Carolina's MVP was the field today.

[NINEster]

There is a difference between an excuse and an explanation. The field was BS. We need to get home field advantage next time, AND the NFL, for all the money fans waste on this, needs to require that home teams assure a better field surface, else replace it with field turf.

The 49ers have lost many a home NFC playoff game on some s*** turf due to the high water table and January rains.

The re-sodding stories for divisional and championship playoff games in the '80s and '90s are epic. What the Panthers had today, Levi's at its worst, Redskins 2012 were all better playing surfaces by far than those muddy stick games.

I think that's all you need to know about whether the turf matters.

 

[NINEster]

Field not the reason for the loss. But I am curious about the problems with grass fields around the league. Washington's field is bad. Carolina had to re-sod 3 times this year apparently. The new Niners stadium has had tons of turf issues. Broncos field looked thrashed today. Is it maybe just that hard to maintain a football field? In a multi billion dollar industry, it would seem teams would always be playing on the best surfaces money could buy. Maybe with all the field turf stadiums I just notice it more.

Greed, used to be football stadiums were used by the team and that was about it, then they became multiuse and then places where tournament were held and anything else you can cram into them for revenue to pay them off. Fields don't get time to recover. Not saying that was specific to this situation, the grass type used may have been a shallow rooted grass so it peels away, the heavy rains made it as stated a layer of moss on mud or clay and slippery.

Look at all the teams that play on grass.....most do it out of tradition:

49ers
Packers
Steelers
Dolphins
Bears
Broncos
Raiders
Chargers
Chiefs

Respect tradition, and the challenges with having a grass field.

You guys want fairways from Augusta quality with 44 cleats going to work for a few hours each week, and non perfect weather.

Grass up, do it better, and then talk.

And BTW with respect to multiuse -- now it's just football and soccer, maybe concerts.

Nobody is doing football/baseball anymore. That would be the ultimate in greed while depriving the fans. Be grateful there's only one NFL team left in that scenario.

 

[chris98251]

Field not the reason for the loss. But I am curious about the problems with grass fields around the league. Washington's field is bad. Carolina had to re-sod 3 times this year apparently. The new Niners stadium has had tons of turf issues. Broncos field looked thrashed today. Is it maybe just that hard to maintain a football field? In a multi billion dollar industry, it would seem teams would always be playing on the best surfaces money could buy. Maybe with all the field turf stadiums I just notice it more.

Greed, used to be football stadiums were used by the team and that was about it, then they became multiuse and then places where tournament were held and anything else you can cram into them for revenue to pay them off. Fields don't get time to recover. Not saying that was specific to this situation, the grass type used may have been a shallow rooted grass so it peels away, the heavy rains made it as stated a layer of moss on mud or clay and slippery.

Look at all the teams that play on grass.....most do it out of tradition:

49ers
Packers
Steelers
Dolphins
Bears
Broncos
Raiders
Chargers
Chiefs

Respect tradition, and the challenges with having a grass field.

You guys want fairways from Augusta quality with 44 cleats going to work for a few hours each week, and non perfect weather.

Grass up, do it better, and then talk.

And BTW with respect to multiuse -- now it's just football and soccer, maybe concerts.

Nobody is doing football/baseball anymore. That would be the ultimate in greed while depriving the fans. Be grateful there's only one NFL team left in that scenario.

Yeah but College games, High School games, Soccer, Concerts, Monster Truck Events, or whatever else wants space and Bowl seating, doesn't take a long time to chew up a field when that is happening with Rain fall as well.

 

[makkapakka]

Does anyone know if the whole team exchanged cleat sizes during half time? If so that would really be telling.

 

[chrispy]

What do we think Home-Field-Advantage means? ... that the Seahawks get a fair advantage because of noise in C-Link, but it's unfair when another team gets an advantage because of field conditions?

Start the season mediocre/under .500, and start the game 0-31: There is no room for any fact/excuse to explain away the season-ending loss except that the team couldn't put wins together at the right time.

This thread is embarrassing....

