Steinmiller interview at Onmilwaukee.com

[Todd_Day]

VP John Steinmiller speaks with Onmilwaukee.com today.

http://onmilwaukee.com/sports/articles/ ... talks.html

I think the "Live and die" core Bucks RealGMers should pop by, read it, and then leave some choice comments on how we feel about the Kohl Cronies of Jim Grayson, Ron Walter, Steinmiller, braintrust that has us on a speeding train to irrelevancy.

God bless them for maintaining a team here, it's not an easy job. I commend the herculean effort it must be at most times. BUT it is clearly evident that this principal group rolling over and conceding to and feeding Kohl's micro-managing and intrusive damage to a Bucks franchise has resulted in the team seeing the 2nd round or beyond a couple of times in 20 years.

Get some damn Basketball people in charge and step back and watch the money roll in and the glory return to Milwaukee.

Time for "old money" and "old mentality" to leave. It's 2008. The NBA is big business and big image that can work tenfold in Milwaukee, and Steinmiller, Walter, and Grayson, and others under Kohl are in way over their heads.

Example:

Such a damn shame that something like "Sidney Moncrief Night" was thrown together at the last second with no advance press or PR or real pomp and circumstance to honor one of the true hearts and souls of the Bucks.
I live on this board and eat up Bucks and I found out about it like 3 days before it was going down. No bobblehead, no nothing. Just some weak half time, whipped together piece of crap.

That's enough example of their rushed, unprepared, slap it together, cheap jack product , not thought out, approach and process that should have those guys launched out of Milwaukee forever.

[75totheMACCfund]

Let me reassure you that Jim Grayson and John Steinmiller are not some of Kohl's Cronies.

[Todd_Day]

That may be true 75tothe.......but then why don't they rock the boat and get it done! I understand there may be insubordination and firings, and they just want to hang onto a cushy NBA gig and are willing to ride along the Kohl Hindenberg down there.

I know you have ties to the MACC fund and your family etc. ( I think I know your bro in Berkley) and may have some more insight than most here at RealGM on back room dealings and front office culture but I feel everyone is accountable.

What do they want to be remembered for? Having a gig that was great but got the team run out of town and reducing it to a Milwaukee Wave, Milwaukee Mustang level of visibility and marketability in this city for pro sports???

No one even cares if they left at this point for the casual fan dollar and beyond and that's on them big time winning or losing.

Cuban took the laughable Mavs all the way up and made them the class of the NBA on brand levels, revenue levels, and visibility within Dallas (A Cowboys town 100%!) and made the Mavs the big ticket.

These guys are not capable of that to help save this team and that goes hand in hand with helping engineer a good team on teh floor and positive mindset and goal of a winning culture inside teh organization.

It's complacent and they all concede to losing and accept it.

They're (as mentioned) partly and heavily to blame for that mentality and accepted culture of BS, medicore market presence, and Kohl generated losing.

I am an optimist 90% of the time and a Bucks fan through and through, but these guys have me mega-p__sed to see what's become of the team I live and die for.

[75totheMACCfund]

Small world...Yea, my brother John Cary Jr. got his masters at Berkeley and now he lives in the Berkeley Hills but he and his wife are moving to Rome in a few days.

When Harris gets fired, I think you'll see a front office shake up...I'm pretty certain a few front office folks will follow Harris to a new team and set up shop there.

I know it's easy to sit there and wish they'd shake it up, but it's tough to get a grasp on how much power Walter, and obviously Kohl, really hold. A guy like John Steinmiller who has been there for 38 years doesn't want to get up and move to a new city in his late fifties/early sixties. This is the NBA...it's' not like a sales job where you can leave an office in Brookfield and join a similar company in Mequon.

I'm sure there are a lot of disgruntled folks in that office. I'm sure the whole front office wishes they were winning. Getting sponsorship and selling tickets would be a lot easier with a winning product on the floor.

[Todd_Day]

The inability and locked in nature of where Steinmiller sits is part of my rant. It's all hand-cuffed. I get he's probably close to retiring in 5 years (In Steinmiller's defense, he's One of the hardest working guys in all of pro sports, mostly overextended, but a hardcore dude.)

