Red Right 88

The most important lesson of free agency for the Browns

If you only read one other story today Cleveland Browns fans, it should be this one by Bill Barnwell at Grantland.

In it, Barnwell writes about how more talent is becoming available at below-market rates in NFL free agency, which officially opens today at 4 p.m.

If you don’t have time to read the entire article, here is the most-relevant part:

“Almost nobody scouts well enough to overcome huge value gaps …, which is why the league’s smarter teams go out of their way to acquire additional picks and are happy to take 90 percent of the player for 50 percent of the price in free agency. What those smart teams will do in this new economy is — very simply — be patient. The true stars will disappear off the market early, and the dumber teams will pay a premium for talent to lock them up in the first 24 to 48 hours, but the smart teams will wait. Even if it’s just a week, antsy players will see the open slots beginning to fill up around them and settle for far less than they would have at the opening of free agency.”

Read more…

Browns have plenty of options when free agency opens Tuesday

The AFC North is a harsh mistress; after all, it’s not known as the NFL’s Group of Death for nothing.

And that’s a lesson that Cleveland Browns CEO Joe Banner hopefully learned during the fall and one that he needs to remember as the Browns get ready for the official opening of free agency on Tuesday.

It takes a special type of player to be successful in this division; it’s not for everyone. Targeting players that you know can perform in the pressure cooker is a strategy that should be part of the decision-making process for the Browns. After all, that’s been a successful strategy for the Ravens and Steelers for the past decade.

To find out who those players could be (and, no, Jerome Harrison is not one of them), head over to The Cleveland Fan.

(Photo by U.S. Presswire)