I think we've officially ridden this series about as far as it can go. Today is the 29th installment of what opened as the MVBrewer series. Here are the others, if you missed them:

#1: Ryan Braun
#2: Prince Fielder
#3: John Axford
#4: Yovani Gallardo
#5: Zack Greinke
#6: Shaun Marcum
#7: Nyjer Morgan
#8: Rickie Weeks
#9: Corey Hart
#10: Randy Wolf

Honorable Mentions: Jonathan Lucroy, Carlos Gomez, Chris Narveson and Francisco Rodriguez.
Other Valuable Brewers: Kameron Loe, Jerry Hairston Jr., LaTroy Hawkins, Marco Estrada, George Kottaras, Yuniesky Betancourt and Takashi Saito.
Lesser Brewers: Tim Dillard, Craig Counsell, Mark Kotsay, Taylor Green, Zach Braddock, Casey McGehee and Mat Gamel.

So now it's time for us to take a quick look at who's left before we close the door.

Josh Wilson

When the Brewers claimed Wilson off waivers in May, I thought they had gotten me a replacement for Yuniesky Betancourt for my birthday. Wilson, however, was never really given an opportunity as a full time starter and made less than 100 plate appearances despite being with the team for most of four full months.

Wilson's 2011 highlight might have been July 16-17, when he made back-to-back starts at short and picked up two multi-hit games, his only two as a Brewer. Yuniesky Betancourt was back in the lineup the next day and Wilson didn't make another start at short all season. He signed a minor league deal with the Braves this winter.

Logan Schafer

After losing nearly the entire 2010 season due to injury, Schafer bounced back and had a really good minor league season in 2011 (.315/.385/.439 over three levels) to earn his first cup of coffee in the majors.

Schafer made his major league debut and scored his first run on September 2, and picked up his only major league hit to date on September 18. He turned 25 in September and probably has an outside chance to make the Brewers out of spring training in 2012.

Martin Maldonado

Despite having developed a reputation as a defense-only catcher, Maldonado put up a good offensive season in the minors in 2011 (.287/.373/.436 between AA and AAA) and earned a callup to serve as the team's third catcher in September.

Serving as an emergency backstop means spending a lot of time sitting: Maldonado made just three September appearances and got one PA, a strikeout. But the Puerto Rico native is still only 25 and likely to be the Brewer backup backstop in 2012 if something happens to Jonathan Lucroy or George Kottaras.

Brandon Kintzler

Kintzler made a major league Opening Day roster for the first time in 2011, but his stay with the team was brief. After appearing in just nine games in April and May he was shut down with what was initially diagnosed as triceps tendonitis, and later underwent surgery to repair a stress fracture in his right forearm.

Kintzler picked up his first major league win on April 18. This fall he made four appearances in the Arizona Fall League, and is expected to rejoin the team in spring training.

Mike McClendon

Actually, the fact that Mike McClendon is still here is something of a surprise. He was pretty good in nine appearances as a reliever with the Brewers (mostly in May), but was sent down in June and never returned to the big club, while others were consistently called up in his place. This led to speculation that he was destined to be one of the PTBNLs in the Francisco Rodriguez trade, as it seemed like the only logical explanation for keeping down a guy with a 2.86 ERA in a small major league sample size.

At any rate, the speculation was wrong and McClendon, who struck out 7.4 batters per nine and posted a 3.53 ERA in 38 relief appearances for Nashville this season, should be back with the team next spring.

Frankie De La Cruz

De La Cruz (whose real first name is Eulogio) was one of the callups that led to us wondering about McClendon. He was added to the 40 man roster and called up in September to work primarily in mop-up duty, but performed pretty well in that role. He pitched 13 innings over eleven appearances for the Brewers and allowed multiple runs just one time. He also did not allow a single home run, becoming just the 17th pitcher in Brewer history to throw 13 or more innings in a season without allowing a long ball.

According to Brewerfan.net, FDLC is out of options. He'll either need to make the roster next spring or be exposed to waivers.

Michael Fiers

There's no pitcher anywhere in the Brewer organization that had a bigger breakout season in 2011 than Michael Fiers. In just his second full pro season Fiers posted a 1.86 ERA over 126 innings between Huntsville and Nashville, striking out 132 batters. By doing so he won the minor league ERA title and earned a late September callup to the Brewers.

