The phrase "closers who flame out" sounds like a Wikipedia article that should redirect to the Milwaukee Brewers page, doesn't it? The Brewers have had a long and proud tradition of pulling closers out of nowhere. Closers who eventually go on to flame out, that is. Mike "Mustard Man" DeJean, Leo "Icelandic Brand" Estrella, Dan Kolb, Mike Adams, Derrick Turnbow, and coming soon - the Francophone Turnbow - Eric Gagne, have all fallen off the face of the Earth since being removed from the closer role.

Last night, I flipped on the AAA All-Star game just in time to see Nashville closer Luis Pena attempt close out the game for a Pacific Coast League victory. Unfortunately, he gave up 3 runs in the 9th and nearly gave up the lead. Pena is the logical choice to take over as the Brewers closer next season, so let's just hope he doesn't flame out before he arrives in Milwaukee.

Good business would be to let a guy close for a year, trade him, and let him flame out with the new club. We did that with Dan Kolb, and it netted us (the admittedly disappointing) Jose Capellan. Saloman Torres is having a solid year since being inserted in the closer role. We have an option for 2009, so we should pick that up and trade him in the offseason. Watch him flame out while Pena flourishes. Trade Pena, find another one-year wonder off the scrap heap for 2010, and so on.

With reports coming out that Seattle first baseman Richie Sexson will be released, and rumors swirling about Prince Fielder's future, an obvious solution appears to me.

You know where I'm going with this. Jeff Cirillo was a great Brewer in the late 90s. He had a few more good seasons in Colorado, then moved to Seattle and fell apart. A few years later, Cirillo comes back to Milwaukee. Career resurrected. Could the same happen to Richie Sexson? Maybe. The Brewers have a solid track record in recent years with reclamation projects. Cirillo, Doug Davis, Gabe Kapler, Jason Kendall, Brady Clark and Rick Helling were all players that everyone else had given up on. I don't know if its comfort. lower pressure, or just something in the water, but these types of players always seem to do well.

Prince Fielder is a great hitter, but he's also a Scott Boras client, and a likely DH candidate in the not-so-distant future. Since he's not likely to sign a Ryan Braun-like contract, and with the Brewers need for quality starting pitching (especially if they cannot re-sign Ben Sheets), trading Fielder to an AL team doesn't seem like such a bad idea. If Sexson can come anywhere near what he was doing two years ago, we lose very little production. If he continues to struggle...well, at least its an easy position to fill. I have little doubt that Mat Gamel or Matt LaPorta could handle first base at a Major League level. Russell Branyan, Joe Dillon, and countless AAAA power hitters are deserving of playing time.

Obviously, trading Fielder based on an assumption that Richie Sexson will return to his career averages is a bad idea. If we could pick up Sexson on a minor league deal, and make it clear to him that he'll be given the opportunity to start at first base if he performs well, this stupid proposition might just work out.

The World Baseball Classic was a pretty neat idea. Well, not really a new idea, but a neat one nonetheless, that probably should have happened sooner. While we're at it, we might as well set up a Champions League-style club competition. Most every other major sport has this. Football has a number of continental and world club competitions. Ice hockey and basketball have simlar setups. Baseball is right up there in terms of international ubiquity, so why not? If the Brewers played some team from Japan in a meaningful competition, I'd definitely go. Who's with me?

Another attempt at minor league indoor football is on its way to failure. Every year, a new professional indoor football league is founded. Every year, another professional indoor football league fails. Obviously, somebody thinks the format has potential. Right now, there are 7 notable leagues operating in the US, from the Arena Football League, complete with network TV coverage and a team owned by Bon Jovi, down to the Continental Indoor Football League, founded in 2006 and already boasting 5 defunct teams.

If these minor leagues want to survive, they need to join together and emulate some of the successful minor league structures of other sports. Many teams in these leagues have left one league to join another. Some have even joined up with af2, the Arena Football League's second division. To me, this seems like the perfect place to unleash a European-style system of promotion/relegation and cup competitions on American sports fans.

In indoor football, you have the AFL, af2, and then everybody else. AFL has substantial TV coverage, many NFL-quality players and teams who play in larger NBA/NHL arenas. The af2 is a developmental league, with teams in slightly smaller cities and slightly smaller arenas. There is some TV coverage, but not nearly as much. The other leagues are largely interchangeable. Most fans attending these games couldn't tell you the difference between the Continental Indoor Football League and the American Indoor Football Association.

Through a series of mergers and affiliate agreements, these leagues could one day operate similarly to England's Football League. My first step would be to organize a large, multi-league knockout tournament, incorporating all teams in all leagues.

The seven leagues operating in the US have a total of 104 members. Teams would be seeded according to league finish and (at least at this point) their league's age. AFL teams are rated highest, while CIFL (the newest league) teams are rated lowest. I do it this way because we don't really have a good way to compare the level of quality of each league, though after a few years it should become clearer.

In my cup competition, I would start with a qualification round of 8 games. Here, the 16 worst teams are randomly drawn into 8 games. Winners move on to the first round. The first round consists of 64 teams. The top 32 receive byes - in this case, the entire AFL and half of af2. Again, the 64 playing teams are randomly drawn into 32 games. The winners move on to round two. Here, the first-round byes enter the competition, giving us 64 once again. Each round from here on will be begin with another random draw, so any combination of teams can play anywhere. Bon Jovi's Philadelphia Soul could draw Lehigh Valley Outlawz away, or they could host AFL an rival like the New York Dragons.

Eventually, we would get a feel for the comparative quality of each league, and thus be able to realign the teams into 5 divisions. Promotion and relegation could be introduced for the top and bottom finishers. Will this ever happen? Doubtful, but anything is better than this current jumble of leagues.