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EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. — Just days before the 2026 World Cup kicked off, New York Giants coach John Harbaugh was asked about the temporary natural grass being installed for the tournament at MetLife Stadium — only for turf to replace it later this summer as American football begins.
"Oh, you're going to try to draw me into the turf vs. grass [debate]. [NFL commissioner Roger Goodell] is going to call me off and he's going to get mad at me because I'm probably not going to say what he wants me to say," he said. "That's all I'm going to say."
On Wednesday, the NFL Players Association posted to social media an image that read: Player Voices Should Shape Their Game from the Ground Up. The word “ground” is designed to look like grass. The second slide on the post showed 92% of its players preferred grass, according to an NFLPA survey.
The turf vs. grass debate is only going to grow stronger with FIFA having installed grass for the World Cup in 11 of the NFL stadiums that traditionally use synthetic turf. The NFL's players haven't been shy about wanting grass fields in all its stadiums.
So it cuts deep that FIFA rolled out the green carpet for this year's World Cup. Fresh natural grass has been transported across the country in refrigerated trucks and laid out meticulously to meet its standards in the 11 U.S. stadiums, seven of which traditionally use synthetic turf as their primary playing surface for NFL games. It is particularly a topic of discussion at MetLife Stadium, where the turf sits beneath layers of sand and natural grass awaiting the NFL season.
It's going to be jarring to see these massive NFL stadiums, some indoor-domed facilities, flush with natural grass surfaces. It's something NFL players have been clamoring for years. Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta, AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Texas, MetLife Stadium, Gillette Stadium in Foxborough, Massachusetts, Sofi Stadium in Inglewood, California, NRG Stadium in Houston and Lumen Field in Seattle have all been temporarily cosmetically altered with a natural grass field.
"Annoying," Giants offensive lineman Jermaine Eluemunor said of what it’s like to see the MetLife Stadium turf covered by a natural grass surface. “It’s nice playing on grass.”
It's a project that FIFA says needed six to seven years of research to implement. It was a massive overhaul in which field use was banned at each stadium for approximately 10 weeks ahead of the World Cup to ensure there were no other events before and during the five-plus weeks of soccer competition.
The 11 U.S. stadiums have since been equipped with warm or cool season grass hybrids, depending on the environment. Each field took weeks to install with grass grown on what's called "sod-on-plastic." This technique allows the surface to be deconstructed, rolled up and shipped with its root system preserved. Specialized stitching machines sew the field into place upon delivery and weeks of maintenance with help from newly installed ventilation systems and grow lights keep the grass pristine for soccer's biggest stage.
"The research and what we've been planning that goes into this, it takes months and years to do this," FIFA pitch manager David Graham told reporters last month.
The NFL and its players have taken notice, especially since 15 of the league's 30 regular stadiums (the Giants and New York Jets share MetLife Stadium and the Los Angeles Rams and Los Angeles Chargers share SoFi Stadium) use natural grass. The other half have synthetic turf.
The Rams and Chargers' former turf home field at SoFi Stadium will host the United States' opening game in the tournament Friday against Paraguay at 9 p.m. ET.
And while the NFL and the players' union concede that the injury rate is similar on both surfaces, players' preference is undeniable.
"The players prefer to play on natural grass. We would love if we could get to that," said Jets defensive lineman Harrison Phillips, a member of the NFLPA’s executive committee. “There’s a ton of issues with climate and how is it possible. If they’re able to figure it out for other organizations and other groups playing, they probably can figure it out for us.”
Players are hopeful that 30 stadiums with grass fields will be in their future.
"Can it be done? Yes. We know it's going to be done [at the World Cup]," Rams safety Quentin Lake said. “So I would hope that one day, maybe in the near future, that they can do it for us.”
The World Cup is the latest proof of concept that it's possible to have grass fields in all 30 NFL stadiums — even the domes. But obstacles remain from keeping it full time.
ALAS, ITS NOT nearly as simple as just leaving the new grass fields from the World Cup behind for the NFL season.
The exclusivity deals around the grass fields are imperative for FIFA to operate the tournament in the United States. Aside from the changing climates and agronomical challenges the grass fields pose, the reality is that these stadiums are in some of the biggest cities throughout the country. These stadiums host countless events aside from NFL games that easily could disrupt the growth and maintenance of the grass.
