Big League Weekend saved

David Strow

Wednesday, Nov. 24, 1999 | 9:22 a.m.

Las Vegas' annual fling with Major League Baseball was saved Wednesday by a $500,000 sponsorship by the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority after a debate among civic and business leaders.

By an 8-3 margin, the LVCVA board voted to provide the Las Vegas Big League Weekend with $500,000 in funding -- about half the event's total cost. Funds for the weekend will come out of the LVCVA's capital budget, used for the maintenance and improvement of the Las Vegas Convention Center and Cashman Center.

The event has created valuable national exposure for Las Vegas during its six-year run, making many board members loathe to give it up. But concerns were raised about the wisdom of granting professional sports teams such a heavy subsidy for just three days of baseball -- and taking the money out of funds used for the upkeep of the convention center.

"I love baseball," said board member Mark Dodson, executive vice president at Park Place Entertainment Inc., who voted against the measure. "But we should consider the long-term ramifications of (shifting funds into the events budget). Will we start doing this at every meeting?"

Joining Dodson in opposition were Mandalay Resort Group Senior Vice President Steve Greathouse and Ed Crispell, general manager of the Imperial Palace hotel-casino.

To raise the $500,000, the LVCVA will push back a project to improve parking and driveways on the north side of the convention center complex to the next fiscal year, which starts July 1, 2000. LVCVA President Manny Cortez said these projects probably wouldn't have been completed before that time in any case, because tight convention scheduling at the center made it impossible.

The remaining $500,000 will be paid by the Las Vegas Stars, the city's triple-A baseball franchise. The LVCVA and the Stars agreed -- informally -- at Wednesday's meeting to split revenues from the weekend, and the authority expects to eventually recoup about $100,000 on its investment.

With the LVCVA's approval, Stars general manager Don Logan said he would immediately invite six clubs to the three-day tourney to be held in April. The teams expected to participate are the San Francisco Giants, the Chicago White Sox, the Arizona Diamondbacks, the Seattle Mariners, the Colorado Rockies and the Philadelphia Phillies. The $1 million earmarked toward the event will be paid to participating teams.

"At one time, we could do a nice event for $25,000, $50,000," Cortez said. "Now, mega-events won't even come to your door for less than $2 million."

In attempting to persuade the board, Logan hinted that the weekend was a key step toward bringing spring training to Las Vegas on a permanent basis.

"(Spring training) isn't on the front burner, but it's being discussed again," Logan said. "Several teams in Florida aren't making it, and they're looking to Las Vegas as a possible spring training site."

Logan also pointed to the direct and indirect impacts of the weekend.

The Big League Weekend had a direct impact of $9.08 million on the local economy in 1999, according to LVCVA estimates, and generated about 18,000 room-nights for the city's resorts.

In Las Vegas, that only puts the weekend in the top 50 percent of all weekends in terms of impact. But more valuable, proponents argued, was the national exposure Las Vegas received in major league cities through the weekend.

Board members watched a tape of Chicago television station WGN airing the White Sox-Padres game during last year's event -- and listened to LVCVA vice president of marketing Rossi Ralenkotter pitch Las Vegas to White Sox fans between balls and strikes.

In all, the authority estimated that the weekend resulted in the equivalent of $1.3 million in media advertising buys.

Especially attractive to Clark County Commissioner Mary Kincaid was the impact that the Cashman Field event had on nearby downtown Las Vegas. Kincaid also liked that the weekend gave Cashman a big event in a time when large events at the complex are dwindling.

"A baseball team gives a different outlook to a community," Kincaid said. "It gives us an image of a family oriented area."

Las Vegas Mayor Oscar Goodman, a vocal proponent of bringing major league sports to Las Vegas, said that the area had to show "it has matured as a major league city" by keeping the event as it lobbies for a permanent franchise.

"The ramifications of the weekend far transcend Major League Baseball," Goodman said. "We're a community that wants to become home to major league sports. The import of this goes far beyond three days of baseball."

But Greathouse was not convinced. He pointed out that Las Vegas' biggest success story of the past decade, the boom on the Las Vegas Strip, occurred almost entirely with private investment.

"I get concerned when we try to create a major league event where 50 percent of the costs are coming from tax dollars," Greathouse said.