Goodman: LVCVA needs to address NFL stance

Wednesday, Feb. 9, 2005 | 10:45 a.m.

Las Vegas Mayor Oscar Goodman isn't worried about any penalties for piling on when he talks about the National Football League.

Goodman, in his role as chairman of the board of directors of the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority, took another swipe at the NFL Tuesday, encouraging his colleagues to consider legal action against the league for its treatment of Las Vegas prior to Super Bowl XXXIX.

"I was shot down two years ago and I was shot down last year," Goodman said. "But I think it's time we did something about the NFL. The league doesn't have a very high regard for Las Vegas and that offends me."

Goodman even dropped in a mixed sports metaphor, stating that NFL Commissioner Paul Tagliabue was "out in left field" in his views about Nevada's legalized sports gambling industry.

A spokesman for the NFL, reached in Honolulu where the league is preparing for this weekend's Pro Bowl all-star game, declined comment on Goodman's remarks.

The NFL cracked down on its enforcement of trademark and copyright protections in Las Vegas in the days leading up to the Super Bowl. The league also negotiated terms with the Fox Network, which broadcast Sunday's game, that effectively prohibited the LVCVA from advertising nationally during the telecast.

The LVCVA managed to get some of its "Vegas Stories" ads on during the game on a regional basis, with a new "What happens here, stays here," ad airing in seven markets. LVCVA Chief Executive Rossi Ralenkotter said Tuesday that he is awaiting details of when the commercials aired and any reaction to them.

No other board member was up to matching Goodman's rant and the mayor said he would await an evaluation from the LVCVA's legal counsel as to what course to take.

During the meeting, Goodman played an audio tape of a portion of a question-and-answer session during Tagliabue's pre-Super Bowl "state of the league" message.

Fielding a question on why the league was cracking down on Las Vegas Super Bowl parties, Tagliabue said the league has made its decision not to associate with gambling. Then, he began comparing gambling with drinking beer and even invoked the failure of Prohibition.

"I don't have any idea what he's talking about," Goodman said. "He's practically incoherent. This is the mentality that we're dealing with."

During and after the board meeting, Goodman listed what he considered to be hypocritical stances the NFL has taken and wondered aloud why the state's legal sports books are held in such low regard.

He questioned whether "the NFL would be what it is without wagering" with newspapers across the country publishing betting lines and weekly injury reports. He also complained that bodog.com, a Costa Rican-based sports wagering Web site, had representatives passing out information at an NFL-sanctioned Super Bowl party.

He also complained about the tastelessness of this year's TV ad by godaddy.com satirizing Janet Jackson's "wardrobe malfunction" during the halftime of last year's Super Bowl, as well as ads for erectile dysfunction medications. Goodman maintains that Las Vegas' ads are more tasteful than some of the ads that aired during this year's telecast.

Goodman said the NFL's own Web site also includes a "fantasy football" component, which he maintains is a form of gambling.