INDIANAPOLIS -- Jimmy Garoppolo's greatest appeal for the Browns lies not in what he might be, but what he is.

Trade for the New England backup, and the Browns get a ready-made starter, groomed and prepped for the opener. But the Browns shouldn't be, and don't appear to be, afraid of development.

If Garoppolo is off the market, the Browns will survive. But they'll still get a quarterback, and the focus will be how good he can be at his peak, not how ready he is right now.

Maybe that's an obvious statement, but fearing for your job can place short-term results ahead of long-term progress. If Jimmy Haslam is as patient this time around as he should be, with the front office and with coach Hue Jackson, the Browns can approach 2017 intent on improvement but without sacrificing the future in the name of a quick fix.

What does that mean for the Browns this week at the NFL Combine? As you wonder who the Browns like at quarterback in the draft -- and they said Wednesday they have their top college QBs ranked -- don't worry too much about the style of offense they ran in college, or maybe even how much starting experience they have (which seems to be the one knock on one-year starter Mitch Trubisky right now).

It's ceiling.

Maybe they get a vet, like Tyrod Taylor or AJ McCarron, to patch a hole. But ceiling is the draft focus -- and that's the kind of thing that should make you wonder if Trubisky at No. 1 really might be the best path for the Browns.

"I think you have to go in understanding they're going to have to develop, almost all of them," Browns head of football operations Sashi Brown said Wednesday when asked how much the Browns can improve a college QB once they get their hands on him. "I don't know what the future will be for Jared Goff. We were very high on him. He's got a great opportunity moving ahead. But the reality this is a very hard position to play and a very competitive and different league than what most of these college quarterbacks are seeing.

"So we go in with a development mindset, an understanding we'll need to work with these guys and bring them up to speed as quickly as we can. But the notion of having a ready-made quarterback who's going to come in and hit the ground running is pretty farcical at this point."

That's a quote that could make some of your groan. That's a quote that sounds like a foundation for growing pains. But there's hope in there.

"Development mindset" is a phrase you can spin whichever way you want to, and it's what you'd expect for a 1-15 team. No one is expecting a 16-0 mindset. But if there's no obvious answer, it doesn't mean there's no answer. There may be a fantastic answer to their quarterback question -- if they can wait for him to develop.

"I mean, there's some talent in there," Denver Broncos general manager John Elway said of this quarterback class. "You talk a ready-made guy in this (draft), probably not. But you never know. There's not one sure-fire guy, at least not yet, that has come to the head."

The Browns have their list, and Brown vowed not to be swayed by a great workout number, or even a great interview here in Indy. They know what they've seen, and the decision makers with the reputation for analytics made repeated points Wednesday on how film plays the largest part in their evaluation.

So, for the most part, the Browns know what college quarterback they want. They don't know if they'll be able to get Garoppolo. But as long as they aren't afraid of development, and as long as they believe patience remains on their side, they can aim high.

Ceiling. Even if they have to wait.