Steve Stricker's Game and His Beer Will Be on Display This Week in Wisconsin

A brewery in the town hosting this week's U.S. Senior Open has a new beer named for the fan favorite. Gary Van Sickle had to investigate.

Good news: Steve Stricker has his own beer.

Bad news: Harley’s Liquor and Bait Shop in Madison, Wis., has already sold out of it at least once.

Wait? Steve Stricker, the PGA Tour Champions’ most dominant player and captain of the most recent Ryder Cup team, has his own beer?

That’s right. The brew is cleverly named "Strick9" and will be available this week at the U.S. Senior Open at SentryWorld Golf Course in Stevens Point, Wis. District 1 Brewing, which produces Strick9, is located less than a half-mile from the course.

There's a new beer in Wisconsin ... stop the presses.  / Courtesy District 1 Brewing

The Ranking staff might have suggested alternative titles for the new Stricker beer such as Bobbi’s Brewski (named after Steve’s oldest daughter); Ye Olde Town Crier (for Steve’s emotional post-victory media chats) or The Beer Hunter (for his love of bow hunting).

Mario Tiziani, Stricker’s brother-in-law and agent, came up with the Strick9 moniker after he was approached by District 1 Brewing two years ago. As a brand name, Strick9 sticks the landing because it is legit.

“There’s some people who call me ‘Strychnine’ so it’s a play on words,” Stricker said during the PGA Tour Champions’ recent American Family Insurance Championship tournament in Madison (which he won). “Strychnine will kill you but this is alcohol. It tastes good.”

District 1 Brewing, a craft beer maker, created a craft beer in 2021 for Cole Caufield, a University of Wisconsin hockey star from Mosinee, Wis., who plays for the Montreal Canadiens.

“My wife is a friend of Cole’s mom,” said Dr. Mike Sheehan, a practicing endocrinologist whose growing side hustle is the craft beer business. “We knew the U.S. Senior Open was coming to Stevens Point, so we wanted to try to couple with a golfer. I reached out to Mario after Steve’s great Ryder Cup showing as captain but that was right about when Steve got real sick. That put things on hold for a year.”

Sheehan followed up last fall and now Strick9 beer is rolling. District 1 Brewing has two other golf-related beverages—Looper, named after a “Caddyshack” movie scene, and Mulligan, an IPA (India Pale Ale).

But Strick9 puts Stricker in rarefied air among golfers who have had their own beer. Bauhaus Brew Labs in Blaine, Minn., created Lumpy’s Lager for senior golfer Tim Herron. In 2014, Florida-based The Brew Hub created unique craft beers for golfers Graeme McDowell (G-Mac’s); Keegan Bradley (Keegan Bradley’s) and Frederick Jacobsen (Freddie’s).

How do these golf beers stack up? That’s going to require additional testing by The Ranking’s staff, preferably on a beach somewhere or in a dimly lit casino.

After Tiziani and Stricker agreed to go forward with Strick9 beer, it was up to Sheehan and his crew to come up with a tasty blend. “Steve said he wanted something easy to drink after a golf round,” Sheehan said. “So, a summer beer. We sent him three options in a blind taste test. They were labeled A, B and C. They both picked A, a pilsner with corn in it. It has a more unique craft flavor than you’d get from a Budweiser or something like that. This blend has 80 percent barley flakes, 20 percent corn.”

A percentage of the profits from Strick9 go to the Steve Stricker American Family Insurance Foundation, which supports charities and educational initiatives aimed at building strong families and healthy kids.

Strick9 is available in four-packs that feature 16-ounce cans, not the usual 12-ouncers, for $13. District 1 Brewing also has some logo glassware and stickers for sale.

The big challenge for Sheehan is keeping up with the early demand for Strick9 beer, which was available behind the scenes at the recent American Family Insurance Championship but not for sale to patrons.

“Some guy just came by the other day and said he owns a Piggly Wiggly store near Steve’s hometown (Edgerton),” Sheehan said. “He said Steve’s mom came in and asked, ‘when are you going to have the beer?’ He happened to be up north and on his way home, he stopped off in Stevens Point and said he wanted to buy 10 cases right now. So we scrambled and got them for him.”

You think that’s big demand? Wait until SentryWorld has to keep Jerry Kelly supplied with Strick9 all week at the U.S. Senior Open. Kelly is a fellow Wisconsin golfer and longtime Stricker friend who is rumored to enjoy beer on occasion and, of course, friendly ribbing.

District 1 has a second batch of Strick9 ready to releasee. The first batch sold out. This new large batch is 600 gallons. Which even a University of Wisconsin frat house would need all weekend to take down.

Most Americans will have a tough time getting their hands on Strick9, however. This is not a national brand. (Not yet, anyway.) There are various restrictions on companies shipping beer across state lines so if you want a taste of Strick9, you’re going to have to visit Wisconsin, either the District 1 brewery in Stevens Point, that Piggly Wiggly near Edgerton or maybe Harley’s Liquor and Bait Shop in Madison.

“We’re on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter if anyone wants to reach us,” Sheehan said. “We just brewed our 110th unique beer. We have a lot of recipes and we have 20 or our own beers always on tap in our tap room. I tell people this is my mid-life crisis project. I’m 55 and when we renovated the brewing space, I put up a lot of drywall and grinded a lot of floors. We’re extremely excited about the Senior Open coming to town. We’re hoping for a big week.

“It’s really tough to get a foothold in craft brewing. There are close to 11,000 craft breweries in the U.S.”

But only one of them features a golfer with his own beer. By the time you read this, let’s hope Harley’s Liquor and Bait Shop has restocked its shelves.