PHILADELPHIA -- Players have always said the turf at
Veterans Stadium feels like asphalt.
So it should come as no surprise the city is turning to asphalt
to try to solve drainage problems that forced the cancellation of
the Eagles' preseason opener.
"I wouldn't call it a permanent solution just yet, but we are
going to try something out in practice that may lead to a more
viable long-run fix," city managing director Joe Martz said.
The Eagles practiced on the Veterans Stadium turf on Monday for
the first time since the cancellation of their preseason home
opener against Baltimore last week. City officials said heavy rains
turned areas around the bases and pitcher's mound into mud, causing
the new artificial turf placed over it to buckle and sag.
"It's better than it was on game day," Eagles coach Andy Reid
said. "But there's still more work that needs to be done."
Players were instructed to withhold comment on the conditions of
the turf, and to deflect all questions to Reid.
The Eagles used the practice, which was closed to both the
public and the media, to try out different shoes to see what would
be best for the new turf.
"We ran 10 offensive plays, and 10 defensive plays, then we
took a shoe break," Reid said.
Representatives of Nike and Reebok were in attendance with a
variety of cleats and turf shoes for the players to sample.
"We had a fire hose out there and watered an entire area,"
Reid said. "We had the players try on different shoes in simulated
rain conditions."
One of the problems with the turf is how quickly it has
apparently worn despite only being installed for five months, Reid
said. The turf has been through 58 Phillies games, several concerts
and a charity carnival run by the Eagles.
"It's matted down, we got to get it up," Reid said. "They got
two machines out there with brushes trying to get it back up."
Officials are hoping to prevent another debacle -- more than
45,000 fans had turned out for the opener -- by installing a
two-inch layer of asphalt over the problem areas. The Eagles play
the New York Jets at the Vet on Aug. 30, after a weeklong homestand
for the Phillies.
Under the latest plan, the turf, called NeXturf, which has a
half-inch rubber base, will be rolled out over the asphalt. The
thick blacktop will be torn up and removed whenever the field is
converted back to a baseball field.
"We certainly hope that the proposed solutions will be
successful," team president Joe Banner said in a statement. "We
are not, however, ready to declare the problem solved."
City controller Jonathan Saidel said he watched a tape of
workers laying out some test asphalt over second base, and is
worried at how long the conversion process took.
"It took forever and a day, with jackhammers and heavy duty
trucks," Saidel said. "This couldn't be the answer. Why are my
people laying a street on third base? It was very time consuming."
Saidel said the asphalt plan may also prove costly, and called
on Southwest Recreational Industries, the makers of NeXturf, to pay
the bill.
Martz insisted that the plan is cost effective. He estimated
each conversion, from baseball, to football and back to baseball,
costs $2,500. He said the city and the Leander, Texas-based
Southwest are still in discussions over who will pay repair costs.
The surface beneath the permanent areas of the field -- the
outfield and the turf areas of the infield -- already rely on a
layer of asphalt covered by NeXturf.
During conversions that follow rain, workers will also re-drill
drainage holes around the cutouts, to make sure they are not
clogged, which is what officials suspect happened last week.
If the asphalt plan does not work, the city has other options,
Martz said.
"We are trying a whole host of different things out," he said.
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