FAYETTEVILLE, ARKANSAS - The University of Arkansas' Baum Stadium, already one of the top-ranked college baseball stadiums in the country, will switch to natural turf, in a move that officials say will make it superior to even many minor-league parks. <br>
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Baum Stadium was voted the top college baseball facility in the country in a 1999 survey by Baseball America. <br>
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Arkansas assistant athletic director Jerry Pufall confirmed Tuesday that replacing the artificial turf with natural grass will move to the top of a list of improvements as soon as other ongoing projects are completed. <br>
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Besides the new field, coaches' offices and two skyboxes are being added to the press box level along with infrastructure that will allow for more skyboxes in the future. A new scoreboard will be installed in the fall. <br>
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The stadium's four batting cages were enclosed and 2,600 chair-back seats were added before last season. <br>
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``When it's done, we don't think there will be anything like it in the country on the collegiate level, and even a lot of Triple-A and Double-A pro stadiums will pale in comparison,'' Pufall said. <br>
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Climate concerns made officials pick an artificial turf when the facility was first built in 1996, but an increasing trend toward natural playing surfaces nationwide compelled the change, Pufall said. <br>
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Some universities in neighboring states began installing natural fields, which allowed them to compete better in recruiting. <br>
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``It's really been the trend across the board, in major-league stadiums and college football and baseball, to go with a natural surface,'' Pufall said. ``The turf was a year away from being torn up anyway, and with the work we're doing on the press-box level we just felt this was the ideal time to address the playing surface.'' <br>
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Pufall said the field will be mostly the same as the Razorbacks football field, with irrigation and drainage systems. All of the improvements will be made to major-league specifications, he said.