Fiers only appeared in two games in Milwaukee, allowing no runs on two hits and three walks over two innings. With that said, he'd probably be a candidate to start the 2012 season in the rotation under different circumstances.

Fiers is already 26 years old, but it'll be interesting to see how the Brewers use him in 2012.

Thanks for playing:

Wil Nieves
Felipe Lopez
Erick Almonte
Brandon Boggs
Jeremy Reed
Mike Rivera
Brett Carroll
Eric Farris
Sergio Mitre
Sean Green
Mitch Stetter
Mark DiFelice
Danny Ray Herrera

Since he spent just 12 days in the majors this season, the biggest story about Mat Gamel in 2011 was the comments Sound manager Don Money made about him in September.

Money came up to help coach the Brewers in September, Adam McCalvy asked him whether Gamel would make a good major leaguer and Money's answers were surprisingly frank and derogatory.

"If he can get his head right, and that's the thing," Money said. "He's hard-headed. He doesn't carry himself well. You have to carry yourself like a professional, and he doesn't do it and I've said it to him."

"The big question is, can he play it every day? Well, he can play first, but can he hit enough?" Money said. "That's the big 'if.'"

To be fair, it wasn't just Gamel he called out - Money had some negative remarks about Caleb Gindl and Mike McClendon, as well.

But the thoughts of a player's AAA manager probably tell you a lot about how the organization views Gamel and likely don't bode well for Gamel's future as a Brewers starter. He was passed over for Taylor Green when the Brewers wanted a left-handed bat on the bench in September and October and his major league numbers have failed to live up to the promise of his minor league ones.

For his short time in the majors, Gamel was called up on June 27 as the Brewers entered the start of the Interleague part of their schedule.Though it was assumed he was brought up to DH, he actually started two games at first, DH'd two games and started at third for one game during Interleague. He stayed with the club for another week, getting two starts at third against Arizona and Cincinnati while also.

The Brewers made it very clear in Spring Training that Gamel was being sent down to learn how to play first base, so it was somewhat surprising when he was started at third three times during his short stint with the major league club.

Prior to being called up, Gamel was hitting 321 with 18 home runs and 58 RBI, with a .380 on-base percentage and .577 slugging percentage in AAA. Unfortunately, that didn't carry over to Milwaukee, where he hit just .115 (3 for 26) with no home runs and two RBI in 10 games.

Many thought Gamel would be called up in September when rosters expanded, but the team stuck with Taylor Green as the left-handed bat on the bench.

In explanation, Doug Melvin said: "We didn't think we could get him enough at-bats to make it worthwhile. There were some other guys on that club such as (outfielder) Caleb Gindl and (pitchers) Wily Peralta and Michael Fiers who had big years but we didn't think they'd get to play, either."

"With the team we have, he's not going to get at-bats, especially with Prince at first base. Prince wants to play every day. We've got Taylor Green here and he's been swinging the bat well, so we think we're covered if we need an extra left-handed pinch-hitter."

We could only put off talking about Casey McGehee for so long, I guess.

In a season full of shining moments for the Brewers there was arguably no darker cloud than McGehee. A year removed from winning the Milwaukee BBWAA's Brewer MVP award, McGehee hit .223/.280/.346. After posting two fWAR in 2009 and 3.3 more in 2010, McGehee was worth just 0.3 in 2011.

Looking at his batted ball numbers confirms what you probably already knew if you've watched McGehee this season: A full 50% of the balls he put in play in 2011 were hit on the ground, a new career high. Combine that with a career-low 16.2% line drive rate and an absolute lack of speed and the cause of McGehee's offensive tailspin is relatively easy to spot: He was making poor to terrible contact a large chunk of the time and didn't have the physical capacity to turn poorly hit balls into base hits very often. That's also part of the reason he led the team by grounding into 19 double plays. To be honest, I was surprised it was only 19.

Given those numbers, the most surprising fact about McGehee might be the fact that the team still played him in 155 games. Only Prince Fielder made more appearances. In fact, Fielder, Ryan Braun (150) and Yuniesky Betancourt (152) were the only Brewers to play more than 140 games. In the playoffs, however, he was replaced at third base by Jerry Hairston Jr.