It's just the lame duck ride it out nature of the spot Steinmiller is in is tough and part of the problem. All is neutered and tied up in Bucks office. They sell that team like Kohl sold strawberries for 78 cents at Kohl's back in the day!
They're lame-brained horrible newspaper ads and the fact they put the phone number on TV commercials! It's laughable. Very old school mode of thinking and how to sell an image.
This team could win 11 games and you could find a way to make the Bucks more relevant to the market as a brand than they are now.

All in all, team needs to be sold to a real group who cares, and wants to get a new building going and make a small market NBA team into a 500 Mill asset.
It can be done.

and guys out the door hanging onto 401K points, and a (Please Use More Appropriate Word) lawyer, and yes men aren't going to do it.

You're bro is a champ of a person, one of the smartest guys I've ever met. A friend of my wife's from Freddy's custard back in the day. I was just in Berkley in 04 and had breakfast with them before I left town from Frisco. Just great great people.
Rome??? We'll have to touch base.

[MickeyDavis]

Let me reassure you that Jim Grayson and John Steinmiller are not some of Kohl's Cronies.

They sure are. Maybe not to the extent of RW but they are definitely in the inner circle. Grayson is useless.

[75totheMACCfund]

I loved Freddy's...FAM can vouch for the delicousness of their burgers and custard.

I wonder if I knew your wife...There was a slight propensity on my brother's behalf to date girls he worked with. If you're married to sexy lexy...I applaud you.

But I understand where you're coming from. The way they market the team and sell the product to their fans. Perhaps that's one of the reasons their PR Director left for Portland, which is obviously a great job now after landing Oden and playing so well, but she also had ties to that organization and the city. The new PR director is a younger guy in his thirties who is a really smart guy and should hopefully inject some new ideas into the organization.

My dad has sat in on production meetings at WTMJ 4 and the top two things "Wisconsinites" want to hear about during the news broadcasts as have been found through surveying the targeted audiences are the packers and the weather. No one in Milwaukee really cares about the Bucks, probably a lot to do with the fact that the organization isn't selling the product in a great way, they are mediocre, and they seem to blow up the team every year.

Kohl is getting old (72), he's up for reelection in I think 2012, so we're probably looking at his ownership through close to 2012. There are a couple of millionaires and billionaires in Wisconsin that will hopefully buy the team and turn it around, get a new arena, and keep the team in Milwaukee.

[Todd_Day]

It's ridiculous, any mindset can be won over (Like my Dallas example)

The Bucks were the ticket in the 80's and the Packers were a huge joke. Winning helps, I am not looking past that, but they have buried the popularity of this team and NBA entity locally from the inside out.

Milwaukee doesn't even care and it's the Bucks front office own damn fault.

[jerrod]

it must be nice to be a fan of one of those teams that don't get disgusted when they talk about their front office

[75totheMACCfund]

-= original quote snipped =-



They sure are. Maybe not to the extent of RW but they are definitely in the inner circle. Grayson is useless.

how so?

[MickeyDavis]

I've worked a lot with the sales office over the years. Grayson doesn't wipe his butt without Steiny approval. Trattner is more on the ball.

[75totheMACCfund]

Well Steinmiller is a Vice President and heads up all Business Operations...would you make a move as the director of sales at your job without running it past the head of business ops?

[MickeyDavis]

He runs EVERYTHING through Steiny. A Director of Sales should be able to make at least a few decisions or why even have that position?

[xTitan]

Steimiller must be tight with Kohl, I heard he dropped the ball in a major way this past offseason and may have cost the Bucks $$millions in promotions.

[GrandAdmiralDan]

Let me reassure you that Jim Grayson and John Steinmiller are not some of Kohl's Cronies.

-= original quote snipped =-



They sure are. Maybe not to the extent of RW but they are definitely in the inner circle. Grayson is useless.

