Lessons New York Giants Can Learn From Cleveland Browns Turnaround
Once upon a time, the Cleveland Browns used to be the laughingstock of the league.
The “Brownies,” as their critics called them, couldn’t find a quarterback, and they had head coach after head coach (including Bill Belichick) fail. They experienced so much turnover in their front office that it was fair to wonder if the ink on the contracts signed by their administrators had even dried before they were replaced.
Behind the scenes, though, there was a seismic shift that by the time Cleveland appeared to finally find its franchise quarterback for the long term (Baker Mayfield), the right head coach (Kevin Stefanski) and a competent general manager (Andrew Berry), the seeds the organization had planted finally began to take root and produce a competitive football team.
How did they do it? And more importantly, what does this have to do with the New York Giants?
The first question is they developed a nine-point organizational plan called “The Browns Guardrails.” This document served as the core structure used by the Browns that enabled Cleveland to rise from the ashes of mockery into a team that, since 2018, has posted a 24-23-1 record, including last year’s 11-5 mark that brought with it a postseason berth.
As for the Giants? Since winning the Super Bowl in 2011, they have regressed as a franchise in part due to bad luck but mostly due to what appeared to be an unwillingness to adapt to the times, which in turn had a bearing on the quality of their rosters.
Although things started to look up last year, the first of the Joe Judge era, that doesn't erase the 15-33 record they've posted since 2018. In reviewing some of the decisions or lack thereof made by the Giants franchise, they have been in sharp contrast to what has worked in helping the Browns get back to prominence.
Let’s take a look at some of the tenets the Browns Guardrails identified and how the Giants, in going in another direction, have struggled with finding consistent success.
Talent Acquisition: Free Agency
We’ll start with free agency since that begins next week league-wide.
The Browns Guardrails list five key core concepts under this category, but there are three, in particular, relevant to the Giants and their approach in recent years.
Don’t pay for depth.
The more a player can do, the more packages he’s going to be a part of, and the more snaps he’s likely to see in a game.
While it’s true that it doesn’t matter who starts a game, what does matter in assessing the value of a football roster versus what was spent on it is what you’re getting in return for your investment.
Take, for instance, linebacker David Mayo, whom the Giants cut last week. According to PFF, Mayo played 194 snaps on defense last year, yet he counted for $3.55 million against its 2020 cap.
That’s about $18,298 per snap spent on a player who, by the way, had his roster spot usurped by a rookie (Tae Crowder) who had a cap hit of $538,867 and who played in 403 defensive snaps—a bargain rate of $1,337 spent per snap.
Or how about tight end Levine Toilolo, who before his restructuring counted for $3.25 million against the cap last year but who took 276 snaps on offense ($11,775 per snap).
Could the Giants have been able to get by with Kaden Smith, a guy they had on their roster the year before and who in 2020 played in 453 offensive snaps for the low, low rate of $675,000, or $1,490 per snap?
And what about offensive tackle Nate Solder, who reportedly could be returning this year. Even if the Giants lower his base salary to the minimum($1.075 million), he would still count for approximately $7.675 million against the cap, a number that isn't horrible if he's starting at right tackle, but which would be rather hefty for a swing tackle.
Build Your Roster and Use Free Agents Less and Less
The whole point of free agency is to supplement one’s roster at positions that either lack in the draft or had to be sacrificed due to another position being a higher priority.
The Giants got away from that philosophy in the last decade—far away—when their whiffs on the draft classes began to pile up at an alarming rate.
Bad drafts lead to a heavier dependence on free agency. That led to overspending. And overspending leads to the need to clear away large chunks of cap space, sometimes at an alarming rate (which in turn leads to a pileup of dead cap money that's unavailable for use.
Put it all together, and it's fair to wonder how much of this cycle has cost the Giants those rare chances to retain talent that maybe they wanted to keep but were outbid for.
Bad drafting is why the Giants had to overspend to land offensive tackle Nate Solder, whom they overpaid after Ereck Flowers turned into a bust of epic proportions.
When it comes to free agency, there have exceptions to the rule, but those are rare. Receiver Plaxico Burress was a great free agent pick-up until fate stepped in that November 2008 night. And is anyone going to question the wisdom of the team signing linebacker Antonio Pierce or safety Antrel Rolle to hefty free-agent contracts?
Draft busts hurt big time. But overspending on a free agent who ends up not finishing his contract with the team hurts even worse.
Age is important
Age is important when it comes to free agency. Why wouldn’t a team want a free agent coming off a rookie deal and just about to hit his prime versus a player whose prime is slowly starting to fade in the rearview mirror?
