The Paul Brown Stadium grass is greener on the stadium's sidelines.

        Stadium managers are leaning toward replacing the center portion of the turf, between the hash marks, after Sunday's game against Jacksonville.

        And if the field's Cleveland-based contractor balks at its promise to do the job for free, the county might swap the lush, green sideline grass with the brown stuff to save money.

        Taking the grass from the sidelines is a better answer than getting new turf, said assistant stadium director Joe Feldkamp. But even if that method is used, the county still will push to get the free sod promised from contractor S.W. Franks so it can start a sod farm near Spinney Field.

        “New grass from New Jersey will not have been treated the same, so the color might not match,” Feldkamp said. “The sidelines get a tarp over them for games anyway.”

        Stadium managers hope it doesn't come to that.

        S.W. Franks promised a free resodding job this year for the middle strip of grass. Feldkamp said the company began waffling after the high school playoff games were scheduled for last Saturday.

        The county will continue negotiations with the contractor next week.

        “They won't give us a straight answer on who will pay for the resodding,” Feldkamp said. “They wouldn't address that at all when we talked to them on Sunday.”

        One thing is clear: The damage to the field was caused by the football games Saturday, not the marching bands that performed during halftime.

        Any damage done to the turf's root system by “compaction” from marching bands won't show up for a week to 10 days, head groundskeeper Doug Bradley said.

        Bradley said he was prepared to lay down new sod after Saturday's games but decided against it. “It didn't warrant it,” said Bradley, who was busy reseeding the brown patches Tuesday morning.

        The Bengals were aware that the field probably would need resodding after Saturday's playoff games, even as they were lobbying the Ohio High School Athletic Association to move the games to Paul Brown Stadium from Dayton.

        “The field has shown wear over the course of the season and would likely need to have the middle portion resodded after the next football game (whether that is the high school games next weekend or the Bengals' game the following weekend),” said a Nov.2 letter to OHSAA commissioner Clair Muscaro.

        Paul Brown Stadium managing director Eric Brown, who is no relation to Bengals president Mike Brown, said it was worthwhile having the high school games at the facility.

        “I'm glad we were able to put it together,” Brown said. “It was an enormous success.”

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