Brown is certainly not alone in taking the ceremonial route to retirement. Emmitt Smith retired as a Cowboy after two sub-standard years in the Arizona desert. Mike Pringle signed a one-day contract with the Montreal Alouettes after breaking the CFL's all-time rushing record as an Eskimo. Former Bills' great Thurman Thomas was welcomed back with open arms for his retirement in Buffalo even after doing the unthinkable and playing one year for the hated division rival Dolphins.

The Washington Redskins seem to be leading the league in the sentimental category allowing former great Art Monk, kick return specialist Brian Mitchell and even WR Leslie Shepherd to retire as Redskins. The Shepherd retirement has to rank as the strangest. In what was an abbreviated 7-year career (five of which were spent in Washington) Shepherd failed to post a single 1000-yd, 50 catch or 10 TD season. I mean what's next, are the Chargers going to bring back Ryan Leaf to put some closure on his career?

Football seems to be virtually alone in running this type of press conference driven faux contract signing. Baseball has had the odd ceremonial retirement, the most recent coming when OF Doug Glanville returned to the Philadelphia Phillies organization. I can't think of a single NBA or NHL retirement going down like this. Perhaps the closest thing hockey has had was when the Toronto Maple Leafs picked up the revered Dougie Gilmour at the trade deadline a few years ago only to watch him blow out a wheel in his first game back in the Blue & White and thus out an end to a terrific career.

	The easiest way for players like Emmitt Smith to be associated with a specific club is to retire on the field as a member of the team.  (Source: AP)

As soon as Brown announced his retirement I heard the same national sentiment across talk radio, TV, print, and digital media: "It's so great to see that Brown retired as a Raider". Why is it so great? Wouldn't it have been better if Brown retired last year or even accepted a diminished role with Oakland rather than give a poor rendition of himself in a foreign uniform? I get that these one-day contracts are building an everlasting association with a club but a piece of paper can not excuse or make fans forget that they had to endure the awkward sight of watching a once great player synonymous with one franchise bolt at the end of a career in order to extend what last moments he could get out of it. If a player wants to be remembered as a franchise player then why not just stay with that club instead of returning in some orchestrated and phony press conference.

To put into perspective how ridiculous these one-day contract signings are just imagine if the average worker had the option at age 60 to sign a one-day contract with a former employer. But instead of the formality of a press conference they were actually put through the rigors of a full day of work. Sixty year olds would be put through the paces of construction after holding a desk job for 35 years or return to job where they were unceremoniously canned along the way. Even worse though would be for those born-again Christians that would have to return to their jobs as drug peddlers, strippers and petty thugs. Now that I would love to see!