X-Golf at American Family Field

(rendering released by Milwaukee Brewers)

I've spent plenty of time on this blog criticizing American Family Field's lack of community social spaces, so I think it is only fair that I also point out a small victory in this space for the Brewers.  The team is set to open an "X-Golf" facility on September 16th.  At over 11,000 square feet and spread over two levels, it is the first of its kind at any level of baseball.  The facility will be accessible to ALL FANS, before, during, after, and between games year-round and will include an array of golf simulators and full bar and concessions menu, including some that will be particular to this area.  The X-Golf area is taking over a long-underutilized private club level albatross of a space that has had many names over the years, most recently the Stadium Club.  It's probably most well known for former Brewers great Rickie Weeks launching homeruns off of the glass in left field on a regular basis, and I myself have only been in there once or twice in 20+ years of the stadium.

It's great to see the Brewers finally acknowledging what is safe to say is much more than a trend and really the current state of baseball - that being, most fans are not at a ballgame to sit in their seats and actually watch the game for 9 innings.  To use a golf pun, the Twins have been the "leader in the clubhouse" on this for some time; most recently, converting a giant club space into a bar accessible to all fans, creating a new kids area at the main gate, and even opening a gaming lounge.  Baseball has been at a crossroads for years now in how to attract new and younger fans and it's things like social/entertainment spaces that help create that bridge.  Baseball is certainly in a unique position to take their in-game experience to a level that no other sport can offer, because the pace of play, configuration of a ballpark, large quantity of games, and lower cost of a ticket are so much different than other sports.  Many teams are starting to embrace a day at the ballpark as a 3+ hour entertainment experience that may or not be related to the game at all.  So regardless how much of a baseball purist you are, and how much you may or may not like golf nor understand why it belongs at a baseball stadium, there's no denying that a ballgame as immersive entertainment is here to stay.  So kudos to the Brewers on being on the forefront of something unique for once.

STANDINGS AND UPCOMING SERIES AS OF 8/22/22:

Brewers 64-56, -5.0, -1.5 WC; 3 @ Dodgers, 3 v. Cubs, 3 v. Pirates, 4 @ Diamondbacks

Twins 62-57, -1.5, -2.5 WC; 3 @ Astros, 3 v. Giants, 3 v. Red Sox, 3 @ White Sox

2022 GAMES ATTENDED:

Erik - 1

Peter - 15

Wisconsin Report Finds Little Economic Impact From Stadiums

(pictured above: rendering of new proposed Milwaukee soccer/theater complex by Kahler Slater)

Only a couple of days after I published my last post on the potential for, and difficulties of, an "American Family Field District," a report released by the Center on Wisconsin Strategy (with the appropriate acronym of COWS) found that Milwaukee would stand to benefit very little economically from a proposed new, publicly-funded soccer stadium near the Marquette Campus.  Milwaukee is billing this new stadium and district as the "Iron District" in trying to entice the city to back this sports-related development, and is largely playing up the perceived success of the Deer District as its case study.  If the project does go through, it would inhabit a swath of vacant and/or underdeveloped land near the Marquette Interchange downtown, and would be completed by 2024.

It's important to note that this report was done for one specific soccer stadium that does not exist yet, so it is not an apples-to-apples comparison to an existing baseball stadium, but this report does reference two major studies that show the "majority of economists agree that sports projects do not actually provide the benefits touted by developers."  There is a lot to unpack here that I'm not going to regurgitate or try to solve in one post - Urban Milwaukee recaps it very well here, and here is the COWS report - but I will just say that it is really important and interesting to discern between the wool being pulled over the public's eyes when things like a Deer District are proposed, and what the actual results are.  As I eluded to in my last post, the Deer District is actually creating very little new public economic impact and is really just pulling business away from other places.  That's not to say that the perception of developed land, or increased tax base, or being a "big league city" with a pro sports franchise, or providing more public entertainment options do not all have intrinsic value because they do, but it is not the economic boon that is often promised.  When you factor in the massive public subsidies, and millionaire athletes rarely living in and supporting the immediate communities which the team/stadium serve, the return is negligible at best.  The main selling point of the new Bucks arena was that it if this does not get built, then the Bucks will leave and be a huge blow to the city, but in reality the team could leave tomorrow and the local economic impact would be miniscule.  This is due to something called the "substitution effect" which basically states that anybody willing to spend money on one form of entertainment will likely just spend that money somewhere else instead, rather than pocket the money.  One need look no further than how people spent all of their spare income on Amazon and home goods during the pandemic as proof of that.  Numerous studies of positive land appreciation from the NBA Supersonics moving away from Seattle is another more topical example of this effect.

