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Cleveland Browns' slow start in free agency beats doing harm: Bill Livingston (photos)

CLEVELAND, Ohio – What's this?

The Browns aren't distressed by the appearance of a weak franchise growing exponentially weaker through free agent defections?

Instead, in the new, analytics-driven, Harvard-educated front office of Sashi Brown, Paul DePodesta (an ex-Indians employee and a stats maven), and Andrew Berry, the Browns issued what amounted to an austerity message.

It was that they had set their budget for Mitchell Schwartz, Travis Benjamin and Alex Mack. They weren't going to break it to keep players who were cogs in a 3-13 machine.

Big investments, little return

You mean, no more throwing money at a kick returner in Josh Cribbs, because no one else was worth watching?