Thursday, February 9, 2023

Sports: What to read and watch

Read about the "God of Sod," watch the Super Bowl.

What to Read This Weekend

George Toma at State Farm Stadium in Glendale, Ariz., on Tuesday. That may look like artificial turf, but it's not.Doug Mills/The New York Times

GLENDALE, Ariz. — If you spend eight decades toiling to create perfect carpets of grass and end up believing that you never fully succeeded, your thoughts inevitably turn to the hereafter. George Toma's certainly do.

For him, it seems safe to say, the Elysian fields will have yardage markers.

"When I'm in heaven, I'll be looking at your beautiful field," said Toma, who this week is preparing the field for the Super Bowl for the 57th straight year, "or I'll be in hell looking up what kind of root system you have."

He is 94 now, but among groundskeepers he is immortal: The God of Sod, they call him, or the Sodfather, or the Nitty Gritty Dirt Man. Toma — who is planted so deeply in the N.F.L.'s root system that he is in the Pro Football Hall of Fame — has never missed a Super Bowl.

Read the full article here.

What to Watch This Weekend

Who will take home the Lombardi Trophy?Peter Casey/Getty Images

All times are Eastern.

Football

Anything on TV this weekend? Well, there's this little-noticed American football game called the "Super Bowl." The "Philadelphia Eagles" face the "Kansas City Chiefs." Apparently it's a big deal. Might be worth checking out (Sunday, 6:30 p.m., Fox).

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Basketball

Two undefeated teams enter, one undefeated team leaves. The last two perfect teams in women's college basketball meet: No. 1 South Carolina, the defending national champion, hosts No. 3 L.S.U. (Sunday, 2 p.m., ESPN).

Soccer

The champions of every continent are assembled in Morocco for the Club World Cup. The final pits Real Madrid against surprising Al-Hilal, the Asian champion from Saudi Arabia (Saturday, 2 p.m., FS2).

Track and Field

The most storied indoor track event of them all, the Millrose Games — now at the Armory in Upper Manhattan — has been showing off running, jumping and throwing since 1908. The Olympic gold medalist Athing Mu in the 600 meters and the silver medalist Kendra Harrison in the 60-meter hurdles are scheduled to be among the marquee attractions this year (Saturday 4 p.m., NBC).

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