The San Francisco 49ers were reportedly “not pleased” with their practice field leading up to Super Bowl LVIII this weekend believing it to be too soft. And NFL commissioner Roger Goodell offered a pretty clear response from the league on Monday night.
During his annual commissioner’s press conference on Monday evening, Roger Goodell insisted that the practice field the San Francisco 49ers were given is a “very playable surface,” claiming that it was tested by 23 different experts and is “well within all our testing standards.”
“That work is being done every single day,” Goodell said regarding the preparation and testing of the practice field according to Pro Football Talk. “We’ve had 23 experts out there. We’ve had the union out there. All of them think that’s a very playable surface. It’s softer than what they have practiced on, but that happens. It’s well within all of our testing standards. It is something that we think — all our experts, as well as neutral field inspectors — have all said, unanimously, that it’s a playable field.”
It’s worth noting that the issue was reportedly more about preference from the Niners than it was about safety, as the field has unanimously been determined to be a safe playing field.