The Giants learned that lesson last year when instead of going for older free agents, they sought guys who were either just starting or in their prime. Cornerback James Bradberry (27 years old) and linebacker Blake Martinez (26 years old) were coming off their rookie deals. Both were also nearing the peak part of their career, and both ended up being two of the best free-agent signings made by Dave Gettleman.
Past examples of the Giants not following this practice include Solder, signed to his four-year, $62 million deal at the age of 30, and receiver Golden Tate, cut last week, who was 31 when he signed his four-year, $37.5 million deal.
Salary Cap
To be fair, no one saw a global pandemic having such an impact on the NFL salary cap (though there were a few teams that today find themselves in great cap shape ahead of the start of free agency.
The Giants? As of the time this article was written, the Giants have $3,283,994 in cap space available based on a projected $180.5 million league-wide cap. They need approximately $6.573 million of space alone for their rookie class, never mind about $20 or so million to add free-agent depth.
How did the Giants get into this mess? Again, overreliance on free agency is a big reason. If a player doesn't finish his contract, the dead money begins to add up. Currently, the Giants have the 11th most dead money in the NFL ($10.342 million).
In 2018 and 2019, the Giants had over $99.094 in dead money for those two seasons, putting them in the top 5 league-wide in those years. In 2018, the dead money accounted for 24.7% of their cap; in 2019, it counted for 28.1% of the cap as Gettleman sought to clean out all the bloated free-agent contracts that didn't last.
Gettleman has changed (sort of) the structure of contracts with an eye toward not having the dead money pile up. Up until recently, the Giants barely made use of roster bonuses. They instead used signing bonuses, which players no doubt like since it ushes a boatload of cash their way up front.
But signing bonuses also lay the groundwork for dead money accumulation if the contract is terminated early, whereas roster bonuses do not. Teams have tried to move away from signing bonuses from shorter-term deals in favor of a combination of guaranteed money and roster bonuses, a practice the Giants began deploying a little bit more of starting last year.
For example, they gave Blake Martinez a 3-year, $30.75 million contract that carried a $6 million signing bonus which prorates to $2 million per year.
But in the first year of that deal, Martinez also received a $4 million roster bonus which fluffed up his first year cap hit to $10 million.
The good news is that although Martinez’s base salary more than doubles in 2021, his Average Per Year (APY) remained consistent at around $10.5 million per year. Further, the Giants left themselves with the flexibility in this deal to either extend it for as long as Martinez plays at a high level or get out of it with minimal dead money damage.
Speaking of creativity, it wouldn’t be surprising if some of the “premium” free-agent deals the Giants hand out this year include voidable years in contracts. The Cowboys did that with quarterback Dak Prescott.
In 2013, the Giants famously deployed this tactic with tight end Brandon Myers. His deal was a one-year $2.25 million contract that had three voidable years to help absorb the $1.5 million signing bonus (prorated at a rate of $375,000) he received during an off-season when the Giants were cap-strapped.
Talent Retention
This is a big area where the Giants have come up short, mostly due to the related cap problems.
Despite their struggles this year, the Giants' cap situation can be a heck of a lot worse than it is--see the Eagles, Saints, and Rams for the league's poster children.
However, the Giants could have been a little better with the cap management through the years, especially in those situations where they were bidding against themselves and ended up paying a player probably more than he might have gotten elsewhere.
(See running back Jonathan Stewart as an example or, more recently, the restructuring of tight end Levine Toilolo, whose deal surprisingly wasn't cut down to the veteran minimum as initially projected.)
Then there is the matter in which the Giants have prioritized their talent. Who could ever forget, for example, the decision by the team a few years ago to retain linebacker Jon Beason, who by the time he arrived at the Giants was on his last legs, over ascending talent Linval Joseph, who went on to find success with the Minnesota Vikings?
These days, the Giants face the very real possibility of losing Dalvin Tomlinson to free agency. Why? Once again, they appear to be in a position where circumstances will force them to choose.
Another aspect of talent retention has to do with the coaching staff. The Giants are on their third staff since Tom Coughlin resigned. But isn't it interesting that Ben McAdoo's staff found roles for Romeo Okwara, who has gone on to emerge as a solid pass-rushing specialist, and Jason Pierre-Paul, who showed he still had a lot of life left in his legs, yet Pat Shurmur's staff found them expendable?
