Ahead of Sunday’s FIFA World Cup final at MetLife Stadium, dozens of NFL players including Chicago Bears quarterback Caleb Williams and Washington Commanders offensive tackle Laremy Tunsil took to social media with the hashtag #WorthTheCost to express their desire for permanent grass playing surfaces on.
MetLife Stadium is among the venues that replaced its artificial turf with grass for the 78 FIFA World Cup games hosted by NFL stadiums this summer.
“If stadiums can make grass work for the World Cup, they can make it work for NFL players. We’re #WorthTheCost,” Tunsil wrote in a post on X.
Green Bay linebacker Zaire Franklin also chimed in.
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“The cost of doing nothing is paid for by players’ bodies,” Franklin wrote in his own post. “Make grass mandatory. We’re #WorthTheCost.”
The renewed social media push comes after the NFLPA released a statement at the beginning of the FIFA World Cup urging team owners to make the switch to natural grass surfaces. At FIFA’s request, all 11 NFL stadiums hosting World Cup matches installed natural grass playing surfaces. Seven of those stadiums traditionally use synthetic turf as their primary playing surface for NFL games and will return to that when the tournament concludes Sunday.
“The temporary installation of natural grass fields for the World Cup is a choice by certain NFL team owners to do for soccer players what they refuse to do for NFL players,” the NFLPA said in a statement posted to social media five weeks ago. “It’s no longer a question of capability; the technology exists, the expertise exists and the resources exist to install the high-level grass fields that our players overwhelmingly prefer.
“We have seen the meaningful investments made to meet the standard for international athletes and global events. NFL players — who regularly compete on these fields help fund these stadiums and whose work makes the league what it is today — deserve the same commitment to quality grass fields.”
The post added that “92% of NFL players prefer natural grass.”
The NFL didn’t respond to a request for comment on the players’ social media movement Friday afternoon.
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San Francisco 49ers tight end George Kittle also released a statement in June to strongly voice his support for grass fields.
“We’ve made it clear that we prefer grass fields,” he said. “We know it’s better on our bodies. And clearly, we know it’s possible based on everything that went into putting down grass fields for the World Cup in each stadium.
“At this point, it comes down to the NFL making it a priority and choosing to invest in us as players, because our bodies are our business, which they get to capitalize on!”
