They are a marriage made in heaven, complete with the fights, the make-ups and the constant support. From the hurled bottle that catalyzed the Ron Artest Melee to the sprayed suds after a victorious season and every heady brew gulped in between, beer and sports belong together, for better or worse.
And while some might use drinking beer as an excuse to watch sports, and others might use watching sports as an excuse to drink beer, either way, the two remain inseparable. But does this pair coupled in holy matrimony have a how-they-met story?
It begins-as it tends to with predestined lovers-in the warm spring months that fold into summer. The year was 1870, and a new fad called “baseball” was taking its baby steps. The promoters of the sport had a captive audience-but for how long? They needed to tie them down. They needed some sort of refreshment. Then it hit them: men like baseball, and men like beer!
Soon enough Burke’s Beer had an ad featuring ballplayers Cap Anson and Buck Ewing swigging down a couple of cold ones. And so it began.
In 1881, the two lovebirds faced their first problem child-society. The baseball higher-ups were getting complaints over the rowdiness that inebriated spectators unleashed in after games. As a result, the National League outlawed ballpark beer sales.
But this bump in the road was no match for the wit and determination of Pittsburgh’s manager, Denny McKnight. He could not bear to watch his beloved baseball without its faithful companion, alcohol. This led him to organize a rival league, which he founded the very next year: the American Association. Known as the “Beer and Whiskey League,” the A.A. (no pun intended) allowed the sale of alcohol in its stadiums.
While the league folded in 1891, the A.A. paved the way for brewers to create their own teams. Thanks to the support of beer-loving baseball watchers, teams sprung up in Baltimore, Cincinnati and St. Louis, as brewers built ballparks so they could better promote their beer saloons.
Beer and sports even survived prohibition, and today you can watch the Milwaukee Brewers at Miller Park, or the St. Louis Cardinals at Busch Stadium, or the Colorado Rockies at Coors Field. While Toronto’s domed enclave, the Rogers Centre, doesn’t have the same name-brewing zest, one can still enjoy a tall cold Labatt Blue while rooting for the like-coloured Jays.
But why beer, rather than, say, whiskey? As with all great things, from sex to sports, it is a question of pacing. Fans sit for hours at a time, soaking in the entertainment while cheering their team. If they were taking shots every inning, you’d have the stadium sponsored by the local paramedics. You don’t want to partake in a beverage that will render you incapable of appreciating the whole of the game. With beer, the only issue is bathroom lines.
The joy of drinking in public also carries it’s own appeal, as sporting venues know. Armed with a small force of vendors, teams come willing and able to serve their fans a tall pilsner whenever they want. And this happens even more often than one would think: the Chicago Cubs, for instance, sell 29,000 beers each home game, making up a quarter of the stadium’s total concession business.
Even beyond the confines of a stadium, beer cases joints for its sporty partners in crime. Take the modern sports bar, a phenomenon that supplies a complete immersion of sports images, a veritable escape of athletic dreams-all fueled by the sweet amber nectar.
And then there is the true monument: the drinking game. While yet to be taken seriously as a profession, beer sports are this young generation’s gift to the drinking world. From Beer Pong, Beirut and Scud to Quarters and Kings, they all are new chapters in this long and storied affair. So drink up, dear friends, and mount a cheer, to the most loving relationship of sports and beer.
