Las Vegas Sun

March 28, 2024

51s look forward to big crowds

Season:

Home:

More than 20,000 people will pile into Cashman Field this weekend to watch baseball, and that's just the kind of kickoff that Don Logan's been looking for.

"This is the wake-up call to the community that baseball's back," said Logan, the general manager of the Las Vegas 51s.

But this year, the wake-up call is more like a screeching fire alarm. Cold, windy Dodgers games and last year's rained out Rangers-Rockies contests have now translated into two marquee teams with near-perfect early April weather forecasted.

With both Cubs-Mariners games selling out in less than an hour, the Big League Weekend contests gave the 51s a great opportunity to sell tickets to this weekend's games coupled with mini-packages for the 51s Triple-A regular season.

"We're up on everything," said 51s director of ticket operations Mike Rodriguez. "We've sold out our dugout seats. Our full season's up, our half season's up. I think the big-league games had a lot to do with it, especially when we have good teams like this."

While this weekend's major league exhibition has an impact on whetting Las Vegas' appetite for baseball, Rodriguez speculated that last winter's hoopla about the possibility of major league baseball coming to Las Vegas helped, as well.

"I think with all this interest in maybe a big league team coming here, and (Mayor Oscar Goodman is) always talking," he said, "people like thinking if we do get a new stadium, they would have the first right of refusal. I think that's helped, too."

The 51s drew an average of 4,318 fans last year, the fourth-lowest count in the Pacific Coast League. But, the 51s also turned a profit last season.

"Last year, we didn't have our full complement of employees here until February," Logan said. "We had to eliminate some expenses, we let quite a few people go and didn't replace them until later. It made it a little tougher last year, but we also knew that this year and next year were going to be that much better."

With season ticket sales already improved, a repeat of last year's low numbers at the gate is improbable. Likely padding those season ticket numbers is an expansion of two of the 51s' most popular promotions - dollar beer night and fireworks. The team will have 34 promotions.

Instead of random Thursdays through the season, fans seeking cheap beer can turn out any Thursday this season, a move that Logan said was a necessity.

"It was confusing. People would show up on a Thursday and we wouldn't have it, but they'd been here the Thursday before and we did," Logan said. "We've got to do it every Thursday to make it work. I prefer to talk about the family aspect but the reality is guys our age like to come out to games and drink beer."

As for the fireworks, they'll debut at the 51s home opener April 15. It's the third time in 23 seasons that Las Vegas will open the season on the road - next Thursday in Colorado Springs - and that, Logan said, is just another added bonus.

Having the home opener eight games in means the season kicks off on a Friday. That should continue to carry over momentum from this weekend's events.

"It's really the first time we've gotten the benefit of opening on the road and having a home opener on a Friday," Logan said. "It's been very positive. We're a warm-weather city so it makes more sense to open here, but it's not fair to get stuck with that every year."

The last time the 51s opened the season on the road, they played four games at Phoenix before coming back for a Monday.

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