Ep 19 - Tropicana Is Officially The Home For The Las Vegas A's, Or Is It?

The A's are coming to Las Vegas...or are they? They've secured a deal to build a stadium where the Tropicana sits now. What does that mean for employees? And how they could still end up in another city. Tony, Ice & MoJoe discuss in this episode.

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
Live from three months three to experiencein fabulous downtown Las Vegas. It's the
podcast that celebrates our city. Thisis living Las Vegas. And I guess
the only people not celebrating at themoment are the ones who got to notice
that their employers said, you gotabout eighteen months and then we're done.
Yeah. Talking about Tropicana, it'sMojo from ninety five five the Bull,

(00:21):
Ice and Tony from ninety three oneThe Mountain What a bomber. And it
looks like the Oakland A's have decidedthat Tropicana is now the spot, which
I want to start with the factthat didn't they have a binding deal with
the other location. That's what Ithought what happened there. I think they
had a deal to buy the land, right right, But I mean you
could buy land and not put somethingon it, sell it a year later

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at a profit. I mean,you know, now you're making a profit,
and the Oakland A's kind of needthat. Wait wait, and if
that's what they're doing with this Tropicanasituation, that's crappy for the people who
are employed by Tropicana. I don'tknow all the details of it. Of
course, if you're listening to this, we're just strong tell us that we're
wrong. Right. It does feellike what they could always do is they

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need this public money, right,they need these tax dollars to help fund
it, or they think they do, or at least that's what they're proposing
as a part of their relocation toLas Vegas. If we don't approve that,
if that doesn't come through for them, somebody else could offer it.
And they could be, you know, the Austin A's, or they could
be the Nashville Athletics or the PortlandAnd in fact, somebody could say,
if it's taken too long in Nevada, we've already got it approved. Here's

(01:25):
your five hundred million dollars in publicfunding. Yeah, wherever Portland. Right.
Yeah, And you mentioned that ofthe locations, this was one you
weren't super excited about, mainly becauseI think you said traffic would be the
issue, because it's right, theydon't try to go onto the strip and
that's going to really clog up thatarea. Yeah. I'm fifty one.
I don't remember saying that it's possible. I said it. So it was

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a few weeks ago. This location, I like the other location that they
announced a lot like, I wasn'tprepared for that location. When they announced
they were buying that land at Tropicanaon the other side of the freeway,
I thought, that's actually kind ofcool. You saw the rendering, Is'm
like, yeah, that looks kindgreat. That's my favorite location. Now
if that's not going to happen,I don't hate the Tropicana location. I
love it being on the strip.Obviously, traffics a problem, but my

(02:07):
opinion on that always is we'll figureout the traffic. Park. There's fenty
of places park. You just haveto walk a little bit or whatever.
I like it being on the strip, you know. I like the Tropicana.
I like the old school casinos.Don't go to the Tropicana a lot.
I just like that it's there.There's some charm about it, right,
I mean, there's a much charmabout it as any casino that was

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built in the fifties by mob influences. Right, it was funded by the
mob. I think it was theKansas City mob that built that built the
Tropicana. But so if that's gone, I mean, we still have the
Flamingo, we still have Caesars,the Sahara. If you want to count
it. I think you do.Yeah, but we're running out of those
iconic casino names. I wish therewas a Stardust here. I mean,

(02:50):
I wish there was, you know. So some of those things I hate
to see them go well. Andfrom what I understand, and again this
is all this could all change tomorrow. As we've seen the into rens,
they're only going to use a portionof this land for the ballpark itself.
In fact, it's going to bethe smallest ballpark in all of Major League
Baseball? Like that's small. Wasthere some new information that came out right

(03:12):
before the podcast? Because I mayhave been right here yesterday. It came
out yesterday, Yeah, yesterday.I may be behind on my info here
just because of the fact that Iwas in the car all day. You're
driving to it from Reno. Man. But they're talking about about also building
like a casino adjacent to it withthe deal they have with Valleys to where
a portion of the land will befor the ballpark, and then they're gonna
build you know, casinos around itattached to the ballpark. Cool. So

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I don't know if that will stillbe called Tropicana, but the casino aspect
of that land. I don't knowhow big that footprint is. Does that
include like OIO, I don't know. I haven't seen. I haven't gone
that far into detail with then No. Same everything I've saw, it looks
like it's not based in reality.The oil. Speaking of iconic names,