NFL stadiums across America host everything from professional football to college football to high school sporting events to concerts to monster truck rallies to rodeos. All during the NFL season. And that's just a sampling.
MetLife Stadium — being called New York New Jersey Stadium for the World Cup because of FIFA's strict "clean stadium" policy, which prohibits corporate sponsors and branding at the venues — has a busy August schedule after the tournament's final July 19. There are concerts and NFL games on 12 of the 31 days that includes preseason contests on back-to-back days Aug. 14-15 for the Giants and Jets.
The multiuse aspect of these stadiums is integral to their existence, so making it exclusive to NFL action isn't realistic.
"That's a really challenging thing to do is say we're going to go from a building that produces not just great football games but also community events, the opportunity for our local fans to enjoy our facility, to have a facility to be this large scale, this big, this nice, it's hard to do that with just football games throughout the season," NFL field director Nick Pappas said.
After being asked about the field topic at the NFL's annual meetings in Phoenix earlier this year, Dallas Cowboys owner and general manager Jerry Jones made it clear that keeping the grass surfaces in place after the World Cup was never really in consideration.
"No, we have more flexibility with the way we handle our surface at the stadium. We have no belief that it's any safer to play on a grass [field] or a turf. We are ambiguous as to the safety of it," Jones said. "The turf, actually like many things, improves the economics of being able to play this game and our players are the biggest benefactor of all. They get the best benefit of when we do good things financially, the players are benefiting. So I'm working for you, baby, OK, if you're a player.
"And so the combination of that, I'm very comfortable putting some grass down for soccer under regulations and proud to be able to do it but quickly get that turf back out there to go about the other business of the stadium and the team."
There are some stadiums that have managed to make grass fields work while maintaining their multiuse. World Cup venue Hard Rock Stadium is home to the Miami Dolphins and uses natural grass fields. It is one stadium that hosts numerous events throughout the year in addition to NFL games and that includes University of Miami football.
Hard Rock Stadium constantly changes its grass by pre-growing fields at its team-owned South Florida Sod Farm. The grass field is changed as often as every month, depending on the conditions. The favorable Florida climate makes this feasible.
It's an investment made by the Dolphins and would need to be adopted by the teams that have turf in their stadiums should they choose to install grass.
"So the discussion now when the how-to question gets answered becomes the economic question, which is what we've known it's always been about. It's always a bit about the economics," NFLPA executive director JC Tretter said. “It also meant the cost of putting the grass fields and the opportunity cost of the concerts that you can’t hold. I think it helps in that it makes the discussion a lot clearer. There’s a little less bulls— that probably goes on around what the actual issues are now.”
Among those issues for the NFL and its players' union includes the injury discussion. The grass vs. turf argument appears to have shifted in recent years. It used to be about injuries on turf. But the NFL said in January at its annual Super Bowl news conference the number of injuries that occur on grass compared to artificial surfaces are similar: 0.43 on artificial, 0.42 on grass, according to Dr. Allen Sills, the league's chief medical officer.
Players insist they feel better after playing on natural grass, that it's easier on their joints.
"You talk about longevity, you talk about injuries, you talk about wanting to make sure your joints feel great; playing a game on turf, after, I'm not going to lie, my knees ache, my ankles ache," Patriots safety Brenden Schooler said. “It’s a little bit more harsh on your body. So if I have any opportunity to go train, work out, play, run around on grass, I would probably prefer grass.”
Ogden: World Cup controversy could damage Infantino’s FIFA re-election
THE FIELDS FANS will be seeing at the World Cup consists of grass that is soccer specific, cultivated by FIFA with a recipe consisting of a controlled mix of grasses over a six-to-eight-month window at 10 turf farms across the country. The cool weather fields are a mixture of 84% Kentucky bluegrass and 16% ryegrass while the warm weather surfaces (including New York New Jersey Stadium) are 100% Bermuda grass, according to John “Trey” Rogers III, a professor of turfgrass research in the College of Agriculture and Natural Resources at Michigan State.
