Is a dominant bullpen back end essential or the new "flavor of the month"?

In sports, we see copycats all the time. A strategy that leads one team to a big season or championship is then copied by others in an attempt to repeat the success.

The Kansas City Royals are a team that others may look to copy in 2015. If a team can build a bullpen as good, they can shorten the game to six innings. The trick is adding three relievers as good as Kelvin Herrera, Wade Davis and Greg Holland to pitch innings seven through nine.

The Orioles have a good back end of the bullpen, too. But that includes current free agent Andrew Miller. Back to Miller in a moment.

On MLB Network on Friday, the discussion turned to relievers and the big contracts that pitchers like David Robertson and Miller could get this winter.

New York Post baseball writer Joel Sherman, who is also an MLB Network analyst, is among those who feel closers are somewhat interchangeable and he feels it is a mistake to spend big for one. The same thought applies, to a degree, to relievers as a group.

"It is the only position on the field you can find someone else to do it and win a championship on a consistent basis. By the way, just six teams have the same closer today they had at the beginning of the 2013 season," Sherman said.

"The burnout rate, because of the stress on the arm and brain for doing that, kind of the air traffic controller job of the sport - either the plane lands successfully or it crashes - the burnout rate is so high, I would want to allocate the money somewhere else."

As for Miller, various free agent predictions see him getting a three- or four-year deal and I've seen predictions of the average annual value ranging from $7 to $10 million per season.

Miller had the best year of his life in 2014 and now it seems everyone wants him. But Sherman made what could be a valid point on Friday.

"First of all, he doesn't have a long track record, right?" Sherman said. "He doesn't have enough of a track record there for me to say this isn't going to turn into B.J. Ryan (part) two. And I think Miller was dominant. He was the most important player in the Orioles beating the Tigers. Detroit tried to get him in July, but the Orioles did. I just want to use that money someplace else. I think he'll get the money, it just would not be on my team."

O's fans, after seeing Miller so dominant for their team, probably wonder why the O's would not go all out to get him back. But here are Miller's stats the last two years:

* 2013: 2.64 ERA, 1.37 WHIP, 7.3 hits per nine innings, 5.0 walks per nine innings
* 2014: 2.02 ERA, 0.80 WHIP, 4.8 hits per nine innings, 2.5 walks per nine innings

Miller's 1.37 WHIP in the 2013 season would have ranked behind these 2014 O's relievers: Darren O'Day (0.89), Zach Britton (0.90), Tommy Hunter (1.10), Brad Brach (1.17), Ryan Webb (1.26) and Brian Matusz (1.32).

In 2013, Miller was good, but walked too many. In 2014, he showed command and was dominant. The combination of his track record, the volatility of relievers and the big price for the lefty might give some teams pause here. It might.

But for now, with apparently so many teams interested, Miller is likely to get the big bucks. He sure did all he could this year and his slider is an overpowering pitch.

At the GM meetings, one agent referred to this strategy of building a dominant back end of the bullpen as the "flavor of the month."

Who wouldn't want Miller and who wouldn't want a back end of the bullpen as dominant as what the Royals had? But how hard is it to achieve that and at what price does it come?

Some team is going to order up the flavor that is Miller this winter. The price will be high and then they'll find out if they ordered the proper flavor for their 2015 bullpen.