Welcome to the Bandwagon. Welcome to the EXPERIENCE.

 


It's been awhile since I've written about the Bucks in this blog. And those readers who have been following me since the get-go will remember that the reason I wrote about them all the time was that Brian and I had half season and/or full season tickets for a few years. Those few years were in the mid to late 2000s, during the Bogut, Redd, and baby Ersan years, when the Bucks were also-rans, owned by the Senator, and playing in the cement-laden utilitarian hockey arena that was the Bradley Center: a "gift to the city" by Jane Bradley Pettit but really a gift to her husband Lloyd Pettit in a failed attempt to get an NHL team to be based in Milwaukee. (We still have the Admirals at least). The Bradley Center was a great place to play hockey, but not much good for anything else. That total cement design made it acoustically awful (I saw one concert in there and never went back for that), and the capacity wasn't large enough to get Milwaukee to host anything bigger than the first round of the NCAA Tournament. And jeez it was ugly. No windows, no plaza, typical let's-not-invest-in-anything-nice, just do the minimum thing that people around here seem to settle for. 

My blog posts about the Bucks honestly were not centered on the game itself that they played. They were about the experience of being a fan. I discussed the weather on a particular night, the parking situation. I critiqued the perfomance of the anthem, the halftime entertainment, and the presentation of the food. And the fans themselves, especially T-Shirt Guy

And God bless 'em, the Bucks organization bent over backwards to make going to this also-ran team's games fun. They brought in entertainment. Every quarter there was a chance to win some T-shirt, or a Chipotle burrito, or a free Palermo's pizza. Maybe Senator Kohl wasn't great at building a strong front office, but he kept the team in Milwaukee, and made sure when he sold it, the team stayed here. 

So those early millennial Bucks never got to the championship. Whatever. I grew up in Chicago as a Cubs fan. I was already raised not to expect winning teams. Going to Wrigley Field (and ditching school to do it) was the fun. The ballpark. The occasional great plays. The hot dogs that already came with mustard whether you liked it or not. The neighborhood with its locally owned taverns and shops and being jealous of people who could watch a game for "free" by sitting on their rooftops.  Being part of "the lovable losers." The fantasy that sounded real for about a week about a "subway series" between the Cubs and the Sox. Just the pure experience of the game for the game's sake. And then I chose to attend the University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign in the early 80s and got that Bachelor's Degree in "Supporting a Team With 'Potential' Only To See Them Blow It in the Final Four or the Rose Bowl" that's offered at all Big 10 schools. And of course, when the Bulls and the Bears were actually coming through during the 80s and early 90s, I watched Michael Jordan and Jim McMahon while living on the East Coast, piping up with "Hey, I'm from Chicago! Do I get to cheer?" And forget about the Cubs, my first love, during that era. The '84 Cubs actually won the NL east that year, prompting me to ask "Who are these imposters?" But then after two impressive wins in the NLCS (sound familiar) they blew it to the Padres, almost to my relief that I wasn't living in some alternate reality: "Look at 'em choke! Ah, there's my boys! There's the Cubbies!

So when I moved to Milwaukee, and married a fellow basketball fan, and we decided to invest in half and full season tickets at the Bradley Center, I wasn't expecting a winning team. I did  expect having some fun times, getting to shoot the breeze with people around us that we got to know (since our seats were also near season ticket holders). Brian and I either went together, or took turns taking our kids (Sammy doesn't even remember this, he was like 5 or 6 but he did have fun and always begged for those damn overpriced Dipping Dots), and Stella had a good time jumping around and eating stadium food. Like the Cubs fan that I was, it was all about the fun of just going to a basketball game. Then the Bush recession hit and we could no longer afford this. But we were still fans. 

So fast forward to the past couple of years. Kohl got to the point where he was getting too old for this and sold the team and so began the argument about whether it was in the city's best interest to help finance a new stadium. I have to give credit to Lasry and the other new owners: they delivered a beautiful new stadium that took into account that other things would be happening there. It's acoustically decent, so attending a concert isn't an assault on your ears' high end receptors. It's versatile, and there isn't a bad seat in the house. They stuck to their commitment to provide good paying jobs, and to hire people from low-income zip codes, and when Covid hit, they threw some $$$ into their employees' bank accounts to help them get through a year without concession and other sales. They built not only a stadium, but a neighborhood (the "Deer District") that would (and has) spurred economic development and made Downtown a destination.