Rogers worked in collaboration with a team at the University of Tennessee, led by John Sorochan, to develop the World Cup's field surface. And it's unique to the sport.
While some NFL fields that have turf can traditionally hold up for soccer, the same rarely applies conversely considering the size and demands of NFL athletes. The turfgrass scientists at Michigan State and Tennessee used machines such as the foot lower extremity, which simulates a 170-pound player hitting the surface during a game, to test the grass specifically for the World Cup. They also used a ball drop machine that drops a soccer ball from six feet in the air to measure the audio of the ball hitting the ground and bouncing to assess the bounce and roll.
These are nowhere near the same demands as American football — 300-plus-pound individuals grappling on every play doesn't put a priority on how the ball bounces and rolls on the surface. The NFL is more concerned with traction, forgiveness and how it handles massive men accelerating, decelerating and changing direction.
"They might be great for soccer. We don't know if they're great for football," Tretter said. "So it is more we need to have a dedicated conscious effort to start building up the same high-quality grass surfaces as we're doing for everything else and other organizations are doing for their grass fields."
The NFL and its players agree that the goal isn't just to have all-grass fields, but what they want is high-quality surfaces.
"We don't want to put grass in that doesn't meet the standard," Pappas said. "And our standards of grass are through the roof, which is fantastic."
"We don't want 30 Pittsburghs," Tretter said, referring to the often unpredictable grass at Acrisure Stadium. Chicago [Soldier Field] and Washington [Northwest Stadium] are among NFL venues that have had problematic grass fields.
Time and usage seem to be the most pressing issues for the move to more grass fields. With all the events that occur at NFL stadiums, can team field staffs sufficiently manage fields to get them up to standards for every game?
"Anytime you do anything on grass, your recovery needs to outpace your usage," Pappas said. "So the more you use the field, the more it needs to recover. So every time you use a field, it needs to then recover from that use. Well, even if you get into a situation like we see regularly in our NFL stadiums at our grass, the use outpaces the recovery."
That becomes more difficult in the Northeast given the harsher winter weather conditions. The domes deal with a different set of challenges without natural light coming in. Five of the NFL stadiums being used for the World Cup have retractable roofs. Rogers says there still needs to be an advancement with grow lights before there likely can be a full-time grass field indoors.
But the technology is getting close.
Bernabeu stadium in Madrid, which recently underwent renovation and has a retractable roof, grows its own grass in a greenhouse underneath the venue.
"I don't think we're far away," Rogers said. "And some of our work that FIFA has sponsored allowed us to really kind of peek over the fence beyond what was necessary for the World Cup. And I don't think we're far away, but it's going to take … the word I'm going to use would be a commitment."
IT'S NOT THAT Northeast teams haven’t tried before. The Patriots had a grass field in Gillette Stadium from 2002 to 2006. The Giants and Jets had grass in Giants Stadium from 2000 to 2002.
It didn't work. They didn't have spare fields like Miami on layaway.
"I think we'll see another push after this particular 2026 World Cup, and it'll involve sod-on-plastic," Rogers said.
A grass field was installed in the Pontiac Silverdome near Detroit for the 1994 World Cup, using the same sod-on-plastic technique that has been refined and improved for the grass in this year's tournament.
It has led to grass fields being used in retractable dome stadiums in places such as Las Vegas and Arizona for the Raiders and Cardinals, respectively. The game-day readiness of the sod keeps getting better from the farm to the stadium. The ability for it to travel thousands of miles — the turf being used in Atlanta this summer came from Platteville, Colorado — has been proved.
With the advancements that have been made, anything seems possible.
Who is to say that eventually there isn't a synthetic turf that is better than grass?
"I wish we would become a little less emotional about the material makeup of what our fields are and become more emotional about the standard of the product we're putting forward, right?" Pappas said. "How do we improve the standard? How do we keep finding new metrics and new ways to measure and objectify our fields to improve that standard and ensure that our fields are meeting that standard?"
For now, the players pine for real grass and, come this summer, the grass fields at the seven World Cup stadiums that temporarily made the transition will go back to turf.
"Yeah, guys are going to be frustrated," Tretter said. "That will be a frustrating moment a few months from now where they see how quickly they roll back out the turf field in place of it."
