MILWAUKEE -- There were 20,500 baseballs, 1,000 bats, 200 batting helmets, 60 cases of sunflower seeds and 20 cases of bubble gum.
Oh, and one vintage bullpen cart.
Those items and more were packed into a semi-truck on Tuesday and sent out on the road toward American Family Fields of Phoenix, where Brewers pitchers and catchers report Feb. 12 for the formal start of Spring Training. For the optimists out there, Truck Day marks an unofficial end to winter in Milwaukee.
“This is always a ritual that we enjoy,” said Brewers president of business operations Rick Schlesinger.
The truck is scheduled to arrive Saturday. Much of the Brewers’ other equipment was sent earlier, in time for broadcaster Bill Schroeder’s annual fantasy camp. A team led by former Brewers Corey Hart and J.J. Hardy was camp champion.
Once the current Brewers arrive, it will take some time for them to get to know each other. Milwaukee underwent a relatively major overhaul over the offseason, trading with the Mariners for catcher Omar Narváez and with the Padres for pitcher Eric Lauer and infielder Luis Urías, and signing nine Major League free agents to help offset notable departures like 2019 All-Stars Yasmani Grandal and Mike Moustakas.
“There’s a lot of new faces,” Schlesinger said. “One of the things David Stearns and our baseball operations people have made clear is there’s always going to be change. Obviously, we lost some very talented players, but we have acquired some young players we have high hopes for. We’ll see what it looks like when we play games. We’re pretty excited. The division is going to be tough; there’s a lot of good teams in our division, and I think it’s going to go down, again, to who plays the best baseball in September.”
The next notable date at Miller Park is Saturday, Feb. 15, when single-game tickets go on sale at 9 a.m. CT. In addition to offering online sales at Brewers.com, the Brewers will once again host their Arctic Tailgate at the ballpark.