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Vegas Baby, Vegas
Vegas Baby, Vegas
Jim Meadows
Published by Swampy Meadows
12-12-2008
Vegas Baby, Vegas

LAS VEGAS (NV) –- Like “The Rat Pack” and the guys on “Entourage” fellow Bostonian Bill Simmons, AKA, “The Sports Guy” from ESPN.com has always been a big fan of Las Vegas. Before he got married and started popping out kids, Simmons and his buddies were regular visitors to the “City that Never Sleeps” and he would chronicle their exploits in his columns.

Believe it or don’t, but this is my virgin visit to Lost Wages. Here are my first impressions:

-- Joe from Roseville and Laurie and her husband from Canton sat next to me on the plane. All of them are LV vets. Joe goes all the time and got comped for his hotel; Laurie and her husband were going on a reward trip from her employer. Our flight arrived 40 minutes ahead of schedule. When does that ever happen when flying east to west?

-- I had some free time on Tuesday afternoon and the MLB Winter Meetings were being held down the street at the Bellagio, so I figured what the hell, why not check it out? It kinda helped to have gray hair and be wearing a sport coat –- I looked like I belonged, even tho I was missing press credentials. It sorta made me wish I had my UD Pride.com press pass, so I could at least try and bluff my way in to a press conference or two. Instead I sat in a chair outside the Media Room, surfed baseball sites on my cell phone and watched the baseball world walk by.

-- K-Rod to the Mets for 3 years and a lot of money was the big buzz. I watched NY Yankee skipper Joe Girardi as he was being interviewed by MLB.com for his reaction to the signing.

-- Tommy Lasorda was hanging out by the lobby bar.

-- Dusty Baker was all over the place.

-- Buck Martinez was there. Man, I thought I had a big old head of gray hair! FYI, I overheard Buck giving out his email address to someone, if any of you want to send him a note.

-- Art Martone, the Red Sox Sports Editor for the Providence Jounal (or ProJo, as it’s affectionately known in New England) was working the corridors.

-- All of the ESPN “Baseball Tonight” guys were there: Steve Phillips, Jason Stark and Tim Kurkjian. They are all tiny, especially TK, who is a freakin’ midget! My main man Peter Gammons wasn’t around when I was there, however.

-- Spent 5 minutes chatting with Amalie Benjamin, the Sox beat reporter for the Boston Globe. She said there was absolutely nothing happening. The Sox met with A. J. Burnett and his agents the day before. No movement on the Mark Teixeira front and there most likely won’t be anything agreed upon during the meetings, which makes her job a lot tougher. Here is her report on Tex:

http://www.boston.com/sports/basebal...response_team/

-- No sign of Theo Epstein or Tito Francona, two guys that I really just want to shake hands with and say thanks for 2004. Bummer.

-- Heading back down the strip, a woman on the elevator going up to the crossover into the MGM Grand came out with this line:

“I didn’t put my contacts in because I didn’t want to see where my money was going.”

That was just a little too good and a bit too original for it to have been a spur of the moment thought –- she probably heard it at a show.

-- My buddy Jason from LA was out in the hall with a woman from security when I came back to my floor. Seems he checked into his room, only to find it had been previously occupied and not cleaned –- twice! For his trouble, they comped him 2 buffets, which is pointless since all of our meals are being picked up by the company. If I get really hungry at 3:00AM, I know who to call.

-- One thing I can do without: the people on the street trying to hand you cards for strip shows and clubs. They all do this thing where they flip the cards and make a ‘popping’ noise as you pass by. Do they teach them to do that at The Las Vegas Academy for Annoying Street People? What is that?

-- For some unknown reason, I kept smelling bacon in my room…and I was 26 floors up from the nearest restaurant.

-- It’s really slow here in Vegas. Not nearly as many people on the streets or in the casinos as there usually are, according to my co-workers who were here last year at the same time.