As noted above, McGehee is only one year removed from a very good 2010 season, and two years removed from a breakout campaign in 2009. There's still some reason to believe he could contribute something of value to this team in the years to come. Maybe having a long offseason to regroup or a new hitting coach next spring will help him start fresh and get back to being the hitter he was before this disaster started. But it remains to be seen if the Brewers will give him that opportunity.

Contract Status

McGehee's contract situation is one massive factor working against him at this point. He's arbitration-eligible for the first time this winter and MLB Trade Rumors projects him to receive $3.1 million for 2012. That's a pretty high number for a bounce-back candidate, and at that price the Brewers may have to consider non-tendering him to pick up some payroll space to use elsewhere.

Assuming they keep him around, McGehee is under team control through the 2014 season.

Best Game

McGehee only hit 13 home runs in 2011, but three of them came on the same day against Edwin Jackson and the Cardinals. In a 10-5 Brewer win on August 3 McGehee drove in five runs with this trifecta:

McGehee also hit pinch hit home runs to win games on April 10 and July 6.

We've nearly exhausted our list of 2011 Brewers but still have a few remaining, including Zach Braddock.

Braddock came up in 2010 and really helped light a fire under a bullpen that was a nightmare through much of the year. He would end up pitching in 46 games and, along with freshly called up John Axford, gave the Brewers a lot of hope for their bullpen going forward. That year, Braddock had a K/9 just a tick below 11 and a lovely 2.94 ERA to match a 2.90 FIP. He did have a bit of a walk problem, as his control seemed to take a siesta every now and then, but that's almost to be expected with a high strikeout pitcher.

He started off great in 2011, too. Through May 1, he had a 1.93 ERA. An earned run the next day would bring that up to 2.73, but it seemed like he was off to a great start. His fastball was lively and batters looked almost as though they were napping when they faced him. On May 3, though, it was announced that Zach Braddock was placed on the DL to make way for the returning Nyjer Morgan. The reason was a sleep disorder. I think, at the time, many of us believed that it was just an excuse, a fake injury, to move somebody so Morgan would fit on the roster. It did seem strange that the Brewers would do that with one of their best relievers, though. At the very least, it would have been nice if Doug Melvin and co. had slept on the decision.

After a month, Braddock returned to the active roster and picked up right where he left off. He had a 1.93 ERA throughout the month of June. The weird thing, though, was that he only pitched in seven games and 4.2 total innings. He pitched a full inning in only three outings, including one that during a total snoozefest against the Mets on June 7. That may have been his best outing of the year, though, as he struck out the side in the eighth inning of a 2-1 Brewers loss. He was so good, the Mets just seemed to be sleep-walking against him that day.

By the end of June, Braddock had a 2.51 ERA on the season. It seemed almost like a dream to have both him and Axford leading a dominant bullpen for the next few years. Unfortunately, in July Braddock just wasn't his usual lights out self. He gave up earned runs in four of six appearances that month, including multiple runs in three of those contests. He had a 30.00 ERA in July and his season ERA ballooned to 7.27. His season was put to bed on July 14, after giving up four earned runs without securing an out in the seventh inning against the Rockies. The next day, Braddock was optioned.

Braddock wouldn't appear for any Brewers minor league team's the rest of the season, though. On July 22, Tom Haudricourt reported that Braddock was shut down again due to his sleep disorder. His first DL stint hadn't been enough for him to work through his issues, and he would take the rest of the year off to deal with this problem. Since then, there hasn't been a whole lot of information on Braddock.

In all seriousness, I hope that Zach can find a cure for whatever ails him soon. I'm sure many fans feel cheated out of having potentially one of team's best relievers in a very important year for the Brewers. But much more importantly, whatever this issue is, it's having a clearly negative effect on Zach personally. Whether it's debilitating to his physical health, his mental health, or is just an extremely frustrating nuisance, it can't be much fun to go through. For either a fan or a player, one's personal life should certainly come first. Baseball is just a game, and it will still be around as soon as Zach is feeling better. Hopefully, he'll be ready in time for spring training. The team could use a good reliever in 2012 with the potential departures of Francisco Rodriguez, Takashi Saito, and LaTroy Hawkins.