What Todd Day said about Steinmiller in his prior posts is really a good synopsis of the situation/problem. Steinmiller is a great worker and has put in lots of time, sweat, and effort into this franchise, and done many positive things, and I realize 75totheMACCfund has a personal affinity for him, but he can't be let off the hook that easy.

On the one hand, it is not his fault that Kohl demands his opinion and input on basketball operations stuff that Steinmiller has no business being involved in and from what I hear would prefer not be involved in, from a practicality standpoint, but he continues to participate in that flawed process that Kohl uses and therefore continues to contribute to the problem of us not allowing whoever happens to be GM to operate properly and effectively.

He runs EVERYTHING through Steiny. A Director of Sales should be able to make at least a few decisions or why even have that position?

Symptomatic of much of the organization under Kohl. No one really does the job their supposed to, it gets done by the person/people above them.

I can't speak first hand on Jim Grayson or the sales office, but it sounds like MD has had enough experience on that end that I'll base my opinion on Grayson on what MD and others like Todd_Day say.

I still say that ultimately little probably matters as long as Kohl continues to own the team, but in the meantime I still think it would be worth a shot to clean out the top three guys of Walter, Steinmiller, and Burr.
If Grayson should be thrown out too, fine. If a prerequisite to that kind of housecleaning means that Larry Harris, Dave Babcock, Larry K, whoever else need to get thrown under the bus to appease the more casual fans (especially the two Larrys) I am absolutely on board with that. Do it now. ASAP.



Anyway, interesting article, TD. Thanks for posting it.

[MickeyDavis]

I have nothing against Steiny or Grayson personally, it's just the way things are run around there it's a joke. And the joke starts at the top.

[Todd_Day]

I concur with Mickey D, and thanks GAD. It's a small bit that brings to light the disfunctionality that is apparent in the organization.

It's nothing personal. But being out there and mixing it up on behalf of a pro sports team kind of makes it a public entity and there is always a bit of emotional ownership of the heart for fans of a team. Sitting in the chairs that the guys we are throwing heat at is in the same realm of the accountability of a Mayor, or broad scale politician.

A president may bust his hump and be a good guy and all but results, accountability, and follow through (especially in light of all of the 07-08 preseason lip service from everyone.) is all that matters.

It's nothing personal on any of these guys. This team and organization is a complete mess from top to bottom and they happen to sit in those roles and it's on their watch. So it's their problem, and they're responsible.
The fact that they are in a spot where they may have roots here and feel entitled at this point not to leave MKE and join another sports entity to get away from Kohl's misguided iron fist is another indication of complacency.
It seems like they're comfy here in cushy Milwaukee in a prestige job , really under a gun to where they can't operate at a high level, but sit back and take Kohl's crap because they're too comfortable and don't want to let go of the silver NBA spoon they've been gifted.

If the current Bucks front office turned over due to sale of being dissolved, It's not like other NBA teams would be beating down the door of any Milwaukee personnel down there based on the crappy work and output they all produce that Kohl has predetermined in his culture and micro managed mess.

Can you imagine the Grizzlies calling up Ron Walter to run things in some capacity?

[DH34Phan]

I wonder if I knew your wife...There was a slight propensity on my brother's behalf to date girls he worked with. If you're married to sexy lexy...I applaud you.

This needs to be answered. Are you married to Sexy Lexy or not??

[Todd_Day]

I'm starting to view Kohl's shield of politics as a major cop-out. His passive aggressive zero public visibility and then behind closed doors hands on strong arming is crazy. The free pass of keeping the team there, which is viewed as a big pro-Kohl aspect, has run out years ago.

This is one of his jobs and he needs to address fans and step up and be a face for this team, Washington D.C. or not.

The strong confident man of the people fighting for us as "our" Senator needs to show up and back up in the Bucks-world the supposed platform he stands on in the political-world.

Public address Mr Senator???

We're waiting.

[Todd_Day]

hahahha, I mentioned Lexy to my wife and she had a good laugh. No Lexy here, but she was aware of her.

From my understanding and from where I sit, I think I'm doing pretty alright with Mrs. Todd_day.