OU kickers on Mitchell Park infield
Bob Stoops acted like the possibility of playing Miami partially on infield dirt at Miami’s Landshark Stadium was no big deal. But the more he thought about it, the more he decided it couldn’t hurt to prepare.
“Maybe I’ll send the kickers over to the baseball field,” Stoops told me Tuesday afternoon.
And on Wednesday, that’s exactly what Stoops did. Jimmy Stevens and the rest of the OU kickers worked out at Mitchell Park, kicking off the infield dirt.
Wise move. Georgia Tech played Miami last week at Landshark, and with the Florida Marlins still in season, the baseball layout remained. Which meant a portion of the game was played on dirt. Same with the Dolphins-Colts on Monday night. Georgia Tech’s Scott Blair missed a 39-yard field goal off the infield dirt, only Blair’s second miss in 19 career attempts from inside 40 yards.
ESPN’s Erin Andrews reported during the game that players from both teams were getting cut and scraped from the dirt. I don’t know how you prepare for that, but no doubt you can prepare for the kicking. Stoops indicated the shoes would be no different for grass or dirt — not that you could do much if they were — and he, as usual, presented a front of no big deal.
The Marlins are only 41/2 games back in the wild-card standings, so while their final scheduled home game is Sunday, Landshark must remain baseball-ready so long as Florida’s playoff hopes are alive. We are trying to find out from Miami officials how soon the park can be transformed to total grass, but so far no information.
Ideally, the Marlins would be eliminated by this weekend, they finish out Sunday and the field could be sodded by Monday, giving it five days to find firm footing for the OU-Miami game.
The Dolphins host Buffalo on Oct. 4, the day after OU-Miami, so no way do the Dolphins want to play on dirt if they don’t have to.
I still can’t believe the NFL allows games to be played on baseball layouts, with infield. Oakland, Miami and Minnesota are the only franchises that still share a stadium with a baseball team, and the baseball Twins move into a new stadium next year.
When we all were kids, we avoided dirt sandlots for football. We’d go find a patch of grass and play. Who wants to play on dirt? Certainly not the Sooners, I can tell you that.
-------------Berry Tramel can be heard Monday through Friday from 4:40-5:20 p.m. on The Sports Animal radio network, including AM-640 and FM-98.1. You can e-mail him here and follow him on Twitter @BerryTramel. Visit Berry's website here.
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Landshark? Miami plays in a stadium named for a classic SNL skit? What, when you get there, Chevy Chase knocks on the locker room door and says “CANDYGRAM”?