 

[Glasgow Seahawk]

We can bitch about the field but the other team had to play in it as well.

Also before we whine about it, Century Link's field turf has been in a very sorry state for well over a year. See criticism from the Sounders, opposition etc. It's apparently like playing on concrete due to years of concerts, truck derbies along with hawks, Sounders and even the huskies having played on it and compacted it. It should get replaced next year.

 

[mrford]

hey guys, Panthers fan here. Registered just because of this thread.

I dont know if you all have been paying attention to the weather down here in the Carolinas, but we had the wettest november and december on record. january hasnt been much better so far. El Nino has been mean to us and hasnt even offered a reach around!

add that with the ACC championship game, and the Belk Bowl (both of which were played in torrential downpours really messing the field up), and that field has gotten a LOT of use. the sod has been replaced atleast 3 times this season.

even though it is sand based and drains really well, it is ridiculous to expect the field to be in excellent shape. I have been complaining about the conditions of the field for a few months too, so trust me, it wasnt just ruined for the seahawks game.

http://i.imgur.com/eyJHE0x.jpg

the field was even tarped for the early morning snow storm.

 

[TriCHawk]

Win #1 seed next year, and it's not a problem. These guys live and breathe football for a living... They should know how to handle different fields. Sunday was just a beat down. An aberration, but still a beat down.

 

[VivaEfrenHerrera]

hey guys, Panthers fan here. Registered just because of this thread.

I dont know if you all have been paying attention to the weather down here in the Carolinas, but we had the wettest november and december on record. january hasnt been much better so far. El Nino has been mean to us and hasnt even offered a reach around!

add that with the ACC championship game, and the Belk Bowl (both of which were played in torrential downpours really messing the field up), and that field has gotten a LOT of use. the sod has been replaced atleast 3 times this season.

even though it is sand based and drains really well, it is ridiculous to expect the field to be in excellent shape. I have been complaining about the conditions of the field for a few months too, so trust me, it wasnt just ruined for the seahawks game.

http://i.imgur.com/eyJHE0x.jpg

the field was even tarped for the early morning snow storm.

Thanks for a quality post. Interesting; did not know that about the weather down there.

 

[Hasselbeck]

You know what will fix that crappy field?

Getting the #1 seed for the playoffs.

That also fixes the traveling cross country for 2x 10am road games in a row. :th2thumbs:

Exactly.

All our problems are solved by not losing 2x to the Rams, not blowing a 24-7 lead to the Bengals, and not blowing a 9 point 4th quarter lead to Carolina.

 

[Hasselbeck]

hey guys, Panthers fan here. Registered just because of this thread.

I dont know if you all have been paying attention to the weather down here in the Carolinas, but we had the wettest november and december on record. january hasnt been much better so far. El Nino has been mean to us and hasnt even offered a reach around!

add that with the ACC championship game, and the Belk Bowl (both of which were played in torrential downpours really messing the field up), and that field has gotten a LOT of use. the sod has been replaced atleast 3 times this season.

even though it is sand based and drains really well, it is ridiculous to expect the field to be in excellent shape. I have been complaining about the conditions of the field for a few months too, so trust me, it wasnt just ruined for the seahawks game.

http://i.imgur.com/eyJHE0x.jpg

the field was even tarped for the early morning snow storm.

Panthers have nothing to be ashamed about.. this is all a part of home-field advantage. We blew 4 games this year, including one to you guys.. and if we took care of business in all of those, we're the #1 seed.

If we don't want to fly cross-country, play at 10AM Pacific in back-to-back weeks, play in a meat freezer one game followed by playing a 15-1 team on painted dirt.. then win. more. games.

 

[mrford]

Thanks for a quality post. Interesting; did not know that about the weather down there.

