Frigate size does not mean a frigate.

Since 1975, in the US Navy, a frigate was the new designation given to a destroyer escort. And that is what the US Navy has considered them: escorts. Their role/purpose in the force structure was "supplemental escort." The Constellation design is exactly that. It is a cheaper ($1.5-"ish" billion) general purpose escort supplemental to the Burke ($2.2 billion) general purpose escort.

We don't want the new manned small combatants to escort. We want them to BE escorted by the new small unmanned ones. We will be forming something new. Groups of small ships operating independently of any carrier group, and networked to each other (and any nearby carrier or amphibious groups, to which they would not be attached.)

If you want them frigate sized, and want to call them frigates, great, so long as you understand what they do, and realize they are not "old tyme" frigates. Nor will they be built to frigate standards, nor function like frigates. And I would wonder if a larger corvette sized vessel might not also suffice? Though I would not call them corvettes either (any more than I consider the LCS a corvette.) This is why the term "Small Surface Combatant" is employed in the "paperwork" about them.