Counties Pay, Owners Profit (Milwaukee Edition)

"You can't be sentimental in this job. You have to be rational." - Bud Selig

I was born in 1966, the same year the Braves skipped town for Atlanta. I didn’t live through it. I didn’t feel that loss. But I knew Milwaukee had already been burned once. And when the Brewers started pushing for a new stadium in the '90s, I could smell where it was headed.

Bud Selig wanted a ballpark. Not just any park, a monument. Something with a roof, something modern. He said the Brewers needed it to compete. He didn’t have to say the rest out loud. We all knew the threat, build it or we might not be here much longer.

And people listened. Fear works. Nostalgia works even better.

So the state passed a 0.1% sales tax across five counties, Milwaukee, Ozaukee, Washington, Waukesha, Racine. No vote. Just a deal. One vote in the legislature made it happen, George Petak flipped, and Racine voters recalled him. It didn’t matter. The tax passed. The park got built.

And we paid for it. Every fucking time we bought a pop or filled up our tanks, we chipped in. It was supposed to be temporary. It lasted 23 years. Twenty-three years of quiet extraction, of everyone carrying a piece of the stadium whether they bought a ticket or not.

Miller Park Crane Disaster

And yeah, I went to Miller Park. I still go. I love the game. The view from the concourse, the sound of the crowd, Uecker on the radio—it still hits. And I like the Brewers. I root for them when they’re not playing the Dodgers. But I’ll be honest because of all this, I chose the Dodgers over the Brewers. I never loved the way it went down. I couldn’t shake the feeling that we got cornered. That it was civic blackmail dressed up as pride.

I’m glad the team stayed. But the way it happened? It made it harder to cheer without choking on it a little.

This was a play. And Bud ran it perfectly. He knew exactly how to work public sentiment. He’d seen what happened when a team left. He knew people would do anything to avoid living that again. And he knew they’d forget the details as long as they had a team to root for and a park that didn’t suck.

He was right.

They told us the ballpark would drive growth. That it would revitalize the area. That it was an investment. What it became was a branded fortress surrounded by parking lots. And now that the tax is finally dead? The Brewers are asking for more public money. Again. For renovations. For upgrades. For “the fan experience.”

It's the same pitch in a new voice. And it's just as hollow.

Look at what’s happening in Oakland. The A’s owner, John Fisher, ran the same play only louder. He gutted the team, raised ticket prices, treated the fans like garbage, and let the stadium rot. Then he pointed at the mess and said, See? Oakland doesn’t support baseball anymore.

It was never about support. It was about leverage. And Vegas offered it.

Now they’re headed to a city that’s never supported baseball, to play in a stadium that doesn’t exist yet, using hundreds of millions in public funds. Same game. Different city. The people of Oakland get left with nothing not even a fake goodbye. Just the echo of what used to be a team.

That’s the modern MLB model, threaten, extract, relocate. Wrap it in sentiment and shove the bill under the rug.

I love baseball. But I’m not naive.

This wasn’t a gift to the community. It was a shakedown in team colors. A stadium built on borrowed money and sold as civic duty.

Next time someone says a ballpark is “for the fans,” ask them why the fans don’t get to own any of it.

Then ask who’s stuck holding the fucking bill.