JC Tretter says the World Cup has made it “feasible” to install grass in indoor NFL stadiums, stripping away long-used excuses. He argues the real driver behind artificial turf is cost and raises the real bargaining question: whether players can push for the s
When JC Tretter talks about turf, it isn’t theory—it’s a line players have heard for years, and one the World Cup is now challenging.
“[T]here’s always been multiple excuses made,” the NFL Players Association executive director told Albert Breer of SI.com. One of those excuses. Tretter said. was the claim that indoor buildings make grass impossible: “Hey. it’s not possible. it’s an indoor stadium. We can’t grow grass here. It’s impossible.”.
Then came the World Cup. Tretter’s point was blunt. “It’s feasible. Now it’s really a choice.”
That choice, he says, is why owners have often stayed with artificial turf. Tretter told Breer that artificial turf comes down to cost—and not just one kind. “[T]hat choice clearly comes down to cost,” he said, describing two different costs that owners weigh.
There’s the up-front and ongoing burden: “One is the cost of upkeep and installation.” But Tretter argued teams can absorb those expenses when it’s tied to major events. “But clearly they’re OK doing that for this event, they just seem not OK doing it for the actual employees they pay.”
The second cost is the trade-off that frustrates players: the risk of losing other opportunities teams use stadiums for beyond football. “And then the other cost. which kind of frustrates guys. is it’s the trade-off cost of potentially not being able to do other outside-of-football events the teams make money off of.”.
In Tretter’s view, the players don’t benefit from that revenue: “And the players see none of that [money].”
With the World Cup having “taken that out. ” Tretter’s argument lands where it always does for players: this stops being an abstract preference and becomes a negotiation problem. “The points are valid,” he said, before pivoting to what happens next. “Regardless, it’s now a collective-bargaining issue. How far will the players go to get the surface they overwhelmingly prefer?”.
He didn’t hedge on the preference. “It’s not where I stand. it’s where our guys stand — 92 percent of our guys prefer grass. ” Tretter told Breer. He added, “It makes it easy for where I stand. . . It’s hard to find 92 percent of people that agree on anything. and we’ve got 92 percent to agree on what surface they prefer.”.
But preference doesn’t automatically turn into change. The question, as Tretter framed it, is whether the group’s majority will carry the strategy far enough: “The question is whether at least 51 percent will agree on the strategy for pursuing the issue on which 92 percent of them agree.”
That strategy comes with pressure in both directions. Will players have to give ground elsewhere to secure grass in all stadiums?. “Will the players make concessions elsewhere to get grass in all stadiums?” he asked. Or does the moment push the other way—toward a breakdown?. “Will they strike over the issue?”.
Tretter’s closing distinction was simple and pointed: it’s one thing to want grass; it’s another for that desire to become urgent enough to force it. “It’s one thing to have a preference. It’s another for that preference to become a sufficient priority to effect change.”
JC Tretter NFL Players Association grass indoors artificial turf World Cup collective bargaining Albert Breer stadium surface