I forgot to mention the Colts Monday Night game. I was at this game, and it rained at least 3 inches DURING the game. Don’t know if any of you remember that November 2nd game, but I was there and my empty popcorn bucket had ~2 inches of water in it just from the 2nd half.

http://i.imgur.com/zb5W1Qb.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/f8pgHft.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/FTtZdvb.jpg

You can see just how hard it was raining, and how bad the field was getting messed up in those pictures. Not only that, but we had a home game less than 6 days after this The field never had time to recover and has been a patch job ever since. You can go back and look at pics from our games and see it. I have been terrified of injuries for weeks, and some have come to fruition (Tillman).

But there isn’t much you can do about it is there? They have tried replacing the sod, and they started replacing just the middle (you can see the difference in color from inside and outside the hashes in the playoff game). Hopefully the field recovers in the off season and next season isn’t so wet! The flooding around here has been really bad in general.

 

[Michael Nano Buble]

I herd the Kittys had extra long cleats bc they knew the feild would be not good and it was a secret except the panthers knew.

 

[Foghawk]

I herd the Kittys had extra long cleats bc they knew the feild would be not good and it was a secret except the panthers knew.

 

[SoulfishHawk]

:?
Yeah, because the Hawks couldn't have figured it out DURING THEIR WALK THRU. There is no excuse for them not being prepared for that crap field. They had plenty of time to be ready with the proper cleats.
They got outplayed, move on.

 

[Scottemojo]

I think Carolina waited until 6 days before the game to re sod, and I think their gameplan was based on that.

Kind of like when San Diego based their gameplan on the heat.

Seattle not being ready for such a thing is on the coaching staff. This is not their first rodeo.

 

[kearly]

For you Turf Apologists, why wasn't the turf a big deal to us in the second half?

Seattle needed a few series to figure out which cleats they needed, plus it probably took a little time to adjust to knowing what cuts players could make and which they couldn't. Look at the first play where Lynch gets hit right at the handoff, and you'll see the Center slip, twice. Look at the first run by Stewart, where he gained more than half his yards for the entire day. It's bottled up, but nobody can make a cut to get him. And then Earl slips.

By the time the Seahawks had adjusted to the conditions, about 11 offensive plays into the game, they were down 31-0.

Rest of the game? 24-0 Seattle. Carolina's offense never got past the 50 yard line. Sure, the Panthers were playing safe, but they got outgained during that stretch 4 to 1.

I'm mad as hell about it, I think it's bush league BS by Carolina. But I'm also a little mad at our coaches too for allowing it to kill a SB caliber season. I hope like hell that it's a lesson Pete took to heart about preparing better for game conditions.

 

[Laloosh]

Probably took some time to get everyone's cleats swapped out as well. How many equipment guys are there?

 

[MysterMatt]

Its not an excuse to say it was a factor in the game, its a fact. Was it the difference in the game? Who knows, but its silly to say it didnt take a role.

To the "both teams played on the same field" crowd, teams adjust their fields to their strengths all the time. Stanford is famous for it. Any time they play a quick, fast team (like my ducks) they dont mow it for a week to make it a slow track.

This field today benefited Carolina. The guys they depend on for offense (Newton, Stewart and Olsen) are all mudders. They're body types and playing style are perfect for the sloppy field. The guys we depend on for offense (Wilson, Baldwin, Lockett) are built for a fast track.

Its not an excuse, but its definitely a factor.

It's nice when grown ups join the conversation. Carolina won the game, congrats, but it was obvious that the Seahawks were totally unprepared for that sad excuse for a field. Shame on them, because if they had been prepared there is no way they would have spotted the Panthers 31 points.

No doubt Car was fired up and came out swinging and, to be honest, I think our O was totally playing to their strengths for most of the 1st half. Carolina didn't force us to opt against an easy FG late in the 2nd. My point is that it's fair to say that our coaches and equipment decision makers collectively had the worst 1st half of football in many a year, which cost us the game.

The field was still a significant factor. It's silly to resist this fact, but then a lot of you are prone to overcompensating.

 

[mrford]

I'm mad as hell about it, I think it's bush league BS by Carolina.

Bush league BS by Carolina? I'm interested in your logic behind that. What exactly do you think Carolina should have done differently? Played the game in a different venue?