The knee injury Los Angeles Rams wide receiver Odell Beckham Jr experienced in Sunday’s Super Bowl when his foot got caught on the artificial turf field has increased calls for the NFL to mandate grass fields only.
Of the 32 teams in the NFL, 16 teams still play on artificial turf, including the Rams and Los Angeles Chargers at their shared home, the US$5.5 billion SoFi Stadium in Inglewood, California.
The non-contact injury to Beckham’s left knee, which some fear could be a torn anterior cruciate ligament, led to an outcry on social media.
“Turf should be banned,” San Francisco 49ers wide receiver Deebo Samuel wrote on Twitter during the game, which the Rams won 23-20 against the Cincinnati Bengals as Beckham looked on from the sidelines.
“The NFL needs to make it a mandatory rule that every team should have grass instead of turf,” Las Vegas Raiders guard Jermaine Eluemunor wrote on Twitter. “Turf is trash.”
A group called Flip the Turf has said is far more dangerous for players.
Turf fields lead to 32 percent more non-contact knee injuries and 69 percent more non-contact foot and ankle injuries, the group said, citing NFL injury data collected from 2012 to 2018.
Turf can get much hotter than natural grass, increasing the rate at which toxic gases are released and ingested, a Columbia University study found, whicle 90 percent of NFL players believe artificial turf will shorten their careers.
Turf is also worse for the environment, Flip the Turf said.
It cannot be recycled in the US, leading to an estimated 149,69 million kilograms of landfill waste each year, and microplastics in water and irrigation systems, the group said in its petition on Change.org.
“Unlike grass, turf does not cool the environment,” the group said. “It does not filter air and water pollutants. It does not fix carbon dioxide or release oxygen. Turf has zero climate benefits.”
The NFL did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
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