And then they picked Giannis Antetokoumpo deep in the draft and began to build the team from there. And admittedly, I was all "well and good, this will be fun" but having lived a lifetime of This Time For Sure, I wasn't expecting the championship they promised. I was just enjoying some good games, a diverse and exciting team, and the heartwarming rags-to-riches stories of the Antetokoumpo brothers. And getting our toaster signed by Khris Middleton (who said "this is the second toaster I've signed today") when we were out at the Pick N Save on Highway 100. This is the kind of corny stuff the Bucks were always good at. It's one of the many reasons I love and have always loved this team. 

But this is also a team that has been coming of age during an era of heightened awareness of racial discrimination, spotlighted by the murders of Michael Brown, (remember Ferguson?) George Floyd, Breonna Taylor and others. While bitter people complained that (Black) basketball players were rich beyond their wildest dreams, money (even a shitton of it) doesn't buy you insurance from discrimination. Just ask John Henson what happens when you try to Buy Jewlery While Black. Ask Sterling Brown what happens when you get a Parking Ticket While Black. 

And while many other athletes have protested American white supremacy and its effects (do I really need to say Kaepernick in this context, or Megan Rapinoe?) and now we have to listen to white right-wingers whine about "All Lives Matter" and "Why does everything have to be about race" and other tone deaf manifestations of white privilege, Basketball is the game where a lot of this really comes to a head. 

Because let's face it, basketball is a Black game. It's as Black as Hockey is white. And it's not just that it's dominated by Black players. It's dominated by Black culture.  The music associated with is generally made by Black musicians.  The fashion of basketball swag is Black: hoops players and fans are generally the most stylin' on and off court. Neighborhoods where pick up games regularly happen are Black neighborhoods. In fact, white neighborhoods have fought to keep basketball hoops from going up in playgrounds specifically to keep out Black kids.  Basketball is fundamentally an inexpensive game to play  -- all you need is a ball, and something to use as a hoop (you'll often see old milk crates used as the basket) and a hard surface, so it is indeed popular in urban lower-income neighborhoods which, in the US, tend to be Black neighborhoods as a result of historically race-based redlining, especially in Milwaukee. 

Oh, and Covid. The NBA had already taken steps during last season to squeeze about as much as they could with no fans in the stadium and and fewer games, and the Bucks made the first round of the playoffs.... and then, not far from their home turf, a Black man, Jacob Blake, got shot by Kenosha Police. 

The Bucks players, despite being millionaires, knew that because of the color of their (or their teammates') skin, something like this could have easily happened to them, just like it happened to Trayvon Martin. They knew that they were part of a community that deserved to be protected by the police, instead of from the police. And so, facing likely (massive) fines and public ridicule on a Colin Kaepernick level, they knew they couldn't play with this on their minds. Minutes before a 1st round playoff game, they took a stand. They refused to take the court. And then something happened that brought me to tears and made me proud of this organization, this city, this city's players and fans. 

Rather than punishing them, the Bucks' front office stood behind them

And then the NBA and the Players' Union stood behind them, canceling all the other games scheduled for that, and the next night. 

Shit, across town, the Brewers refused to take the field. And then MLB stood behind them

The Bucks -- and the NBA -- realized that they weren't playing this game in a vacuum and took leadership on this. The Bucks were playing for one of the most segregated cities in the nation, and as much as the Fiserv Forum did its best to boost economic development just south of Milwaukee's Black neighborhoods, more needed to be done. Bucks superstars joined Black Lives Matters protests -- and in some cases, led them. They dumped millions of dollars into Black-based economic development projects and started up foundations to provide seed money to black businesses. 

And of course, there was the whining and complaining from White Wisconsin. "I don't want politics in my sports! I don't want to have to see this racial stuff while I'm trying to enjoy a game!" Well, I bet Black folks would like to forget about "this racial stuff" and just be able to drive down the street without worrying about if that traffic stop means they'll get shot. I bet Black people would love to go shopping in a high-end neighborhood without some security guard following them around. I'm not Black -- so I won't even pretend to understand the numerous microagressions (and macro agressions -- I'd say getting shot for wearing a hoodie was pretty macro). And White Wisconsin's biggest threat?

"I'M NEVER GOING TO WATCH ANOTHER BASKETBALL GAME AGAIN!" 