-- The guy I sat next to during dinner is a huge Spankees fan. Even he was shaking his head at the deal for CC Sabathia. 7 years? An opt-out clause? I pointed out that it wasn’t so bad, as the New Yawkers got the big boy for roughly $2.59 a pound.

-- After dinner, a bunch of my co-workers decided to ride the roller coaster at New York, New York. I passed on that idea, as it was 40 degrees outside and I liked my meal where it was then currently situated. The rodeo is in Las Vegas this week, so there are tons of folks walking around sporting cowboy hats, boots, jeans and big-ass belt buckles. While we were waiting for our intrepid roller coaster riders, a family of four came up to check it out. They all had big belt buckles, but the mom’s was the biggest. Wonder what that means?

-- If any of you guys or gals are in charge of finding really excellent sales training for your company, let me give you a name: John Costigan. Send me and email or PM me and I’ll tell you all about him or check John out here:

http://www.johncostigan.com/index.html

-- Costigan related a great recruiting story about Billy Donovan’s pursuit of PG deluxe Kenny Boynton that was later retold in ESPN’s Rise magazine:

“Donovan rolled up in a tan minivan and carried a brown backpack with a surprise inside that was original enough to win points from a Disney Imagineer. Once in the house, Donovan had the family gather around and placed Boynton in the middle. Then Donovan reached into his backpack, pulled out a Nerf dart gun and placed it on the glass coffee table. Puzzled smirks formed around the room.

"He said 'As soon as any of you feel like I'm recruiting and not speaking from the heart, I want you to pick up this gun and shoot me,'" Boynton says. "I thought that was cool, and hey, we didn't have to shoot him … OK, well, almost once."

That's when Patricia asked Donovan if her need for special seating would be a problem at the Stephen C. O'Connell Center.

"He said 'I will let you sit right beside me at the game,'" Lovett says. "That's when his assistant [Lanier] said 'OK, Kenny pick up the gun now.' We all laughed."


Donovan got the Nerf gun idea from Costigan during a training session John conducted with a group of coaches; Kenny Boynton subsequently signed with the Gators. Here’s a link to the entire piece:

http://sports.espn.go.com/highschool...ory?id=3592275

-- I had to do a presentation on one of my target accounts for 2009, during which I mentioned that we vacation in Stone Harbor, NJ. My boss Glenn came up to me afterwards and said he’s been going to SH for 10 years and just booked his place for this summer.

-- One of my counterparts from NY won $22,000 in a nickel progressive slot machine and was showing off the check at dinner on our last night here.

-- I really wanted to like Las Vegas, but I came away saying “Meh.” I’ve enjoyed my previous visits to the desert while attending sales meetings in Palm Springs, CA and Scottsdale, AZ. The fact that I’m not a gambler might have something to do with it, altho I was half-way tempted to put $20 down on the Flyers vs. Creighton…which in retrospect I am glad that I did not.

As I told Mrs. Swampy (who has never been to Vegas either) after walking around the strip on my first day here “it’s basically Wildwood, NJ without the ocean.” Las Vegas reminds me of the cantina scene from the first “Star Wars” -- every life form in the universe can be found here.

That’s it “From the Swamp.”
You can email me at: swampy@udpride.com
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  #1  
By LostInThought on 01-28-2009, 10:03 AM
Vegas Baby

Enjoyed your trip report! Where were you staying that you smelled bacon in your room on the 23rd floor?


__________________________________________________ __________
"I skate where the puck is going to be, not where it has been."
---Wayne Gretzky

Lost, las vegas strip hotels
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  #2  
By Swampy Meadows on 01-28-2009, 08:58 PM
The MGM Grand which was great. For the life of me I couldn't figure out where it was coming from.
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  #3  
By LostInThought on 02-07-2009, 02:06 AM
vegas

Wow - that's a surprise! Thought you were going to say you were staying at the Casino Royale and the smell was coming from Denny's! I like the MGM, too--great location, pool and restaurants. Thanks again for the entertaining story!

I Vegas
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