Houston was the first to use Astroturf and it changed the landscape of stadiums around the nation. Now, the Houston team is the first to use TurfGrass: The Astros appear to be on the cutting edge of turf yet again. Groundskeepers began installing 2.3 acres of a new turfgrass playing surface at Minute Maid Park on Sunday. The new sod is called Platinum TE Paspalum. The Astros are the first sports organization in the world to use the product. It's an upgrade over the previous sod used at Minute Maid Park, which opened in 2000. It requires less sunlight, gives off a greener color and handles gameday wear and tear well. "The Astros grounds crew has embraced the challenge of keeping a beautiful stand of turf under the roof of Minute Maid Park," said Dan Bergstrom, Houston's director of Major League field operations. "We expect to keep our playing surface in top-notch condition for our players, and we are excited to have the latest technology and turfgrass genetics with our new Platinum TE Paspalum." The new surface was produced by Turf Ecosystems, LLC., which also develops golf courses. http://mlb.mlb.com/news/article.jsp...news_hou&fext=.jsp&c_id=hou&partnerId=rss_hou
So this is a type of real grass right? What makes it special? I'm not sure introducing Astroturf to the world and domed multisport stadiums is something to be proud of.
It paved the way for the new type of synthetic turf that's used in a lot of stadiums. It is something to be proud about. Of course it wasn't pefect, it was the first of its kind. Read the article, it tells you what's special about it.
@ "new, improved, technologically made, non-natural" crap. Whoop-dee-doo. What a bunch of pansies, this Major League of Basecrap... making the game and its components a thing of the "past"... congratulations. Whatever happened to keeping the game intact?
WTF are you complaining about? It's grass. It's genitically improved to look better, need less sunlight, and to be stronger but it is still grass. Why are you bent out of shape over that? And what are you quoting? I don't see any of that in the article or on the company website.
That's kind of like saying we shouldn't be proud of building the Astrodome 43 years ago because it's currently outdated.
Artificial turf today is leaps and bounds beyond what most people think of synthetic turf. The stuff coming out in the near future is going to be even better. Of course, I work in the industry, so I might be a little biased.
I quote DUMB terminology, Oski. If it is REAL grass, then why the need to change the OLDER grass? Es el juego del FAKE GRASS ahora. My main beef is that with so much stupid crap added, it's no longer baseball au naturale. It's like droolin' over fake boobs. They feel like... like damn, I'm scared to puncture one of them things...
The Astros have also recorded another "first" in sports. In addition to being the first organization to use artifical grass, known as AstroTurf, the Astros are now the first sports franchise to be run by a GM who has an artificial brain in current GM Ed Wade. Rumor has it, Ed Wade and his artificial brain are on the verge of creating a synthetic pitching arm for grizzled-veteran pitcher Mike Hampton. Stay tuned folks....the "firsts" keep coming! (what next, artificial sports fans to fill the seats )
If we miss out on Peavy, I wonder if we'll see a poll asking what we'd rather have had..Peavy or turfgrass?
Because the older grass turns brown and dies easily and looks bad and gets torn up. This different breed of grass is better. It looks better, it plays better, it is stronger and easier to take care of, what is the big freaking deal? You are comparing genetically improved grass to fake boobs? This isn't the enhanced with artificial fibers stuff they have at Lambeau Field, there's nothing added. It's the same thing man has been doing with plants since we started cultivating. Obviously these guys are using high science/genetics, but for thousands of years humans have been selectively breeding and cross breeding plants to come up with heartier, tastier, and better looking results. Next time you have a banana, know that if bananas weren't improved by humans, we'd have this seed filled monster to deal with instead of the tasty bananas we enjoy today:
