Being the hottest team in Major League Baseball this summer didn’t stop the Milwaukee Brewers from getting active in their community.
From playing with children at local parks to hosting an annual charity concert, members of the team have dedicated time to give back to the city the Brewers call home. Many of these player appearances in the community are coordinated with the Brewers Community Foundation, the charitable arm of the Milwaukee Brewers.
“I have not been involved in anything with a player where you didn’t walk away from it realizing that they’re bigger than life,” said Cecelia Gore, executive director of the Brewers Community Foundation.
The foundation, which funds about 200 nonprofits annually, focuses its programs on health, education, recreation and basic needs. It has raised more than $60 million since its inception in 2011, including $4.5 million last year. Some of the BCF’s programs include the popular 50/50 raffle, scholarship opportunities and the 5K & 10K Famous Racing Sausages Run/Walk.
“I think Brewers Community Foundation exemplifies how a professional sports team should be engaged in the community,” Gore said. “We want to be a fabric of the community. I think that we’re serving as a model for the corporate community to be all in and recognize that our citizens deserve whatever we can do to make sure that we are a well-run, high-quality, engaged community that cares about each other.”
Gore says the Brewers are a “100% giving team,” as the players give both their time and money. Beginning during spring training, Gore and Brewers vice president of community relations Katina Shaw sit down with each player to discuss the impact they can have with their brand and resources.
The players are young, Gore said, “so they’re learning that they not only have influence, but they also have resources.”
“They know that, if they can, they want to support important issues,” Gore said. “They recognize that they’re Major League Baseball players, and that they have more than others and they have an opportunity to do something that’s unique.”
When bringing the players out for events in the community, the Brewers consider who might be interested in seeing a player. The players engage with people of all ages, but primarily children “because they’re somebody that young people can look up to,” Gore said.
Many of the players dedicate their time and money to community issues that are personal to them.
“I love all the players,” Gore said. “They really buy into the fact that this is a fantastic community and that they want to give back.”
Christian Yelich
This year’s Christian Yelich Home Plate Charity Concert raised $175,000 for the Brewers Community Foundation, Visit Milwaukee and Live Like Lou, a nonprofit honoring baseball legend Lou Gehrig through its support for ALS research and families affected by ALS.
“BCF does a great job in the community, along with Visit Milwaukee,” Yelich said in an interview on the night of the event, in a video published by MLB. “They’re partners we’ve had in the past. This year, Live Like Lou was important and I think they have a great cause. I think a lot of people either know someone personally or know a friend that has people that have been impacted by ALS. It’s a terrible disease, so to be able to help out a little bit in that area was pretty special this year.”
Yelich and his family hosted the second annual Home Plate Charity Concert on April 17 at the Pabst Theater in Milwaukee. The concert featured the Goo Goo Dolls as the headliner.
“It was just something that came together a few years ago,” Yelich said in the video. “I wanted to do some good in the community.”
Yelich and his family donated $40,000 of the concert’s proceeds to the Visit Milwaukee Foundation. These funds are being used to bolster the foundation’s Emergency Relief Fund – which help businesses in the hospitality sector recover from hardships by providing $500 to $2,000 per business per year – as well as provide scholarships to hospitality students attending Concordia University and Milwaukee Area Technical College.
Because of this year’s charity concert proceeds, the Visit Milwaukee Foundation will be expanding its scholarship program to include students attending the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee and Marquette University, said Visit Milwaukee chief marketing officer Joshua Albrecht.
Albrecht has worked closely with Yelich and his family to put on the event, as Visit Milwaukee is a key partner in organizing the charity concert. Yelich and his family “truly have the community in their hearts and want to benefit the community in a variety of ways,” Albrecht said.
“It means a great deal and that they’re valuing the small business community,” Albrecht said. “They’re valuing the hospitality industry in our region.”
Style Pop Café and Oscar’s Frozen Custard were the recipients of emergency relief funding from the Visit Milwaukee Foundation this year. In June, Yelich, along with Visit Milwaukee, showed up at the two businesses to surprise them with checks from the fund. Yelich spoke with the owners and listened to their stories.
“Having Christian go to their businesses that day and see them – their faces lighten up, tears in their eyes,” Albrecht said. “Being seen in their time of need was really special.”
Sal Frelick
It was a bright summer day at Merrill Park on Milwaukee’s near west side. Children crowded Milwaukee Brewers right fielder Sal Frelick, who crouched down to sign a young boy’s shoe.
Once the shoe was inked, the boy ran off toward a group of children playing nearby.
“He signed my shoe!” the boy shouted.
Frelick signed shoes, hats, shirts and baseball cards that day for local children, who had gathered to receive a free meal and partake in some outdoor fun as part of Summer Sizzle – an event put on in partnership with Hunger Task Force, Sargento, the Brewers and Centers for Independence on Aug. 14.
Frelick also handed out popsicles, played parachute games with the children, and gave and received a variety of temporary tattoos at the Brewers Community Foundation’s face painting table.
Frelick said community involvement means “everything” to him.
“It’s such an important part of my job, and it’s not even a job to me,” Frelick said. “This is fun to me to come out and do this. I want to do this, I have fun doing it. I always tell (the Brewers), the more stuff I can do the better. Seeing the smiles on the kids’ faces just means the world to me.”
Growing up in Boston, Frelick saw athletes out at events in his city. Now that he’s in that same position as a professional athlete in Milwaukee, he enjoys being able to provide that experience for local children, he said.
“I was fortunate enough to come out last year and do this,” Frelick said. “Had an absolute blast then and made sure I was able to come back out this year.”
The Summer Sizzle event aims to provide free meals to children at a time of peak childhood hunger, as many kids lose access to school meal programs during the summer, said Jonathan Hansen, chief strategy officer at Hunger Task Force.
“I always say that time is actually more precious than anything because you can’t give it back, and you can choose where you spend your time,” said Portia Young, director of corporate public relations at Sargento. “For Sal to choose to be here with us, with Sargento on this day, to give back, that’s really meaningful.”
But participating in the Summer Sizzle event is only one of many ways Frelick has dedicated his time to get involved in the community this season. Throughout the summer, Frelick has made many appearances at nonprofit events as part of the Brewers “Beyond the Diamond” initiative, including visits to Ronald McDonald House Charities, Boys & Girls Clubs of Greater Milwaukee and others.
“He has just been somebody who has said from the beginning, ‘I’d like to do something every month,’” Gore said.
Frelick has also been shining a spotlight on Best Buddies.
In high school, Frelick was involved with Best Buddies, an international nonprofit that offers one-to-one friendship, integrated employment and leadership development programs for individuals with disabilities as well as those without. Frelick participated in the Best Buddies friendship program, which pairs a student with a disability to a student who does not have a disability.
Last year, Frelick reached out to Best Buddies Wisconsin through Instagram to see how he could get involved locally.
“Of course, we’re gonna jump at that chance to partner with him,” said Caroline Tyson, director of development of Best Buddies Wisconsin.
When spring training rolled around this year, Tyson reached out to the Brewers with a list of events and asked if Frelick would be interested in joining any of them. He came to all of them, including the Best Buddies Friendship Walk on May 3 in Oconomowoc. It was a game day, so his time was limited.
“He came out in the morning and spent as much time as he could with us,” Tyson said. “We thought maybe it would be an hour and he stayed well beyond that. He’s the one who said, ‘I can stay longer. Don’t worry about the time.’ He’s incredibly generous with his time and has a huge heart for the population that we serve.”
At the Friendship Walk, Frelick also met Mackenzie Edinger, owner of Inclusion Coffee Company in Hartland. Inclusion’s mission is to hire individuals with disabilities.
Edinger asked if Frelick could come out to the parking lot during Inclusion’s annual tailgate at American Family Field. He offered to come by the shop instead.
Frelick visited Inclusion for a meet-and-greet with staff and guests on June 7. They promoted the event ahead of time to get the word out in the community, so by the time Inclusion opened at 7 a.m., people were already lined up to meet Frelick.
When Frelick arrived, he went inside to meet the Inclusion staff first.
“He took the time to talk to all of them and have conversations,” Edinger said. “They all had a story for him, so he just sat there and listened to all of them talk.”
By the time he moved outside for the meet-and-greet event, the line wrapped around the building and parking lot. Tyson, who also attended the event with an information table about Best Buddies Wisconsin, thought Frelick would never make it through the whole line before having to leave for another game.
But he stayed and took pictures with everyone. He “stopped everything” to walk over and chat with an elderly woman who parked in an accessible parking spot to see him but didn’t want to get out of her car, Tyson said.
“He takes time out for anyone,” Tyson said. “And that’s really what Best Buddies is all about. It’s about friendship. It’s about acknowledging those around you. It’s about being a friend, and it’s about being kind. Sal just embodies all of those things and we’re happy to have him involved.”
