Las Vegas lands 2008 minor league meetings

Nick Christensen

Friday, July 15, 2005 | 10:07 a.m.

As Las Vegas continues to seek opportunities to promote itself as a city suitable for hosting major league sports, the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority made another move Thursday to help bring Southern Nevada along.

The authority formally signed a deal with Minor League Baseball COO Pat O'Conner to bring the 2008 Winter Meetings to Las Vegas, providing the city with tremendous global media exposure while giving the area its best chance to showcase itself to Major League Baseball.

Las Vegas Mayor Oscar Goodman seemed optimistic that by the time the meetings begin, baseball will be talking about the "Las Vegas Oscars' " first season.

Goodman's hyperbole aside, the fact that baseball would consider holding the meetings in a Las Vegas casino, the Hilton, is another benchmark in the city's evolving courtship of professional sports.

"I believe that when Major League Baseball sees what Las Vegas is all about ... they're going to see that we have the best of everything and that's what Major League Baseball deserves," Goodman said. "It's the beginning of the dream that's going to come true. We are going to have a Major League Baseball team in this community and we're going to have it sooner than later."

While O'Conner gave a variety of reasons as to why it took 20-plus years to attract the Winter Meetings to Las Vegas, he admitted that the city's image was a factor in the delay.

"I think to the credit of Las Vegas they've marketed themselves to baseball, specifically to Major League Baseball to overcome any stigma that may have been tied to what the perception may have been of holding an event here," O'Conner said.

And, the improvement of that image was what made 2008 the right time.

"The fact that Las Vegas was a player in the Expos, that allowed Vegas to be showcased to Major League Baseball," said LVCVA president Rossi Ralenkotter. "This is another sports meeting that will draw great attention to Las Vegas from this point forward."

Mike Shapiro, who was the pointman in last year's efforts to lure the Montreal Expos to Las Vegas, said that effort allayed many concerns baseball had about Las Vegas.

"I think there were some serious questions we were able to intelligently and professionally address, not only as a market but certainly about the image and the perception of Las Vegas," Shapiro said. "We were able to successfully convince baseball that this was an appropriate market and any negative images about gambling... are areas of perception and not reality."

MLB president Bob DuPuy said in an e-mail that the decision to host the meetings in Las Vegas was made separately from the process involving the Expos.

"Las Vegas is obviously one of the premiere meeting locations in the world, and we are excited about having the winter meetings there," he said.

51s general manager Don Logan, who has been working on bringing the meetings to Las Vegas since he began working for the Triple-A franchise in 1984, said hosting the event is the next step in Las Vegas' effort to attract a major league team.

But he added that Las Vegas still hasn't proven itself as a big league city.

"Building a facility would be the first demonstration," he said. "Everybody talks a big game, and nobody's stepping up to do that."

Still, Shapiro said this week's announcement about the Winter Meetings shows that Las Vegas has cleared a major hurdle.

"It's a good thing that if baseball had moralistic concerns about associating its name with the Las Vegas community, they would never have their winter meetings there," he said. "But it's a different decision-making process altogether compared to what is undertaken in the decision of relocating some future franchise to the Las Vegas market."