Allow me to begin with a note of gratitude for the late George Petak, whose late-night vote kept the Brewers in Milwaukee and ultimately cost him his state senate seat.
For obvious reasons, I don’t delve into politics in the sports section very often, but to my friends who did not support the building of Miller Park, now American Family Field, please believe me when I say that I have gotten more than my share of enjoyment, entertainment and memories from the facility and I thank those of you who may have been unwilling contributors to the initial construction and subsequent improvements.
That may seem like an odd starting point for a piece about the Brewers hosting an event celebrating alumni from 25 seasons at the stadium, but I felt it was important to begin that way because this will be a different take than most outlets have offered about what was essentially a festive franchise event welcoming back dozens of players who have worn the team colors at the stadium during its existence.
While the Brewers are obviously the main tenant of the building, I have memories from the ball park that extend beyond baseball.
Shortly after the final game at Milwaukee County Stadium, I remember discussing my memories from the former home of the Brewers. My friend Niki did not understand the reason I had an emotional attachment to the old facility, comparing it to the opening of a mall. She said something to the effect of that when a new mall opens, she doesn’t get sad that the old one closed, she becomes excited for what the new mall will have to offer.
I actually think about that comment frequently. It remains funny to me, and I still laugh all these years later whenever I think about what she said.
Not to diminish the fun times people have while checking out the latest fashions, hanging out with friends and sharing a meal in the food court, but I think a stadium is a little different from a shopping center, and I will do my best to draw from my experience of probably around 750 trips to American Family Field to explain why.
My memories date back to the open house event, when the Brewers welcomed the public inside for the first time and allowed people to check out the brand new facility. I then attended the two exhibition games that opened the stadium, the first official game and four of the first five regular season contests.
In the years since, I have been to hundreds of additional games, and visited when Cleveland and Miami called the stadium home due to weather-related events. It was definitely odd being there when the Brewers were the visitors on their own home field. I was two seats away from catching a ball during the 2002 Home Run Derby and sat in the bleachers when the All-Star Game ended in a tie. I’ve attended concerts, such as Jon Bon Jovi, Paul McCartney and the Motley Crue/Def Leppard show, among others. I saw a movie filmed at the facility (Mr. 3,000 starring Bernie Mac). I ate a number of meals at Friday’s Front Row before it was replaced by the Barrel Yard. (As a side note, I thought it would have been a great touch to rename the restaurant Milwaukee County Stadium Bar and Grill. The team purchased the letters that hung on the old park a few years ago and I thought it would have been a great way to display them and give a nod to the past by placing them on the wall overlooking left field.) I even went to a watch a soccer match that was played at the facility. Instead of a cottage up north, the stadium is my summer home.
There is a sense of community when you attend a game or other event. One of the coolest things is that baseball is a game that doesn’t operate on a clock — well, there is a pitch clock now, but I think you get the idea — and time stands still, kind of like when you are on vacation and you don’t need to stick to a schedule.
While the stadium itself is merely a structure, it is also somewhat symbolic.
Each time I drive past the building I take a peek at the structure and inevitably think about something related to it — the people I have attended games with, stories from those outings and the great players I have had an opportunity to watch play.
Opening Day is an event like few others and nearly every year I come home with a story from the game that gets the home portion of the season underway. For example, in 2002, my best friend and I watched two people seated near us bash each other over the head with a toy flamingo for nine innings, providing entertainment to accompany a win by the Brew Crew.
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The following year, my buddy Steve doubled over laughing when he saw a person dressed as the Easter Bunny walking through the parking lot. (For context, it was the Friday before Easter.) I’ve never seen him laugh that hard before or since.
There was an opener more recently when we spotted a person roaming the parking lots dressed up as the mascot for Notre Dame, but never got an explanation why.
In pre-pandemic times, I used to host an annual tailgate party event. At first it was with friends from school, then morphed into a mix of childhood friends with new friends and coworkers. It was always a great time and the memories are numerous, such as the time we called then-Green Bay Packer Javon Walker. I’d share stories, but what happens in the parking lot, stays in the parking lot.
The amenities of “the keg” — I am still amazed and sad that nickname for the building did not become ubiquitous — are nice, but when I first started going to games the concessions options were limited to hot dogs, peanuts, a soda and the occasional Super Rope (licorice). The Big Kahuna — an ice cream cookie sandwich with a layer of fudge, which was much better than it sounds from that description — was a delicacy that my friends and I discovered in the last year or two of the County Stadium days and dearly miss.
But, as long as I have a place to sit and a view of the field, I’m a happy customer. However, the improvement in the sound system and scoreboard over County Stadium are tremendous luxuries and upgrades that I am very thankful for.
Best of all, the Miller Park and American Family Field era has played host to a competitive run of baseball by the Brewers. It is more fun and enjoyable when the home team wins. When I was young, I wanted to see Barry Bonds, Ken Griffey Jr. and Greg Maddux play; these days, the opponent doesn’t really matter as much to me and I rarely pick the games I will attend based on who the team is facing.
In watching the celebration of the 25 Brewers’ alumni that took the field in the position they played — a moment that in some ways was reminiscent of the postgame ceremony that closed County Stadium — it dawned on me that this may be the first event that really featured none of the players usually honored when it comes to franchise history. Jim Gantner, Paul Molitor, Gorman Thomas and Robin Yount, among others, were not on hand, and it would not have made sense for them to have been honored. Early in his career, Ryan Braun somewhat famously said he was looking forward to the day in which team history would move beyond talk of 1982. Not that it was intentional, but Friday’s ceremony did provide something of a symbolic changing of the guard in a sense, as different players took their place as franchise icons. That will be even more apparent in future years when the team honors the anniversary year of the 2011 and 2018 teams that advanced to the league championship series and the club retires the number of players who spent their career calling Miller Park or American Family Field home.
The ceremony also made me think that there are a lot of people who were not present but should be recognized for their contributions during an anniversary like the one celebrated last week.
Obviously the players have done their part on the field and it was nice to see them. It would also have been great to see others that I have enjoyed watching through the years — such as Jeromy Burnitz, Ray King, Jonathan Lucroy, CC Sabathia and Richie Sexson — but they were there in spirit.
Bud Selig championed the cause for building the stadium, which helped Milwaukee remain a big league city.
You cannot forget the efforts of thousands of people who worked on building the actual structure, including William DeGrave, Jerome Starr and Jeffrey Wischer, who died during a tragic accident in 1999 when the Big Blue crane collapsed.
The Brewers stadium is much more than a mall to me, although there are multiple team stores throughout the building to handle those shopping needs. It has been my home away from home for the past 25 years and while I still have nostalgic memories of County Stadium, it truly is “Sweet across the street,” as Mark Loretta predicted during his comments in the closing ceremony for the old park.
Here’s to 25 more years. And hopefully a World Series. And a chance to host a WrestleMania. And more concerts. And, mostly, to many more memories.