Few things are as predictable in the NFL as imitation. Win a Super Bowl with a new wrinkle on offense or defense and by the next season, a half dozen other teams will be running the same looks.

It’s as old as the shift from the single-wing to the T-formation. Try something different and lose and no one cares. Do it and win, and everybody follows merrily along.

When the Redskins went to a one-back offense and won the Super Bowl, half the teams in the league went with one back. When the Giants won with a 3-4 defense, everybody had to have one.

It’s still that way, but now, instead of imitating what the New England Patriots are doing on the field, teams are starting to mimic what one of the best teams in NFL history does in the offseason.

And that tactic is to be brutally unsentimental when evaluating your roster, to never pay anyone a ton of money simply because he’s a good player, to cut even your best player if it gets in the way of your budget.

The object is to win championships, not to support the lifestyles of the rich and famous superstars. If a Lawyer Milloy wants more money than you feel you can pay him, you cut him, even if he is the leader of your defense.

Super Bowl XLI Colts 29, Bears 17 It's not Super, but Colts prevail |   Images Borges: Dungy leads way | Tops his protégé Celizic: Manning now among all-time greats Opinion: Peyton ditches curse | Legacy? Grossman fails | Buzz: Who's 'ignorant' now? Celizic: Bears lick wounds; future bright Super diary: Minute-by-minute commentary Opinion: Chargers next year? | Your vote   Discuss the game | MORE COVERAGE

Look around the league, and you see cold-hearted capologists getting the idea. Most recently, you can probably lay the pending release of quarterbacks Drew Bledsoe in Buffalo and Jeff Garcia in Cleveland to the Patriot syndrome.

The Bills aren’t necessarily going to be better next year without Bledsoe, a younger version of Vinnie Testaverde who is blessed with a strong arm and cursed with slow feet and a remarkable talent for throwing interceptions at the worst possible moments. The team’s quarterback of the future, J.P. Losman, who played little as a rookie last year, is now the quarterback of the present.

The change in quarterbacks isn’t completely unexpected. Bledsoe returned the Bills to respectability, but not to the playoffs. But dumping a guy who’s a proven commodity in a league in which good quarterbacks are hard to find isn’t something we’re used to seeing. But if Bledsoe was going to eat up cap money, why keep him? Better to find a cheaper backup and spend the money you save on the sort of mid-level free agents who have been so successful on the Pats.

Then there’s Garcia, who didn’t last two weeks into Romeo Crennel’s tenure as the new head coach. Crennel is a Bill Belichick disciple, and his decision to cut Garcia and take a cap hit for the bonus the team paid him last year is a clear statement that Crennel feels Garcia, who wasn’t the happiest camper in Cleveland anyway, isn’t going to take the Browns to the upper echelon of the game. And if he isn’t, he’s not worth keeping around.

The Browns and Bills will be better off for cutting the two quarterbacks. Even with the bonus money that goes against their caps, they’ll be able to use the saved salary to get solid players elsewhere in the lineup while they search for the right quarterback to lead the team.