NBA Commissioner Adam Silver called the Bucks' Fiserv Forum a "spectacular" facility and said it is the "new standard" for the league's venues. Silver on Friday joined the FS Wisconsin broadcast of Pacers-Bucks, the new arena's first regular-season game. He said, "I had another opportunity tonight to walk through the suites and to walk the concourse, saw the locker rooms, and it’s just a fantastic place to play." He said the concept that Staples Center and L.A. Live created is the “same thing they're doing here." Silver: "They develop the property around the arena and (use) the arena as the economic engine for hotels, commercial space, residential, retail." Silver said he told Bucks President Peter Feigin “as soon as the shovel went in the ground they went on the list” to host an All-Star Game. Silver: “There is no doubt we'll have an All-Star Game here in Milwaukee" (“Pacers-Bucks,” FS Wisconsin, 10/19).
RAISE A GLASS: In Milwaukee, James Nelson noted the Bucks on Friday "toasted the new beer garden that connects Old World Third Street with the plaza outside Fiserv Forum." The team and arena concessionaire Levy operate the "enclosed tap room and the open air" beer garden. The garden, which will be open year-round, has been "operating for a couple of weeks and already become a novel spot to watch" games on a "28-foot television screen" (MILWAUKEE JOURNAL SENTINEL, 10/20).
