After a long saga of revolving ownership and management, Bad Albert’s Tap & Grill has been reincarnated. Co-owners Cory and Shawn Rockey are back at the helm of the long-standing pub at 5100 Ballard Ave. after its short-lived stint as Tailgaters, which opened back in January.
We spoke to Cory Rockey today, who he said they regained ownership of the space about a week ago, and managed to turn it back into Bad Albert’s in just six days. He says everything is back to the way it was before they closed in the summer of 2012. Rockey says almost the whole crew is back together again, with Marco Abergo in the kitchen and a few new menu items.
Rockey says the community has been very supportive of their reincarnation, adding that “it feels really good.” They opened up yesterday and said it was a great day. “This last year has been weird,” Rockey says of the changing name and management, but that people are coming in and feeling good about the return of Bad Albert’s.
A condensed history of the lifespan of Bad Albert’s: it closed in 2011 after original owner Steve Katsandres put it up for sale, opening again a few months later by the Rockey brothers. In summer of 2012, it closed suddenly after an “investor/management dispute,” according to Shawn Rockey. The bar reopened as Tailgaters in January this year, run by manager Jeff Denny, and remained as such until just last week, when the Rockey brothers returned to reestablish the beloved Bad Albert’s.
Worst all around experience -from food to service- I’ve had in Seattle, only rivaled by Five Point Cafe. It was so uniformly bad that it could have served as a text book chapter on how to insure customers will not return. Twice my 13 yr. old son and I were served cold french fries, the original order AND the replacement. Nothing came out in a timely manner.
The waitress was nice but either incompetent or simply overwhelmed as she was the only wait person in the place.