Mike’s Tavern on Troost has closed; Brady’s Public House will soon open in the location

The twin forces of Troost gentrification and UMKC expansion arrived last month, inevitably, at 5424 Troost, home to the beloved brick box known for the last 50 years as Mike’s Tavern. The place closed not long after classes let out. By the time UMKC and Rockhurst University students return, in August, Mike’s will be operating under a new name: Brady’s Public House.

For decades, Mike’s Tavern was one of the city’s great dives, a grimy, cheap, lowdown joint that attracted a wonderful mix of college students, neighborhood regulars, drunks, lowlifes, and petty criminals. Sometimes there was live music. Sometimes it was a frat party. Sometimes you got the feeling you might get stabbed if you said the wrong thing to the guy across the pool table. Like all great bars, there was an undercurrent of lawlessness at Mike’s.

But that hasn’t really been the case in recent years. In 2010, Ray Dunlea — who then owned The Gaf, in Brookside, and now is an owner of both Conroy’s locations in town — bought Mike’s and niced it up a little bit. For awhile, they were serving Mexican food in there. More recently, it’s been standard bar fare. With Brady’s Public House, Dunlea and partner Shaun Brady intend to gut whatever was left of the old Mike’s spirit and lean into something more deluxe.

“It will be upscale Irish American fare,” says Brady, most recently the executive chef of the Ambassador Hotel downtown. “It’s a full remodel on the inside. One side of the bar will be more of a restaurant type of space serving food from a scratch kitchen, and the bar side will serve handcrafted cocktails, barrel-aged cocktails, things like that.”

Brady says he’s gone into business with Dunlea on the Conroy’s restaurants (4730 Rainbow Boulevard, in Westwood, and 285 W. 95th Street, in Overland Park) as well. He’ll serve as executive chef at all three restaurants.

Other changes at 5424 Troost include a redo of the patio and an open kitchen in the back. There will be no more bar games or anything of that nature.

“We’re turning away from the college dive bar thing,” Brady says. “We’re going for the people in Brookside. We want to be an upscale destination for people in the neighborhood who want good food and good drinks. So I think people who come in expecting a $2 beer — they’re going to be disappointed, because that’s not going to be available.”