Freddy Peralta
In recent years, Freddy Peralta has rallied his Latino teammates to help pool funding for scholarships supporting local students.
The Brewers Community Foundation has a longstanding history of funding scholarships for students in Milwaukee, including an existing scholarship program in partnership with LULAC and Milwaukee Area Technical College Foundation to support Latino students attending MATC. Since its inception in 2014, the program has supported more than 272 students, according to a news release.
Last year, the program awarded scholarships to 65 Latino students attending MATC. The scholarships ranged from $250 to $1,000 each. Peralta, who has worked to support this program, attended the ceremony honoring the scholarship recipients in September last year.
“It’s a pleasure for me to be here, to be a part of this,” Peralta said last year, according to a CBS 58 broadcast of the event. “It’s just giving something to the city that’s been supporting me for seven years, and I’m going to keep doing it.”
Trevor Megill
Trevor Megill and his wife, Katie Wayland Megill, hosted the Brewers Pawgeant benefitting the Wisconsin Humane Society last September.
As part of the event, community members who signed up brought their dogs down to home plate at Helfaer Field to be judged based on a trick, pose or costume. Megill, Yelich and Joey Ortiz served as judges for the event, which raised over $5,000 for the Humane Society.
“These guys (Megill, Yelich and Ortiz) are big deals, and to be able to do things like this and truly enjoy it and have smiles on their face, it really means a lot,” said Billy Zakrzewski, associate director of corporate philanthropy at Wisconsin Humane Society.
It was Wayland Megill’s idea to put on the pawgeant, Zakrzewski said. She brought the idea to the Brewers, who then reached out to WHS to coordinate the event.
The pawgeant also helped to raise awareness for homeless and adoptable animals, Zakrzewski said.
“This time of year is our highest population time, so when we can spread the word and we have people who have a large following like that, who are willing to use their platform for good, it’s really going to be helpful to get many more eyes,” Zakrzewski said.
Quinn Priester
Brewers starting pitcher Quinn Priester had sweat dripping down the back of his neck by the time he was done playing with children at Aurora Health Care’s 84South health center in Greenfield.
On Aug. 12, Priester surprised 10 children who were patients within the clinic’s pediatric rehab department to receive physical, speech or occupational therapy. Aside from signing hats and baseballs, he also played catch with the children and pitched some balls for them to hit.
“He was so into it,” said Jena Weber, a physical therapist at Aurora Health Care. “By the end, the kids were giggling because he was sweating so hard. They’re like, ‘He was working hard with us!’”
Throughout the hour Priester spent with the children, he shared the message that anything is possible if they set their mind to it and encouraged them to try again if they did not succeed, Weber said.
When the kids successfully threw or caught a ball from Priester, “they felt like they were participating at a level that they otherwise wouldn’t participate at,” Weber said. Many of the children have limits on what they can participate in recreationally because of their physical abilities.
“Having Quinn meet them where they were at to participate in what he had planned for the day was really awesome to see,” Weber said. “The kids got really excited if they hit the ball over his head, and they got excited if (mascot) Bernie (Brewer) caught the ball. It was just a really positive environment to be in. A lot of the parents had a lot of really nice things to say. They were just grateful that their kids got the opportunity to do something so special.”
Jacob Misiorowski
Pitcher Jacob Misiorowski has recently partnered with Wisconsin Parkinson Association to raise awareness and donations for individuals affected by Parkinson’s disease.
Misiorowski’s father, Tom, was diagnosed with Parkinson’s in 2014.
“This is a cause that’s obviously very important and deeply personal to me,” Misiorowski said in a WPA news release. “I’m hopeful that through this partnership we’ll be able to raise awareness and help families dealing with this horrible disease.”
Misiorowski’s baseball cleats honoring his father’s battle with Parkinson’s caught WPA’s attention, said executive director Kelly Cieslak. In response, the organization reached out to see if Misiorowski was willing to be a partner.
WPA announced the partnership in August and plans to get him scheduled for future events. The partnership is still evolving, Cieslak said.
“Jacob’s passion for this cause is as powerful as his arm,” Cieslak said. “He understands the toll Parkinson’s can take on a family, and he’s stepping up to help others walking the same path. His support will help raise awareness for Parkinson’s, amplify our mission, and expand our reach throughout the state of Wisconsin and beyond.”
