The Titans announced Tuesday that they are removing the natural grass field at Nissan Stadium and replacing it with new synthetic turf ahead of the 2023 NFL season.
Tennessee elected to make the change in surfaces after assessing injuries and technology, as well as Nashville’s climate, which has led to the franchise’s struggles to cultivate and maintain grass inside the venue. The Titans already have been practicing on synthetic turf, which was added to their indoor practice facility last year.
In the team’s announcement, it stated that Nissan Stadium’s grass-based field led to more lower-body injuries than any other stadium with monofilament synthetic turf fields between 2018 and ’21, according to the NFL. The venue also ranked among the NFL’s leaders for lower-body injuries.
As a result, Nissan Stadium will become the first NFL venue to contain technology of a synthetic turf system that includes organic infill.
Tennessee led the league in the most players used in the last two seasons because of injury that includes using 91 in ’21. Vrabel, who has witnessed the health of his team’s field go from great to subpar during an NFL season, said nothing is more important than the health and safety of his players.
“Our grass surface is not on the level of some of the other grass surfaces (across the NFL),” Titans coach Mike Vrabel said. “At the beginning of the year, summer, training camp, early season, I can see it being very consistent. But as the season wears on, and the weather changes, there is a noticeable difference in performance of the field.
"We added this product inside the bubble and … the response has been very positive, very favorable to that surface to the new technology that continues to come out.”
The surface will be fully installed before the 2023 season starts.