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am I supposed to live in aLas Vegas without an oil? They have
a rich two year history here,guys. I dismissed when it was the
Hooters casino. Yeah, yeah,yeah, I see both sides of it.
Me. When we talked about theoriginal three locations before the one that
they agreed to was even in play, we had ranked him and this was

(04:18):
your lease. And I think thereason I had it as my favorite was
because we get the free parking atMandalais and I'm like, oh, he's
walking across the street. Yeah.I don't hate this location at all.
Again, I'd love for the Tropicanato still exist, but progress is progress.
I do want the A's here.Yeah, even if there's some tax
assistance that has to help make thathappen, I'm comfortable with some. I'm

(04:41):
not comfortable with all of the numbersI've seen so far, but yeah,
I don't hate that location. Atall. The Vata Legistrate slature is expected
to vote on the public funding proposalthis week, so at some point we'll
get a YEA or nay from themand see if we're gonna be on the
hook for that four hundred million dollarsin public fund To know, I'll just
I'll just laugh at this point,there's a real possibility. That's to know.

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Look, there's I don't know wheredo you think public sentiment is on
it right now? And if thosepeople are contacting there are representatives in this
situation and saying let's start second.Guess you're your vote is going to determine
whether I vote for you or noton this And I don't want to pay
tax dollars to bring an MLB teamhere. I mean, do you think
it's fifty fifty in this town fiftypeople four or fifty people against? Is

(05:26):
it's seventy thirty against? I mean, well, you probably it's probably closer
to fifty fifty than it was theprevious deal because it's less money now on
the line. I think one hundredgrand less than what the other deal had
in play, one hundred million,one hundred, one hundred millions. I
hate to be the guy who doesit. But big difference. I'm not
I'm not a big point out themistake in the math. But yeah,
no, but but but it's stillone hundred million less than what the other

(05:47):
bill was. And I just doa lot. And I don't know if
this is this is game in LeisureProperties is also agreeing to put up one
hundred and seventy five million in fundingfor the development. I don't know if
this is to eat away at thefour hundred million or is is on top
of I'm not clear on that.Let's get some clarity on it. But
again, I mean even if it'sfour hundred million or whatever the number ends

(06:08):
up being, that's still a lotin the eyes, Like a dollar is
too much to pay for a teamto come here and you know, and
be a part of what we're doing. So some people are just dead set
against any tax dollars going against goingfor this. And I think it is
fifty fifty fifty people four or fiftypeople again, so we'll see. I
believe these teams get a big supplementationfrom the league too for having a team,

(06:30):
and that money that they use helpsfund their their salaries for their team,
right, and the A's have alwaysbeen one of the cheaper, you
know, rosters in the league.Maybe there's some kind of a minimum requirement
we can put on them to fitthe bill and make it worth our while
knowing we're gonna have a contender.That's an interesting point. Yeah, I
don't expect the Oakland A's to comehere and change their business model. Obviously

(06:53):
there if they're getting a ton ofmoney to come here, and that goes
toward the build out. But Idon't get I don't get the sense the
A's owners are going to start allof a sudden paying players more and doing
things differently. They're going to comehere as one of the worst teams in
baseball. Well that needs to eveneven years from now, because we are
building a city of champions. Wehave one with the with the Aces,

(07:15):
We're gonna have one with the VegasGolden Nights this year. We're gonna talk
about that on Friday's episode as weget ready for the Big Game. And
maybe even the Raiders might actually belegit contenders now, especially since I'm hearing
that Tom Brady might be one ofthe limited partners for the Las Vengas.
It wasn't he just that was withthe Aces too. He wanted to So
what is he doing? Mark tightHey, get over. He's putting down

(07:40):
roots in Vegas. I'm not madat that, all right, all right,
So I don't know what that meansfor the Raiders, but as much
championship blood as you can get intothat organization better I agree with that.
That's on a future podcast. Doyou want to talk? I'm about to
be careful not to wear the sameclothes when we do that once Tonnay.
They can just hear you, theycan't see you on. I just want

(08:00):
to tell them which cameras on.So we'll be back tomorrow. We have
more news about big shows. Oneof the residents. He's adding a crap
ton of dates, a major residencehe kicking off in town this week,
and a festival that I know.Ice has got our glow sticks out ready
to go. We'll share all thedetails in tomorrow's episode. Follow and subscribe.
We're on Instagram and Twitter at LivingLV pod and wherever you listen to

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Living in Las Vegas