The easy thing to do when it doesn't work out for a player and his team is to send him out of town carrying all the negatives.

Robert Griffin III deserves better than that.

Because even though the quarterback struggled from the pocket and was injured, he did show something to whatever team signs him next.

Griffin joined the Cleveland Browns a little less than a year ago in an effort to revive a career gone south in Washington. He didn't play a down for the Washington Redskins in 2015, but from the moment the Browns signed him the starting job was his to lose.

He kept it in preseason, started the opener -- and struggled.

Late in that game he broke the coracoid process in his left shoulder in a freak play when a Philadelphia Eagles defender was shielded by a Browns player, resulting in an awkward collision as Griffin tried to run out of bounds.

That sidelined Griffin for 10 games and a bye week. The easy thing for Griffin would have been to let the season play out and just rehab. Doctors had told him it was unlikely he could return at all, and the Browns were winless and going nowhere.

Even by the 13th game, Griffin's coracoid had not fully healed. But it had healed enough for him to be cleared to play. So he returned and gave it what he had. He struggled the first two games back and almost was pulled for the third, against the San Diego Chargers. Hue Jackson stuck with Griffin, who played well enough to contribute to the Browns' only win -- though he ended up with a concussion.

In the season finale, he threw for 232 yards with two touchdowns and led the Browns to an overtime field goal. Normally that wins a game, but the Browns' defense gave up the winning touchdown to Pittsburgh Steelers backups and the season ended like much of the rest of it went: badly.

Griffin's overall quality of play wasn't good enough for the Browns to keep him. He completed 59 percent of his passes with one more interception than touchdown and had a rating of 72.5

But he was liked in the locker room and respected for his efforts to make it work -- both before the season started and after he returned from injury.

He will need to continue to refine his pocket passing and improve on his processing and awareness.

But a guy who has the gumption to play with a bone not fully healed and give it his best in bad circumstances has something teams can like, and something he can rely on.