Repeated analysis like this think tank report is one of the major reasons I was skeptical of the Deer District when it was built, and to bring this back to the topic of baseball, it's a reason I would be very skeptical of anything successful being built around American Family Field.  Milwaukee has many problems and shouldn't try to leverage another entertainment option out of the Brewers as some sort of false flag to bring in money.  The investment into impoverished communities and existing infrastructure is way more important and financially beneficial in the long term.  And an absentee millionaire owner like Mark Attanasio certainly does not need this district either.  We'll see where this goes but an already cash-strapped city like Milwaukee has plenty of other things it should be spending its money - like repairing the street I live on!

STANDINGS AND UPCOMING SERIES AS OF 8/8/22:

Brewers 58-50, -2.0, -1.5 WC; 2 v. Rays, 3 @ Cardinals, 4 v. Dodgers, 3 @ Cubs

Twins 57-51, +1.0; 2 @ Dodgers, 3 @ Angels, 3 v. Royals, 4 v. Rangers

2022 GAMES ATTENDED:

Erik - 1

Peter - 15

Milwaukee County Board Backs Resolution to Develop AmFam Field District

I remember one day when my family and I were out for a walk a few months ago, and we got stopped by a young man named Peter Burgelis, who was running for County Supervisor in our district.  He handed us a flyer and gave us the rundown of the platforms he was running on, and I distinctly remember that, even despite some lofty goals, he impressed us enough to gain our vote.  One of the items on that flyer was that he was determined to leverage land around the Brewers' stadium as an entertainment district.  I'm not writing this all as any sort of political commentary or even an endorsement of Burgelis, but simply as a welcome surprise when I saw that not even two months after he was elected, the proposal was before the County Board.  No matter what your political persuasion, it's always very rewarding to see when someone you voted for delivers on a promise.

The land surrounding American Family Field as long been home to, well, not much.  The Brewers made a conscious decision to remain in the Menomonee Valley area of Milwaukee (right next to the old County Stadium) when planning what was then called Miller Park, and the major reasons were that the Brewers would control a large amount of land for surface parking and tailgating, and would not have to compete with any downtown entertainment at a time when the urban ballpark was not yet trendy, nor was downtown Milwaukee anything to be proud of.  Times have changed in the last 25+ years, and the Brewers and Milwaukeeans need not look any further than our own downtown Deer District surrounding the new NBA Bucks arena for an example of a successful, 365-days-a-year revenue-generating district.  This was a district I was admittedly very skeptical of that has been a huge success since pretty much day one.  But there were a number of things working in the Bucks favor that the Brewers unfortunately do no have - 1) the arena is already nestled into a vibrant downtown and 2) the majority was privately financed outside of public infrastructure improvements, and 3) the land the Deer District was built on was largely available and practically given away.  The Brewers and their stadium authority own all of the surrounding land and it's really in an area of the city that is not super exciting, surrounded by manufacturing buildings, and not to mention bisected by a major interstate.  Nobody outside of Mr. Burgelis and a couple of urban planners have ever expressed any interest in this sort of district, particularly the Brewers, and right now this is all just a nice pipe dream on paper.  This was all partially brought about by the relocating and thus rezoning of the large Komatsu plant to the south of the stadium, but as of today, nothing concrete has been planned for that land.

I certainly commend the effort and it's certainly worth vetting, as it could be a novel way to help finance future renovations to the ballpark in lieu of extending a tax, but I think it would be a stretch in a city of Milwaukee's size and with the resources of the Brewers to get this done.  As someone who doesn't live that far away and having seen the success of places like the Battery in Atlanta in person, of course I would love to see the increased tax base, but it would be a long haul to get this done.  To get this to work, it would mean relocating a lot of businesses, probably a major reconstruction of the highway and removal of the WI-175 Spur, a private-public partnership entered between the Brewers and the city/county, and probably most crucial, it requires an influx of business and residents from somewhere.  This sort of district does not organically create business - on the surface, the Deer District looks successful, but really it is just pulling business and people spending their money from other areas of the city, and the same thing would happen at this "Brewers District."  Neighboring West Milwaukee, and a lot of the small businesses in my neighborhood, would eventually die depending on the size and success of the entertainment district.  As much as I would love to see every inch of Milwaukee thriving, the logistics of this situation don't seem to work out very well, but you never know.  At some point in my lifetime, the Brewers will do either a major overhaul or completely new ballpark, and that will undoubtedly stir the pot on this discussion once more.

STANDINGS AND UPCOMING SERIES AS OF 8/1/22:

Brewers 57-45, +3.0; 3 @ Pirates, 3 v. Reds

Twins 53-48, +1.0; 3 v. Tigers, 4 v. Blue Jays

2022 GAMES ATTENDED:

Erik - 1

Peter - 15