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Michael “Mike B.” Brown
Michael “Mike B.” Brown, owner of Sloppy Chops and Sloppy Crab in Detroit, was fatally shot early Saturday morning outside a nightclub on Schaefer Road on the city's northwest side, the Detroit Free Press reports. Two other people were shot and wounded.
The shooting occurred around 4:30 a.m. outside Suite 100, a cocktail bar on Schaefer Highway near Puritan Avenue, the Detroit Free Press reports. Brown was 52.
Police are urging anyone with information to contact Detroit Police Department's homicide unit or submit an anonymous tip through Crime Stoppers or Detroit Rewards TV.
The Freep reports on Brown:
His first major restaurant venture, Sloppy Chops, opened in 2020 on West McNichols just off the Lodge Freeway. The steakhouse featured high-end cuts like ribeyes and tomahawks, but it quickly drew wide attention for its low-cost lamb chop specials – a dish with a fervent local following and long-standing ties to the city’s food culture.
He later opened Sloppy Crab at 519 E Jefferson that later named Crab Sports Bar.
Award-winning Darralynn Hutson wrote on Facebook:
"I had the opportunity to interview Mike a few years ago for a feature in Food & Wine and I remember how reluctant he was about sitting down to talk. Interviews weren’t his thing — he was much more comfortable building than explaining. I had to call him more than 20 times to set up the interview. He didnt care about Food & Wine. But once we ate and got into conversation, what came out was his commitment to creating something for his Detroit."
Starex Smith, aka "The Hungry Black Man," a prominent food blogger, wrote on Facebook:
I visited his establishment but never had the chance to eat at Sloppy Chops.
My visit to Sloppy Chops was over five years ago. I posted a review that went viral in Detroit. The service had been abysmal to the point that I couldn’t get a seat to dine. I shared this experience in real time, loudly. It was one of my most explosive rants, and it built a sizable portion of my Detroit following. Shortly thereafter, my brother, Chef Max Hardy called and said, “The owner wants to speak to you.”
I braced myself for the wrath of an angry owner, which is what usually came after my honest reviews.
Instead, I encountered something that never happened before.
Mike B. picked up the phone and said, simply, “Everything you said was true. We have work to do. I want you to come back when we open our new location and we have our staff right. I appreciate you letting me know.”
In more than 2,500 restaurant reviews, he remains the only owner who responded to a viral critique not with defensiveness, but humility. Not with accusation, but accountability. That speaks volumes about the measure of a man.