If we're talking about 2011 Zach Braddock, it's important to look past his alarmingly high ERA. For nearly twenty outings, he pitched great. A bad few outings in July, when his sleep disorder seemed to be getting to him, brought his numbers up. He's still an extremely talented pitcher, and will still hopefully continue to pitch well for Milwaukee in the years to come.

Taylor Green appeared in just 20 games this season, so the story on him is probably that it wasn't more. As Casey McGehee's struggles lasted later and later into the season, many readers were calling for a Taylor Green call up. He was hitting extremely well in Nashville and folks were getting might antsy with Casey's lack of production.

Green finally received the promotion on August 26.

At that point, McGehee was hitting.241/.294/.356 with 10 home runs while Green, at Triple-A Nashville, was hitting .335/.413/.575 with 21 home runs.

Of course, that didn't seem to matter. McGehee still started 17 games in September and October, while Green started just seven. Jerry Hairston, Jr. got the starts down the stretch and Taylor Green was left to rot on the bench.

He ended up with 10 hits over 37 at-bats. Worries about whether his production would carry over to the majors were basically put to rest when he started the season getting six hits in his first six games - just the second Brewer to ever do that.

Green did get a post-season roster spot over Josh Wilson, something many didn't believe would be the case when the call up with made. He had two post-season PH at-bats and was also inserted as a defensive replacement in the ninth inning in game 2 of the NLCS.

Green became the first Brewer ever to be named the Brewers Minor League Player of the Year twice. He won this year and was also given the award in 2007. Despite spending the final two months in the majors, Green was named to the honorable mention of Project Prospect's Top Ten AAA position players list.

Back when the Brewers first signed Mark Kotsay, there was a whole slew of comments basically saying it was a dumb move but that it wasn't that big of a deal. He was 35 years old and was coming off a season during which he hit just .239/.306/.376. In addition, he had been worth a grand total of -1.8 fWAR from 2005-2010. He was a veteran guy to bring into camp and, unless he lit the world on fire in spring training, could be cut with little consequence.

Well, Kotsay did hit .340/.386/.440 in spring and earned a bench spot to begin the year. He would be one of the first bats off the bench and an occasional spot starter in the corner outfield. With Corey Hart being injured to start the season, Milwaukee needed a player who could take his place for a few weeks. Kotsay maintained a decent to good on base percentage for much of the year, though his power stroke was virtually non-existent. In fact, Kotsay's OPS was above .700 for only two days in 2011. He hit .702 on May 18 and .703 on September 26 to close his regular season. Comparatively, he had 15 days where he was under a .600 OPS. In particular, there was a rough month and a half long stretch between June 13 and July 31 where he hit .206/.214/.324--and still started 14 games.

On May 11, one of the more frustrating lineup decisions we have seen happened for the first time. That day, Mark Kotsay started in center field. While Nyjer Morgan was injured at the time, Milwaukee had a more than capable center fielder in Carlos Gomez. Brandon Boggs was also on the roster at that point, as well. That may have been the moment where one started feeling uneasy about the role of Mark Kotsay. It didn't help that he then started two more games in a row in center field a week later. And then two more in a row four games after that. Overall, Kotsay played ten regular season games in Center Field, with nine starts. It felt like even more, but that was ten games too many.

Mark Kotsay hadn't played an inning in center field since 2009, when he was center field for just five games. Mark Kotsay has not had a positive UZR/150 in center field since 2004. Mark Kotsay has not even had a center field UZR/150 in single digit negative numbers since 2005. In fact, the only two positions Kotsay has had a positive UZR in during the last three years are left field and first base, probably the two easiest positions in the game.

It's probably not Kotsay's fault that he was playing a position he couldn't handle for significant innings in 2011. Ron Roenicke is the one who put him out there, despite having Carlos Gomez and Nyjer Morgan on the roster. Or having at least one of those two when the other was injured. Still, though, it's hard not to dislike Kotsay for being in such a significant spot. Especially when it seemed like every game saw him make an absolutely boneheaded play that Morgan or Gomez would have made easily.

