinson tore his proper ACL at MetLife Stadium just lately.
So it might be silly to push forward with out participant enter.
Who is aware of: the turf would possibly even deter Odell Beckham Jr. from coming again to New Jersey, on condition that he’s torn his left ACL twice already.
“GET RID OF TURF,” Beckham tweeted after seeing his good pal, Bills move rusher Von Miller, harm his knee on Detroit’s artificial floor.
“You want that grass,” Giants receiver Kenny Golladay advised The News. “It’s better. It doesn’t matter that [someone says] this turf is better [than another]. Grass is way more forgiving. With turf, you get stuck a bit in it. And if you think about it, on turf, whatever force you’re putting into the ground is shooting right back up into you.”
As the Giants group researches what to do in regards to the enjoying floor, although, additionally they are contending with a fair bigger subject:
They are yearly one of the vital injured groups within the NFL. This yr isn’t any totally different. And it’s not simply the turf.
SOMETHING’S WRONG WITH PLAYER HEALTH
The Giants have been within the NFL’s backside third groups for many accidents in 4 of the final six years. That spans three totally different head coaches: Pat Shurmur, Joe Judge and now Brian Daboll.
Through Week 11, Daboll’s staff was the NFL’s fifth most injured staff in 2022, in keeping with ManGamesLost.com, with 153 video games missed on account of injured gamers and well being protocols (The Saints lead the league with 173).
Mara acknowledged to the Daily News that that is an “issue” and mentioned the group is engaged on discovering an answer.
“It is an issue we continue to discuss and review with the GM, head coach and medical, which includes athletic training, strength and conditioning, and sports science,” Mara mentioned via a staff spokesman.
What is the foundation trigger, although?
The set up of MetLife Stadium’s present turf was solely accomplished on June 8, 2020. So the enjoying floor hasn’t even been a relentless because the Giants have constructed a popularity as one of many NFL’s most injured groups.
And the Jets, who share the identical house stadium, had been the NFL’s fourth-healthiest staff via 11 weeks (solely 77 video games missed, per ManGamesLost.com).
The Giants’ well being points date again to the Tom Coughlin period. They ranked useless final thirty second within the league for 3 years working from 2013-15 in Football Outsiders’ Adjusted Games Lost metric. They ranked twenty fifth in 2017 (Shumur), twenty third in 2020 (Judge) and twenty seventh in 2021 (Judge).
Now, after GM Joe Schoen and Daboll lowered and altered the Giants’ apply and coaching workload, this yr’s staff has been devastated by main accidents just about throughout the board – together with 4 torn ACLs of their 11-player rookie draft class alone.
Head athletic coach Ronnie Barnes and the coaching employees seemingly have been the first fixed throughout this final decade, which included improved rankings of eighth in 2016 and sixteenth in 2019. But any short-term good points have been fleeting.
Schoen promised in September that the Giants will “continue to evaluate” their coaching program and mentioned “if there’s something we can do better, we’ll find a way to do it better.”
As these evaluations proceed, gamers’ focus stays on the MetLife Stadium turf as one factor that should change instantly.
“We shouldn’t be taking more damage from the field,” Love tweeted in help of the NFLPA’s latest social media marketing campaign towards turf.
NOT JUST THE PLAYERS
Shepard mentioned one thing stunning: Some of the Giants’ coaches really feel turf’s impression on their knees whereas simply standing on the sidelines of video games.
“Whenever the coaches are standing on the sideline with turf versus grass, the coaches feel it on their knees and they’re not even out there playing,” Shepard mentioned. “They’ll say it after the game that they feel it on their knees. I feel it on my knees just standing on it. Everybody does. So imagine playing a full game on that and doing it back to back weeks. It’s probably tough on your body.”
Center Jon Feliciano mentioned, “Arizona has the best field in the league by far,” referring to the Cardinals’ well-manicured floor that’s rolled out into the desert solar and stored pristine.
He mentioned “when you fall on [turf[, you can feel the difference.” And he shook his head excited about final yr’s Bills house playoff recreation on the frigid Buffalo turf towards the New England Patriots.
“Falling on that field felt like concrete,” Feliciano mentioned. “Whatever the hardest possible surface is, that’s what it felt like.”
Oddly sufficient, although, Feliciano mentioned the opposite most painful area to fall on in chilly climate is Kansas City’s. And the Chiefs play on grass. Washington’s FedEx Field is also broadly thought of one of many worst enjoying surfaces within the league.
“It’s horrible,” one league supply mentioned. “And that’s grass.”
The NFL additionally just lately launched a knowledge chart that exposed a near-identical damage price on turf (.042 incidence price) vs. grass (.041 incidence price) within the 2021 season.
At the identical time, turf’s price was nonetheless barely larger in 2021. And the info additionally confirmed that damage price was larger on turf in the entire earlier three seasons: .040 to .033 in 2018, .048 to .036 in 2019 and .048 to .041 in 2020.
NFLPA president JC Tretter took subject particularly in a latest missive with “slit film” turf that he mentioned “has statistically higher in-game injury rates.” MetStadium is likely one of the six stadiums that makes use of it, together with the houses of the Detroit Lions, Minnesota Vikings, New Orleans Saints, Indianapolis Colts, and Cincinnati Bengals.
Tretter mentioned “the NFL and its experts have agreed with this data and acknowledge that the slit film field is less safe.” And he challenged the league over a number of participant well being points, together with turf, to “stop with the lip service, stop with the media spin, stop pretending you care.”
But Jeff Miller, the NFL’s govt VP of communications, public affairs and coverage, advised ProfessionalFootballDiscuss in a press release that the ‘slit-film’ dialog is extra complicated.
“While slit-film surfaces, one type of synthetic material, have 2-3 more injuries per year, most of them are ankle sprains — a low-burden injury — whereas slit film also sees a lower rate of fewer high-burden ACL injuries compared to other synthetic fields,” Miller mentioned. “As a result, the league and NFLPA’s joint experts did not recommend any changes to surfaces at (our joint meeting on field surface safety) but agreed more study is needed.”
That mentioned, 5 of the NFL’s seven healthiest groups via Week 11 play on grass, per ManGamesLost.com: the Jaguars (38 video games missed), Chiefs (63), Eagles (72), Bears (83) and Packers (83). The Jets (77) and Bills (83) had been the one two turf groups to crack that group.
MetLife Stadium officers advised ESPN just lately that they “historically have replaced our playing surface every 3-4 years.” They mentioned “we have made the decision to replace the field in 2023 and are currently reviewing proposals from multiple vendors for a new synthetic surface.”
And one league supply mentioned on the brilliant aspect, whether or not they set up a brand new turf or grass, “addressing it shows they see it’s a problem.”
Shepard mentioned MetLife Stadium’s resolution to make a change was not on account of any gamers storming upstairs into Mara’s or Schoen’s workplace. That didn’t occur.
It was extra in regards to the groundswell of public frustration from gamers throughout, starting with the San Francisco 49ers’ anger with the MetLife turf whereas shedding gamers in back-to-back video games there towards the Jets and Giants.
“I just think it’s the uproar of everybody around the league,” Shepard mentioned. “And then you see how many injuries have happened on our field particularly and around the league, it’s hard to ignore that. But I’m glad we’re taking a step in the right direction doing something a little better for the players.”
Who is aware of if Mara, stadium officers, the Giants and Jets will get the gamers their grass. But listening to them is an effective begin.
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Source: www.bostonherald.com