MINNEAPOLIS — While the 2022 Twins are in Florida getting their arms, gloves and bats ready for the grind of a 162-game season, a different team is at work inside Target Field doing their own preparation.
After 12 years of wear and tear, the natural playing surface inside the boutique ballpark is being replaced as the original turf was shot. Period. That's what 926 Major League Baseball games (including the 2014 All-Star Game), 11 years of Minnesota State High School League championships, approximately 40 college baseball games, 17 concerts, two college football games and one soccer game will do.
The 2022 NHL Winter Classic was the final nail in the coffin, with a huge regulation ice sheet, a handful of side rinks and all the set-up and take-down requiring flooring to sit on the field for 53 days. The Twins had planned for the transition ahead of time and ordered 102,000 square feed of sod from a farm in Colorado, a special four way blend of Kentucky bluegrass.
Under that sod is a bed of foundational sand mined in Elk River and trucked to downtown Minneapolis. An 18-person crew began rolling the sod out on the infield yesterday, a job that will be completed today (Friday). Work on the outfield begins next Tuesday and is expected to be completed sometime Thursday, weather willing.
With the under-field heating system and Head Groundskeeper Larry DiVito's care, the new field should be ready in time for the Twins opener versus Seattle April 7.
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