The Milwaukee Brewers announced on Monday that they will be honoring the team's former owner and present Major League Baseball commissioner Bud Selig with a statue that will be displayed at Miller Park's Home Plate Plaza. The Selig statue will join current statues of Milwaukee greats Robin Yount and Hank Aaron, both of whom have been there since Miller Park opened in 2001."We are proud to honor dommissioner Selig for all of his efforts on behalf of the Milwaukee Brewers and Major League Baseball," said Brewers Owner Mark Attanasio in a statement. "The Brewers and Miller Park are in this city because of the dommissioner's vision and dedicated efforts. Just as importantly, he has remained a prominent and highly philanthropic member of our community while effectively leading Major League Baseball during his tenure as baseball's top executive."
The statue will stand seven feet tall, not including the base, and will be designed by Brian Maughan, the same man who did the Yount and Aaron statues.
Selig has been in charge of baseball for so long now -- 18 years -- that it's easy to forget that he was the man who brought baseball back to Milwaukee in 1970 and also played a key role in getting Miller Park built for his former team.
Whether you're a fan of the job Selig has done while being commissioner of the sport, be it instituting the wild card, beginning interleague play, overseeing the strike in 1994, having the winner of the All-Star game decide home-field in the World Series or instituting baseball's drug-testing program after watching over the sport as steroids became an enormous problem, the fact of the matter is that baseball has never been stronger than it is right now under his stewardship.Combine all that with what he meant to baseball in Milwaukee, and it's hard to blame the Brewers for wanting to build a statue of the man.
Comments (Page 1 of 1)
I assume the statue will do exactly what Bud did during the steroid era...just stand there.
Will the statue have a bad bronzed haircut?
Will the statue have a bad bronze haircut?
This would be like if AOL Fanhouse built a statue of Fornelli. What a shame.
I can hear the pigeons celebrating already...
While Selig was the end man in bringing the Brewers to Milwaukee, it should be remembered that he was not alone. When the irresponsible Braves left town so to add to the Perrini's pockets, Fred Miller(Miller Brewing) andothers rescued baseball in Milwaukee by bring the Whit Sox to town to play nine games a year then later eleven games. Selig was definatly a part of this as were many influrntial men who loved baseball. The Pilots moving from Seattle to Milwaukee was the result. I was at that first "Milwaukee Brewer Game" and you could still see the words "Pilots" on the shirts where the letters had been torn off. The S was still visible on tghe caps. We loved it we had a team again, and an American League team at that. Seligs biggest mistake in Milwaukee was the switch to the National League. His best move? Selling out to the current owners, Mark Anastasia (sp?) has taken the Team to new heights. Selig deserves a Statue but only as a tribute to the many men who brought baseball back to Beersville. My Dad was one of them!
Perrini and company did not want the Braves to continue their successes of '53-'58 because they could see $$$ in booming Atlanta.
When I was a kid my family vacationed in Florida often and drove through Atlanta; it was a dirty city and a pimple on Milwaukee's ass. Now it's much larger than Milwaukee and has replaced Chicago's O'Hare as the nation's busiest airport city. It's also cosmo and fairly clean.
How quickly times can change. I guess reconstruction worked.
I know this has nothing to do with the Selig statue, but I already blogged about that topic.
I bought my first car from Bud Selig, later wondering how an auto dealer could afford a MLB team. Perhaps I paid too much.
He has been great to Milwaukee, where I grew up but no longer live, however have fond memories. He has also been a fine commissioner. His successes are noted in the Fornelli article. Bud Selig is a credit to baseball because he simply loves the game.