New president on board with the 51s

By Case Keefer (contact)

Saturday, June 5, 2010 | 2:05 a.m.

Drew Dondero considers his interaction with Southern Nevada residents the most enjoyable part of his move to Las Vegas from Detroit six months ago.

“It’s actually surprising how easy it is to talk to people,” Dondero said. “Everyone moved from somewhere and is in the same situation.”

Dondero hopes connecting with the community is something that will continue to come easy in his new role as president of the Las Vegas 51s. The 51s, the Triple-A affiliate of the Toronto Blue Jays, announced this week that Dondero would step into the role that Don Logan has occupied for the last decade.

Logan will retain his title as general manager and minority owner. He will work closely with Dondero, who has been involved with the 51s from afar since the Stevens Baseball Group purchased the team in 2008.

But Dondero said the owners decided it was time to have a daily presence around the 51s and Cashman Field. That’s why Dondero, who has worked for the Stevens Group for the last 20 years ago, took on the president role.

“We are a company that has always been hands-on,” Dondero said. “That’s one thing we really identified, that we need to be here and working with the operations.”

For the rest of this season, not much will change. Dondero said he would primarily spend his time learning from Logan and beginning to formulate a major marketing and advertising push.

Logan said he understood the change and was supportive of it.

“It’s the ownership,” Logan said. “They wanted to have one of their guys who had worked for them involved in the situation here. I had only been involved with them for a few years.”

The 51s are in the middle of their 28th season this year, easily making the franchise the longest-running Las Vegas professional sports team in history.

The 51s average season attendance in that span is about 330,000. But Dondero thinks Las Vegas is capable of more and will take steps to increase the number.

“We have a very strong commitment to the community,” Dondero said. “We are only successful if the community is successful.”