Enough is enough. Things have now have gotten way out of hand.
I'm talking, of course, about the trend of colored football fields. It's bad enough that colleges and universities are following the lead of schools such as
Boise State,
Eastern Washington and
Central Arkansas are using colored fields as a gimmick for selling more tickets. However, someone has to step in now that
high schools have started installing colored fields.
As a reference, here is a list of the high schools with colored football fields so far:
- Barrow High (Alaska), have installed a bright blue field, a la Boise State.
- Hidalgo High (Texas) has installed a field with a darker shade of blue. Looking at the picture, it's actually not that bad. If the other fields started out with this shade of blue, maybe I wouldn't be so opposed to this trend.
- Lovington High (NM) - they went with the annoying Boise State blue field.
- Santee West Hills High (CA) - wanted to be different, so they have alternating shades of blue every 5 yards.
- New Braunfels Canyon High (TX) - the nation's first red high school field. The bright red is arguably worse than the bright blue.
And now, West Hills Chaminade High school in California will soon be joining this group, as
they have announced that they will be rolling out a blue all-weather turf field for this fall. When asked about the new color, their coach had this to say:
"Florida blue, baby," Chaminade coach Ed Corson told the [LA] Times. "It's going to be pretty."
I'm not sure whether I can get my head around a FOOTBALL coach talking about the field being "pretty". I want to hear football coaches talk about the toughness of their players, about punishing their opponents, and, most importantly, about winning games. I don't want to hear a football coach saying "Look at our pretty field."
This brings up some interesting questions, such as:
- Is there really such a high demand for these colorful fields? What is wrong with green?
- What colors are next? Hot pink? Bright yellow? An ultraviolet field that glows in the dark?
- Shouldn't the schools be spending the money on something else, like, say, giving their students an education?
The NFL has already instituted a rule to keep their fields green. If only the colleges, and now high schools, would follow their lead.
Another California high school joins blue turf craze [Prep Rally]
