SANTA CLARA, Calif. — Nick Pappas’ process for preparing the Super Bowl field got underway long before the Seattle Seahawks and New England Patriots started getting ready for the 2025 season.The NFL’s turf guru picked the sod farm that began growing the field for the game about 16 months ago and spent time since then monitoring the progress. The job went into overdrive in January when Pappas and his crew started a monthlong installation and preparation process to make sure that the story of the game is about the teams and not the grass. The field at Levi’s Stadium will be the stage for the country’s most-watched sporting event of the year on Feb. 8, along with the pregame and halftime festivities and concerts that make Super Bowl Sunday a cultural capstone.“I always joke with everyone, it’s the most expensive real estate there is, everyone wants a piece of it,” Pappas said. “Trying to set that calendar up in a way that we have this time and space available to maintain it and work on the field and prepare it, but also provide time and slots for all those different entertainment pieces, the halftime rehearsals and so on. That becomes a bit of a challenge just to make sure that we can all get what we need done.”The process is an intensive one, starting with picking the sod farm to grow the turf. Pappas settled on a farm about two hours east of Levi’s Stadium in what was an easy choice as he had used the same farm to grow the grass for S …