And you know what the Bucks and the NBA said to that? "OK. This doesn't change what we're doing here." 

Because while I want to believe that the Bucks front office and the NBA really do care about the issues facing 80% of their staff and players, I know they're fundamentally a business. I'll bet my next paycheck they turned to their marketing staff and bean counters and said, "What's this BLM stuff going to cost us?" And when they calculated out their spreadsheets, the answer was either "Small loss, we can live with it" or (more likely) "We will lose big$$ if we don't support our players." I don't have access to their profit and loss statements, but the fact that not only did the Bucks support their players, they doubled down on their support indicates the latter. They encouraged (let) the players put BLM-associated slogans on their jerseys during games. They devoted parts of the All Star game to discussing the issues. Being on the right side of history was a nice side effect. 

And that's White Conservative Wisconsin's biggest fear: that Black lives matter more to the overall culture than white comfort does. Not having the economic and social sway they are used to wielding all these years is pretty hard for them to take. Despite all their bellyaching on Fox News about how we should not even try to hold law enforcement accountable and "keep this racial stuff out of sports," between 20 and 65 thousand people still dealt with the traffic and waiting downtown to cheer on this team.  Despite all the moaning on FB, Giannis jerseys are flying off the shelves and every other corner is a popup tent selling Bucks gear. Despite white threats of ignoring the NBA, all local news lately has been dominated by Bucks stories, kind of rubbing it in that for once in their privileged lives, they're not the market to be kow-towed to. So yeah, I guess the NBA isn't missing those whiners all that much. The boycott isn't working. 

And so, I jumped on my bike Tuesday night (I didn't want to deal with car traffic!), parked it in front of the Cop Shop on Highland, and went by myself to the Deer District, where I quickly made friends with the people I shared one of those cement street block things that I could sit my senior citizen ass on for four hours and still enjoy being part of a mostly peaceful but excited crowd. Like many, I couldn't afford the ticket to be inside, but being the Midwesterner I am, I enjoyed getting to be a part of this excitement for free. (And that was brilliant marketing on the part of the Bucks -- instead of making this a $5K elite ticket for the rich, they made it a big party for the masses to enjoy). I got there early, and as I posted on FB, it felt like I was at Summerfest, staking out a spot and sitting through 3 bands I didn't care about in order to have a good place for the headliner.

My little corner of the Deer District was filled with the most diverse group imaginable -- racially, age-wise, economically. We all joked in line (well, mob) during the 45 minute wait for the portolets to take a whiz. We laughed at the three guys who would enter a portolet at the same time to make the line go a *Little* faster for those of us who accepted we'd be missing the 1st quarter of this game. 


We all told stories to each other about how long we'd been supporting this team. We compared various seasons of Bucks colors (purple! red/green! red/yellow! blue stripe!), and us older folks told the younger ones stories of the old days at the Bradley Center (and even the Mecca Arena). We collectively cheered the free throws that Giannis hit, and we collectively sighed over the missed 3-pointers we all wished they'd stop taking. We chanted Bobby! Bobby! Bobby! when Portis hit his shots. I didn't know any of these people before I got there, and I'll never see them again, and yet we were the best of friends for four hours. I needed this. I needed this collective joy that brought this city together. Heck, Milwaukee needed this. We were all in this together, on an old gravely parking lot, all watching a giant screen TV, and counting the seconds to the buzzer. And here was the moment we all realized it was finally going to happen. Not the final buzzer, but when we saw the score and knew it would take an act of god for the Suns to score 7 points in the time for just two possessions: 


I don't give a crap that a lot of these folks may not have been Bucks -- or even basketball - fans as recently as two months ago. This diverse team (black/white/hispanic, originally dirt poor and some originally middle/upper class, American, European, African, Asian roots) has attracted worldwide attention to themselves as well as Milwaukee. And that's what I really appreciate about this whole Bucks winning this thing altogether.  When we are about inclusion, when we are about diversity, when we support those who have not had the privileges some of us enjoy, we emerge victorious: whether or not the Bucks won Tuesday night, Milwaukee won. Socially, economically, emotionally, Milwaukee needed this experience

But, duh I am glad -- make that overjoyed -- they won. I needed a good happy cry, like the happy cry I got when the Cubs finally did it. I think we all did.  So welcome to the experience. Welcome to History -- on a number of levels, not just sports. 











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