Soldier Field in Terrible Shape For Bears Preseason Opener

Soldier Field has been a topic of conversation all offseason, primarily because it is old and the Chicago Bears want to renovate it but also want the city to help fund those renovations. The city isn't terribly keen on doing so, considering the Bears are apparently still in debt over the last round of renovations nearly two decades ago. It has led to a back-and-forth featuring threats of moving the team entirely and terrible renderings of what a new Soldier Field could look like.

As the actual NFL season creeps closer, there has been a new angle on the Soldier Field discussion-- the quality of the actual field. Kicker Cairo Santos sparked this conversation when he came out and basically called the field trash, saying he had to find local parks to practice on during the offseason because Soldier Field is in such brutal shape.

The Bears will begin their preseason this afternoon against the Kansas City Chiefs and the field looks bad. Real bad.

It's obviously ridiculous that an NFL team worth hundreds of millions of dollars can't tend to their grass adequately, but more importantly, it's a huge injury risk. Divots everywhere only raise the likelihood that somebody, whether it be Justin Fields or the fourth-string tackle, takes an awkward step and goes down with ligament damage.

It's not great.