MILWAUKEE, WI (WSAU) — Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett says if Baseball isn’t going to honor former Home Run Champion Hank Aaron in Atlanta, then it only makes sense to bring this year’s Mid-Summer Classic to the city where his career began and ended.
Shortly after MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred announced that the league would move this year’s All-Star Game out of Atlanta in protest of new voting regulations that were just signed into law, Barrett offered up Milwaukee as an alternative.
“As you review alternative sites for the game, I ask you to consider Milwaukee,” Barrett wrote. “It is a particularly appropriate location to honor Hank Aaron, who is a revered and beloved former Milwaukeean. He started and concluded his Major League career with teams here.”
He added that he would fully support baseball’s efforts to move the game, which comes with several other events including the popular Home Run Derby and All-Star Futures Game if they choose his city.
Events to honor the life of Aaron, who died last winter, were planned for this year’s game at Truist Park in Atlanta.
Neither the Brewers nor Major League Baseball have commented on the matter. The city of Minneapolis has also thrown its hat into the ring, and pundits have also offered the brand-new Globe Life Field in Arlington, TX as a possibility after last year’s NLCS and World Series were played there.
Milwaukee hasn’t hosted the All-Star Game since that now-infamous 7-7, 11-inning tie between the American and National Leagues which was cut short after both teams ran out of pitching.
Should the game be awarded to Milwaukee and American Family Field, it would be the first major event to come to Milwaukee since the city was scheduled to host last year’s Democratic National Convention. That event was ultimately scaled back into a virtual event.