Vegas group plays pat hand

Monday, July 12, 2004 | 9:34 a.m.

Groups representing Washington, D.C., and two Virginia areas landed in Houston on Sunday.

They did not jet to Texas, though, to watch Tuesday's game at Minute Maid Park. Schmoozing for the Montreal Expos, with Major League Baseball executives and a few choice owners, will be their priority.

Moreover, MLB relocation committee members will reportedly visit D.C. to scrutinize stadium financing details and potential construction schedules by the end of the month, and Northern Virginia could be next on that itinerary.

None of which concerns Mike Shapiro, a consultant for Centerfield Management Group who, for 15 months, has served as the point man in discussions with MLB for Las Vegas Sports and Entertainment LLC.

"There's no reason to go," Shapiro said Sunday. "I'm only thinking of what's in the best interest of seeing this proposal succeed. If I at all thought in an instant that it would be helpful to go to Houston, I'd go.

"I understand that the relocation committee is not meeting there, so I don't understand what value would be served by going there."

Team owners Jerry Reinsdorf (Chicago White Sox), Tom Hicks (Texas Rangers) and Wendy Selig-Prieb (Milwaukee Brewers), though, are expected to attend the mid-summer classic, so there might be opportunities to curry favor.

Shapiro said he has not paid much attention, or given much heed, to the growing national attention that D.C. and Northern Virginia are receiving as the perceived leaders to land the Expos.

In addition, he has no opinion on trips relocation committee members might make to Washington or Northern Virginia.

"Not really," Shapiro said. "Our only focus is on making the best possible proposal we can for Las Vegas. We have no control whatsoever over what D.C. or Northern Virginia does. Again, I don't see us in competition with them.

"I see us as trying to do the very best we can with our ideas and concepts. We will let baseball weigh them all and make a decision in the best interest of everyone. They're being very thorough, and they're going through them with a great deal of caution and detail."

Expect the Expos' relocation drama to last a few more weeks, at least. What was originally to be decided a year ago was reset, allowing LVSE and other cities to enter the fray, for this All-Star break.

Then that deadline evaporated. MLB commissioner Bud Selig is expected to announce the team's new home in conjunction with the release of the 2005 schedule in August, according to the Washington Times.

However it unfolds, the clock is ticking loudly for LVSE, which is in charge of assembling the potential funding for a $420 million, retractable-roof stadium projected to be built behind Caesars Entertainment Inc. properties Bally's and Paris Las Vegas.

Both Shapiro and Earl Santee, a principal architect for HOK Sport in Kansas City, Mo., said committed design work must begin no later than by the end of this month to have a 40,000-seat stadium ready for the early part of the 2007 season.

In an exclusive, the Sun revealed a design concept of the baseball stadium, and a boxing layout of the versatile arena, on June 23. Caesars would act only as a landlord.

Monterrey, Mexico, is one of several venues, according to two sources, that LVSE has recommended as a temporary home for the Expos, until a Vegas stadium is completed. Shapiro said committee members responded positively to each option.

Although Shapiro has not personally met with any relocation committee members in about three months, he said phone conversations with them have been regular and constructive.

Shapiro said he spoke with several of them last week, at different times and about various topics.

"Basically, folks on the relocation committee have wanted to know certain further explanations or have asked for further descriptions of some of the things contained in our proposal," Shapiro said.

"From all I can determine and what we've been told, the relocation committee is doing its due diligence, on all of the proposals, to try and determine which have the highest merit. I don't know if they have resolved that question yet."

Apparently, few can answer that question.

"I know pretty well that there are about eight people who know what's going on," William Somerindyke, the chief executive of the Norfolk Baseball Company, said Sunday in the Portland Tribune. "And they're not talking to anybody."

It remains to be seen how Baltimore owner Peter Angelos, a member of MLB's exclusive executive council, might affect Selig's decision.

Angelos, who speaks with Somerindyke almost daily and is tight with Selig, believes another team in his general vicinity will negatively impact that team and his Orioles.

Not every Washington local is convinced that the area is close to ending its 32-year baseball drought, either.

"That feeling is based purely on a sense of momentum," the Washington Times reported Saturday, "rather than facts."

In a 125-page LVSE proposal that the relocation committee digested for a May owners meeting in New York, Shapiro first detailed a stadium deal that could be funded entirely with private financing.

Selig charged the relocation committee, chaired by Reinsdorf, with recommending the most viable candidate city, and Selig will be the final arbiter. Once that is settled, an ownership group will be selected.

Randy Vataha, of Boston-based Game Plan LLC, has told the Sun that he has plenty of interested, and qualified, financiers lined up to possibly operate a major league baseball team in Las Vegas.

"The guy has done things in sports business that other people can only dream of," Shapiro said of Vataha, who has connected prospective owners with sports franchises for more than 10 years. "If he says he has it, I don't doubt it."

Shapiro has been just as impressed with Manhattan-based Merrill Lynch investment banker Peter Hoffman, who has been unavailable for comment.

"He's the brains behind everything I take credit for," Shapiro said. "He's a brilliant financial person, and he's brought so many resources and brilliance to the financial model for our whole proposal. He should get all the credit for what's been put in front of baseball."