If you think playing on the baseball field at RFK is bad....

[Cweedchop]

Get a load of the piece of crap field that the New England Revolution played on tonight.

Unfortunately I don't have any links, but you can go to www.mlsnet.com and click onto the game highlights and look at the dreck they are faced with.

RFK looks like an lush green Irish meadow compared to Gillette Stadium.

[kebzach]

Do people really think the field is (at least right now) a poor field for the players to play on?

I sat right behind home plate at RFK tonight and the field seemed to play fine.

[MeridianFC]

In general it played fine except for one play where the ball launched off of an infield seam in front of Esky.

[Clint Eastwood]

Atrocious CWeedchop. At least we know that they're TRYING to make the groundshare work between United and the Nats.

How in the world could the football lines and numbers still be visible on the NE field. That to me demonstrates a complete lack of interest on the part of the Krafts. That in effect means they covered the field after the last Patriots game and haven't done anything since.

I like the NE fans and team and want the franchise to work, but we're looking at a sinking ship. Rochester Revolution anybody?

[dcu n bntwn]

Agreed.

I watched the Revs game last night ( couldn't see the DCU game as I haven't been able to convince myself that the HD package is worth it yet) and was shocked to see the poor condition of the field. This was the home opener on national television! The Krafts clearly don't give a ******** about Revs/MLS. In addition, it was beautiful weather here in Boston and the crowd # looked pathetic. I am obviously not a Revs fan, but I hate to see any MLS franchise struggle.

The crowd was under 10,000... for their home opener!

Hoepfully, the RFK pitch will improve. I am not so concerned about conceded goals. Divots and uneven seams can be a recipe for injury/disaster. I would hate to see any of our players go down due to a pitch related injury.

Condition of the home pitch can be very important and should not be underestimated. Look at what happened to Barca in the beginning of this season. An epidemic of knee injuries that many believe to be due to the Camp Nou pitch.

[nyceuro]

omg, Gillette stadium looked like a real pos considering its the beginning of the season and football ended quite awhile ago. although i havent been to rfk yet this year, i heard they are working hard to make sure DC United has a good pitch to play on, and that in the near future plans for a stadium of their own in the works.(ya know how rumors go)

[Sundevil9]

I'll take our two shades of green grass over thier two shades of brown grass and dirt.

[mutinywxgirl]

I feel bad hearing about how poor the field was in NE. I'll have to ask one of the photographers if, up close at least, it's as bad as everyone is saying.

RFK - from being on the field, was amazing - barring the few minor issues with seams.

[BigKris]

That to me demonstrates a complete lack of interest on the part of the Krafts. [...] I like the NE fans and team and want the franchise to work, but we're looking at a sinking ship. Rochester Revolution anybody?

Well, that's a little extreme. Sure, the field isn't great -- on the other hand, they've put together arguably the most talent-laden lineup in the league. (I say 'arguably' because I'm partial to DC and we've got a Cup to back it up).

Put it this way -- I'd happily trade them our field for Clint Dempsey.

[Th4119]

Bump.

Anyone see it tonight?

Football damage all over, and to make things even better, the center circle wasn't even a circle. At first I thought it might be the camera, but no, a good portion of the center circle was actually a fairly straight line, complete with two obtuse angles on each end.

Utterly bush league.

I can tolerate (for now) crap attendence in some stadiums, along with some up and down level of play depending on the team. Hell, I don't even care about a trapeziodal field that United was playing on, because a six-yard difference from the line from corner 1 to 3 over the line from corner 2 to 4 is pretty marginal at best.

At least the field doesn't resemble a high school field, and this is while actively sharing it with a baseball field, complete with a pitchers mound in the middle of it, and New England can't get their pitch into shape over the entire offseason, and now have some sort of crazy geometrical shape as their center circle?

Ugh. :mad:

[Knave]

You've got to be kidding me. A DC United supporter talking smack about the playing surface in other stadiums?

Our field hasn't been rectangular for who knows how long.

It will have the outline of a baseball diamond on it for years.

The field at the Razor looked worlds better today than it did a few weeks ago. And I'd trade a slightly dented center circle for a rectangular field any day.

There are some things we should be quiet about. This is one of them.

[jlm120170]

This is a pro league and i think all fields should look good most deff.. when the game is being televised.How can you show case the league for future investors MLS must do a better job..

[beltwayrob]

This is a pro league and i think all fields should look good most deff.. when the game is being televised.How can you show case the league for future investors MLS must do a better job..

I agree with you here. Heck if my old high school can put together a regulation pitch with parents having to supply all the funds for uniforms and travel I don't see why MLS can't make sure that each of its teams plays on a regulation pitch. That said, anyone have pics of what NE's pitch looked like this week?

[Th4119]

The average joe who flips a game on at RFK can see the baseball outline, but they can also see a field that's fit for pro soccer. They can tell the lines from the grass being cut are at a funny angle, but there's no way they can tell that the field isn't 100% rectangular.

The average person that turns on a NE game can see that their kids play on similarly crappy fields, and that the center circle is anything but.

Besides, the problem at RFK will be fixed by next time, who knows how Gillete will look.

[bofahey]

You've got to be kidding me. A DC United supporter talking smack about the playing surface in other stadiums?

Our field hasn't been rectangular for who knows how long.

It will have the outline of a baseball diamond on it for years.

The field at the Razor looked worlds better today than it did a few weeks ago. And I'd trade a slightly dented center circle for a rectangular field any day.

There are some things we should be quiet about. This is one of them.
I don't think the point here is that RFK's pitch is better than the Revs'.

The point is that even with baseball sharing RFK, DCU has successfully gotten a lot of accomodations. Frankly, I've been stunned at how well the grass covering the infield has held. The dimensions issue is one that exists most likely due to the fact that they kind of hurriedly did the markings for the Pumas game (they'd never done it before with the new set-up), and things didn't get done right. I'm sure that going forward it will be fixed.

The Revs on the other hand control their own venue. Kraft owns it. It's built to accomodate soccer. The Patriots are not in season and haven't played a home game in 4 months. And notwithstanding all of that, their pitch is a piece of crap.

The Revs' situation is much more embarassing to the league because there's no excuse for it. Our situation is just the result of sharing. The fact that we're getting the field re-sodded and the stands moved shows that our franchise and our landlord actually care about the conditions under which we play and do their best to make it work within the limitations that exist. You can't say that for New England right now.

For instance, do you think the NFL is "embarassed" because the Dolphins had to play an ESPN Sunday night game last year in a sandbox with ankle deep puddles last year because the game took place during the Marlins season? I don't think so--people understand that when you share a facility, there are hardships. What's embarassing is when you have plenty of time to get your pitch ready and you can't do it.