Even more frustrating was his one post-season start in center field, against the Cardinals in game three of the NLCS. That game, Kotsay had a base-running gaffe in the first inning that helped prematurely end a Brewers rally. Then, even worse, there were at least two different defensive plays that either Gomez or Morgan likely could have made that Kotsay didn't in the bottom of the first. The Cardinals scored four runs that inning en route to winning 4-3. Kotsay did hit a home run in that game, and reached base in three of four plate appearances, but I still struggle not to blame Kotsay for the Brewers losing that game. And had the Brewers won that game, maybe they would have built on that momentum and won the series.

Here are two lovely videos from that game:

Mark Kotsay had just a one year deal with the Brewers and signed with the Padres in the offseason for more money than he probably deserves. So I guess at least we don't get to see him replace Prince Fielder at first base next year.

Last year wasn't the best way for Craig Counsell to, potentially, end his career. For him, 2011 will always be marked by his tying the (at the time) record streak for hitless at-bats as he went 0-45 for a stretch in the middle of the season. That awful streak is somewhat indicative of his play the rest of the year, as well.  Counsell struggled through the worst hitting season of his career, batting just .178/.280/.223. That's good for a .234 wOBA with his previous career low .248 coming when we were still working about Y2K.

Counsell has always been known first and foremost as a defensive player, though, and he shined yet again last season. He rarely makes plays that make you jump out of your seat, but he gets to a number of balls and makes many plays that should be difficult seem easy.  He was worth a whole lot at 3B, 2B, and SS defensively in 2011 according to UZR, just as he has been his whole career. He even played a couple of innings in the outfield for the first time in his major league career, though he didn't have any chances.

Counsell's bat had just fallen off so much, however, that his glove hardly seemed worth it. The Brewers must have seen it the same way, as he slowly began losing more and more playing time as the season progressed. Counsell ended up with the fewest at-bats he has had since 2000 and was relegated to the late-inning defensive replacement role for much of the season. The Brewers trading for Jerry Hairston, Jr. was just about the final nail in the coffin as far as playing time for Counsell goes.

Counsell is now a free agent and has expressed interest in playing at least one more season. Whether that is in the 41-year old's best interest is debatable, though he could find a suiter who needs a strong glove off the bench. Doug Melvin has said recently that he wasn't going to pursue Counsell, though I'm sure if worst comes to worst we could find Counsell on the bench for the 2012 Brewers. There seems to be legitimate interest in having Counsell become a coach, too. The Brewers have shown some interest in that possibility as they would like to keep the Whitefish Bay native around. In addition, Dale Sveum has mentioned that he could look into bringing Counsell on as a part of his new coaching staff in Chicago. Whatever happens, I'm sure that Counsell, by all accounts one of the league's "good guys", will be able to find a job somewhere.

If you weren't watching closely, you might have forgotten that Tim Dillard spent most of the season as a part of this Brewer team.

Dillard was called up for the first time on May 13 but, in what would become a theme for him this season, he had to wait a while to get into a game. He was used for the first time on May 23, ten days later. He made 13 appearances for the Brewers in June but was sent back down on July 2.

Dillard's second stint with the Brewers was where his inactivity really became notable. He was recalled on July 16 and pitched two thirds of an inning on the 18th, but appeared in just one of the Brewers' next 21 games. He made just six more appearances in the two months that followed.

You wouldn't know it from the way Dillard was used, but he was actually pretty effective in his brief work this season. His 1.047 WHIP was outstanding, as was his 1.3 walks per nine innings. His 8.5 strikeouts per nine innings were the most he's ever averaged at any level.

Contract Status:

2011 was Dillard's eighth season in the Brewer organization, but he's accumulated just one year and seven days of major league service time. As such he can't become arbitration eligible for the first time until at least the 2014 season, and won't be eligible for free agency until at least 2017.

Dillard is also out of options, so he can't be sent to the minors in 2012 without being designated for assignment and exposed to waivers.

Best Game:

Dillard was mostly used in mop-up duty in 2011, but there was one very notable exception. On June 5 Dillard was called in during the bottom of the ninth inning of a game against the Marlins with disaster brewing: The two teams were tied at five and Florida had loaded the bases with one out against LaTroy Hawkins and Zach Braddock. Dillard entered the game and defused the threat, getting a groundout and a fly out to end the inning. He went on to pitch a 1-2-3 10th to keep the game alive and allow Josh Wilson to win it in the 11th with this blast: