Mark Attanasio Brewers Workout Day Soak In
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NL Division Series: Rockies vs Brewers Thursday, October 4, 2018 Mark Attanasio Brewers Workout Day soak in. You never forget the birth of your first child. Q. We kind of talked to you a little bit last week And David Stearns seems -- I hear Whitney is doing about the progress at that point, but to be here great, which is important, obviously, and David Stearns again today in the postseason, just how fulfilling is seems really happy. it for you as an owner? MARK ATTANASIO: It's immensely fulfilling. My main I will say only David Stearns could figure out how to get challenge is to actually embrace it and enjoy it because a team back to the playoffs in two years and then have this morning I was speaking with my wife Debbie, and I a baby come right in between clinching a division spot said, well, I think I'm two-thirds excitement, one-third and the first game. Congratulations to the Stearns anxiety, and it's already moved to 50/50 anxiety and family. excitement as I got to the ballpark here. Q. I'm wondering in the years that you've been I think what I remember from 2011 is more as you get here, what did you know about Milwaukee when through these games, like a relief at the end of the you first bought the team and how has the city game if you prevail rather than elation, until you grown on you? actually win the series, that is. MARK ATTANASIO: Well, I knew a little bit because my younger brother Robert married into a family, the Stein Q. How do you feel about playing the Rockies family here. They own Stein's House and Gardens. rather than the Cubs? But I got a much more intimate view once I bought the MARK ATTANASIO: You know, we all -- it's interesting, team. a number -- whether you're thinking of Craig Counsell or David Stearns, Matt Arnold, coaches, players, we all The biggest surprise to me was how welcoming kind of came at it the same way. We were always sort everyone was, not that Milwaukeeans are known for of rooting for actually a 20-inning game the other night. that, but having grown up in the Bronx in New York and then living in Los Angeles, I'm not used to that type of We know the Cubs really well. We also know they warm welcome, whether it was -- I've said it often; once have the heart of a champion, having been champions. a guy literally got off a sanitation truck and came Neither we nor the Rockies have been. We knew we'd running to me and said, hello, sir, welcome to have a little more of a home field crowd here with the Milwaukee. And he took his glove off, too. Everyone Rockies, so that is feeling good. Mostly we just was always very welcoming here. My family and I, it's watched and waited. been 14 seasons now, have just really felt part of the fabric of the community. Q. Your GM got distracted last night I hear in the maternity ward. You've always talked about how he Look, it just gets better and better. This community can do multitasking. Now he's really being has supported this team over, I've said this in a number challenged. of interviews, more than two and a half million fans 11 Tell us about what you've said to him and what he's out of 12 seasons. So the fact that we have over 2.8 said to you just about having a baby right at this million fans this year is great, but even when we're time, and if you told him anything about planned challenged, the people come out. parenthood failure? Our TV ratings this weekend were something like 12.8, MARK ATTANASIO: I'm just going to make sure I have 13.8, crazy numbers for the last game against the the right birth weights and things here. So most of our Tigers. It was the Sunday game, which is otherwise a texts have been about the baby. Nora Ann Stearns, 7 Packers Sunday. People were watching the Brewers. pounds, 5 ounces, 20 inches. Everyone is doing well We like that. today, as well. They did well yesterday and today. And the sponsors, as well, we have a good group of You know, as we try to do here with the playoffs, I 135 sponsors. The whole community really surrounds advised him to embrace the moment and really have it this team. It's part of the fabric of the Milwaukee Rev #1 by #166 at 2018-10-04 18:26:00 GMT page 1 of 4 summer, and we're delighted it's now going to be part around. of the fabric of the Milwaukee fall, Wisconsin fall. You know what was interesting to me was the skill set Q. Kind of building off that, when you took over to add -- the very first add was Junior Guerra, was a this team in 2005 I think it was, something like that, Rule 5 add, really you find a diamond in the rough, and things had not been very great for the Brewers for he's found a bunch of those. So we saw he had that a while, the Packers were kind of at the pinnacle. skill set. We wouldn't know he'd have the skill set to Just the way the perception of the franchise and make a bold trade like he did for Christian Yelich at the the team has kind of changed, not just locally, but same time he made a bold free agent signing. That also around the game in the time that you've had was our largest free agent signing ever. control here. MARK ATTANASIO: Well, we had -- the team had To get Lorenzo Cain and do them on the same day, something like 11 or 12 losing seasons, and that -- it $150 million of commitments, that was bold, especially had been 20 some odd seasons without playoffs. So when everyone thought we should be adding a starting even when we got to 500 the first year, sort of the pitcher or two or three. thought was, well, but you're still not winning. And so he's shown an ability to execute and manage at That's why Doug Melvin helped get a very high level. Some guys are good at building teams, but not getting to winning. Some guys can CC Sabathia here in 2008. It was a huge -- that was manage winning teams, but he's shown the ability to do really the seminal turn for this franchise. He brought a both. Having the most wins in the National League this complete winning attitude, which everybody saw. He year is an absolutely extraordinary accomplishment. still -- obviously he's a Yankee, a New Yorker, but he's Nobody would have said that. still very fond of his time here, and we talk about that. If David and I were to announce here three years ago, So I think that was a shift. And then that group of we said, our goal is to have the most wins in the players, that entire group of players, we still have one National League in three years, we'd have had of them in Ryan Braun, but Prince Fielder and Corey probably the same reaction I had when I said my goal Hart and the whole group of guys who grew up was to win here. And so I think that David and Craig, together. We had the terrific 80's teams into the early they really get the credit for all of this. 90's with that terrific team, and now we have a third terrific team to embrace, and that's really fun. I will say I did two smart things. I hired Craig Counsell as a manager and I hired David Stearns as a general Q. You said David Stearns got this team back to the manager. Those were two pretty good moves. All the playoffs in two years, and I'm wondering because rest is their doing. David Stearns will never put timelines on anything, he's not calling it a rebuild, anything like that, but Q. Many of your colleagues in ownership, how do you view it in terms of where he inherited particularly in smaller markets, have embraced the this team and the moves he made to where it is concept of some people call it tanking, some call it now? rebuilding, but giving up a few years to get better MARK ATTANASIO: Well, you know, it started -- Doug down the road. You've been more resistant toward Melvin did an exceptional job of literally -- any number that. Why is that? of contracts that we would have addressed were pretty MARK ATTANASIO: Well, you know, a lot of my much moved, bringing in -- I believe we got Corey mentoring in the sports frankly came from Doug Knebel, Zach Davies and Josh Hader in trades that Melvin. The reason I'm so fond of Doug is -- you know, Doug made, three critical pieces to our team. I thought I knew a lot about baseball before I bought the team, and when I bought the team, I found out how And as written, David Stearns has really taken the best little I knew about baseball. And we would talk a lot -- we kept virtually all the key baseball people in about how hard it is to win and how hard it is to get Doug's group in some role for us and then filled in back.