Jim Powell, one half of the Brewers radio broadcast team, enters his seventh season this spring calling Milwaukee games. Widely regarded as one of the best pairs in the industry, Powell works alongside the venerable Bob Uecker -- which can be a tough act to follow. But Powell does his job with elegance and grace, and his contemplative style has engendered him to fans all across the Brewers listening area.
But Powell is more than just a baseball guy. He's also the father of three little girls, a fantasy football nut and active on the board of the Child Abuse Prevention Fund. We caught up with Powell this spring at Maryvale Baseball Park in Phoenix, Ariz., in what's now becoming an annual OnMilwaukee.com tradition. Here's what he had to say:
OMC: You must have had a pretty interesting offseason. There was some talk about you moving over to TV with the departure of Matt Vasgersian to San Diego.
JP: The Brewers have talked to me for quite a while, actually, about the possibility of moving over to the TV side. I've always told them I'll listen. I'm a team player, and I'll listen if I'm better suited to a different role, but I'm very happy where I am. I have the best partner in the big leagues in Bob Uecker. And as long as I'm working up here, which is hopefully quite a while, I'll never get a chance to work with another Bob Uecker. I'm certainly not anxious to change my situation in any way. I did, as promised, talk to them. We had discussions, but I felt I wanted to stay where I was, and in the end, I think I convinced the Brewers of the same thing.
OMC: On radio, you can certainly get more narrative and descriptive. Do you think your style is more suited to radio than to TV?
JP: I don't know. I don't know that I have a set style that I couldn't change from one place to another. I've tried to analyze what my job is and my role is, then try to have my style conform to that and do the best job in the role that I'm in. If I switched to TV, I'd have a different approach.
OMC: This will be your seventh season. I'm not sure how long Pat Hughes was around, but you're closing in on a record for longevity with Uecke.
JP: He was here for 11, so I still have a way to go to catch him.
OMC: Outside of getting ready for baseball, what else did you do this off season?
JP: I honed my video game football skills. I improved my tennis skills. On a serious note, I had a great time with my family and my kids. Only one is getting on a school bus already. I know from talking to other parents that these early years go by very quickly. So I'm really to try enjoying them, and I'm blessed with a wonderful wife and three beautiful little girls. I love my job -- I have the best job in the world, and I would never complain about it. But it's tough when I'm in the off season, home with Allie, Julia and Sabrina and my wife, Emmy, then I have to go cold turkey in Spring Training.
OMC: I hear you're somewhat of a fantasy football guru.
JP: Guru might be a strong word. I don't take it very seriously, I just win every year. There is a difference! I love the NFL, and I've done a fair amount of football work in the past, in the college variety. I probably could get football work in the offseason, but then I'd have to give up my Sundays on the couch. I've got the satellite dish and the whole package going. That's my hobby, watching football. I like to have a sport where I can just be a fan and not have to work it. Because there is a difference.
OMC: You're also involved in the CAP Fund with your wife, right?
JP: We've been involved in the Safe At Home picnic for a number of years. The CAP Fund asked if we'd be on the board of directors and we were, of course, honored, and we accepted. This year we are going to be the "celebrity" co-chairs of the picnic. And of course I'm involved with you, Andy, in the Mustaches For Milwaukee program.
OMC: And it looks very good, by the way.
JP: You are a shameless liar. I look like a complete twerp, but that's OK, because we're raising money for the kids.
OMC: Back to baseball, what are your thoughts about all this contraction talk?
JP: I have never thought that contraction would actually take place. That's not to say that it's not considered by some of the owners to be a viable option. I think if a number of things happen in succession, then maybe contraction could happen. But I still think it's very unlikely. Major League Baseball doesn't really have a great alternative market to dangle to the other cities like it used to. All you're left with now is Charlotte and maybe the Washington, DC market. Owners have run out of leverage for building a new stadium, so contraction has become that leverage. If the Twins can get a new stadium built, then I think they'll move the Expos to Washington, and talk of contraction will disappear.
OMC: What about this rumor of players boycotting the All Star Game?
JP: That's complete malarkey. Total garbage. Here's what happened. It's Spring Training and all these writers who have had nothing to write about all winter had to get out and justify their existence. And I'm not saying they invented the story. Some guy in the clubhouse may have said, 'We don't like Bud. We're gonna stick it to him and boycott the All Star Game.' Next thing you know it's a front-page story, and it's in all the papers around the country because they don't have anything to print, either. They've given way too much credit to this theory, but there's no way they'll do it. For one thing, the money generated from the All Star Game goes into the players' pension fund. Do they really think that if they boycotted the game in Milwaukee that they wouldn't just put it in Milwaukee next year? It makes no sense. No chance it will happen.
OMC: Do you see anything you like in the Brewers this spring?
JP: I like the young pitching. This team will go as far as its young arms take it. Neugebauer is getting healthy and has a ceiling as high as anyone in the game. His minor league profile is identical to Kerry Wood. He has a chance to be a perennial 20 game winner. But he's just a kid, just a rookie. Ben Sheets is coming back for his second year. He needs to learn how to stay healthy and make all his starts. Ruben Quevedo I like, too. His stuff isn't as obvious, but he knows how to pitch. That's three young starters to build a staff around. Glendon Rusch is the obligatory left hander.
OMC: Were Dean Taylor's offseason trades good ones?
JP: It remains to be seen. People make snap judgements about trades. In my position, I've found that it's much wiser to sit back and watch the guys play. The Brewers needed a left-hander and had to pay a premium. I think Ochoa will be a help. He's built for Miller Park. So let's give it a few years and have this discussion in year five of this serial of interviews we're working on.
Andy is the president, publisher and founder of OnMilwaukee. He returned to Milwaukee in 1996 after living on the East Coast for nine years, where he wrote for The Dallas Morning News Washington Bureau and worked in the White House Office of Communications. He was also Associate Editor of The GW Hatchet, his college newspaper at The George Washington University.
Before launching OnMilwaukee.com in 1998 at age 23, he worked in public relations for two Milwaukee firms, most of the time daydreaming about starting his own publication.
Hobbies include running when he finds the time, fixing the rust on his '75 MGB, mowing the lawn at his cottage in the Northwoods, and making an annual pilgrimage to Phoenix for Brewers Spring Training.