Let’s go back to the Giants' draft classes. Between 2010-16 (the 2017 class’ contract statuses are about to take place), only Pierre-Paul, receiver Odell Beckham Jr, and receiver Sterling Shepard received second contracts from the Giants. That’s three out of 49 draft picks--a very bad batting average no matter how you dissect it.
Identify and Pay Early
The Giants have made more effort to keep key guys off the market, finding success with offensive lineman Nick Gates, receiver Sterling Shepard, and defensive back Logan Ryan.
To be fair, it takes two sides to agree to terms, and there are some players who, as they ascend in their careers, might be advised to wait until their contracts expire to test the free-agent market, where historically, the available cap dollars have risen.
Still, how much easier would the Giants have had it had they identified and paid Tomlinson or Wayne Gallman before each went on to set themselves up for a huge payday?
Key Positions
The Browns Guardrail lists four positions as the key to a football team’s success: quarterback, cornerback, pass rushers, and tackles. It also emphasizes the importance of investing in the quarterback every year by adding a solid supporting cast around him.
Although it’s hard to knock the selection of running back Saquon Barkley, given what he brought to the table before his injury, in retrospect, how much more sense would it have made to trade down and pick up offensive line help and other assets to help the quarterback?
When it came to the offensive line, the Giants waited until last year—Year 2 of Daniel Jones’ development—to invest draft resources into an offensive tackle position that had been screaming for an upgrade.
They also decided not to add a receiving threat via the draft, instead, hoping to catch lightning in a bottle a second time in a quest to find the next Victor Cruz from among the undrafted free agents signed.
The result was the league’s 31st ranked offense and scoring offense and a young quarterback who, although he progressed in some areas, didn’t take that huge step forward people were hoping he'd take.
This off-season, the Giants have no choice but to invest in the offense let they end up wasting the investment made in Jones. And of all the mistakes the Giants have made, not properly setting the stage to make the new quarterback's transition to the NFL is a big one they probably wish they could do over.
Talent Acquisition: Draft
The draft has come up on other tenets listed, but let’s dive a little deeper.
There are three bullet point areas in which the Giants have fallen woefully short when it comes to the draft over the last decade.
The first is drafting a “red” vs. a “blue.” Presumably, this refers to blue-chip prospects versus reaches, or “red chips” that are typically riskier.
In terms of the draft, that could come down to reaching for guys, such as what they did with cornerback Eli Apple and tackle Ereck Flowers. It can also come down to drafting athletes over football players, particularly in the later rounds.
Whatever the case, the Giants have been guilty of doing both, which is a big reason why most of their draft classes have failed to create a foundation made of concrete instead of sand.
These next two principles run hand in hand: acquire as many picks as possible and accumulate future picks because of their high discount rate.
In 2019, the Giants had ten picks, at least three of which came about thanks to trades. This was the most they’ve had in a seven-round draft since they had 11 in 2003.
Future picks, however, have eluded the Giants for one simple reason: They have refused to trade down, particularly in the first round of the draft, where the chance of picking up a cache of draft picks is ideal.
The Giants’ approach to picking up more draft picks, as a rule, has been to let free agents leave and hope that their departure yields a comp pick the following year. This appears to be the direction the team is likely to head this off-season as they are not expected to retain all their picks.
But this approach comes with a risk. For one, comp picks aren’t guaranteed and can be canceled out depending on many factors.
Even if they do get a comp pick, in the meantime, an entire season passes before they can use that pick that might otherwise have helped them. As a result, the window of having several key players on rookie deals closes a little more.
If there is legitimate value in Rounds 2-3 of this year's draft, as many believe, wouldn’t it make sense to rack up picks? At the very least, a side benefit in accumulating picks in the later rounds and future drafts could help the salary cap.
Learning
There’s probably no better way to end this analysis than to cite one of the last bullets of the final guardrail: learning.
The NFL is a copycat league, and very few teams have blazed new trails over the years.
The Browns, who, as mentioned earlier, have had countless false starts, have taken this concept to heart and believe that it’s important to learn from what other organizations have done.
The Giants? While they haven’t been as close-minded as some might think, it was only recently that they started to incorporate more analytics by expanding that part of the operation, hiring an in-house psychologist (Dr. Lani Lawrence), and modernizing how they approached personnel evaluation and the draft.
The Giants showed up late to the party in many areas, but progress is being made slowly, albeit slowly.
Head coach Joe Judge and his staff in particular always seem to be exploring ways of doing things better, and now it looks as though, of late, the front office has finally caught up to that as well. If the Giants can continue to be receptive to changing any outdated approaches holding them back, we can likely expect brighter ahead, and hopefully sooner than later.
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