New Lottery, Raiders HQ Tour, Nevada Is So Stressful & What Is Happening at Rio?

Hello and welcome to the MTM Vegas podcast. I'm Sean Coomer, your host joined as always by Mark Osterman. We have a great show for you. As a reminder, you can watch this entire show along with all the visuals that go with it at youtube.com forward slash miles to memories. We have a great show for you this week. We're going to talk about the lottery one Nevada representative has proposed to bring it back, but it's not as simple as you might think. Plus Rio, what's happening with it? Is it going to get the investment in the transition to hire it or will it become a ballpark? That bit of news came this week as well. I also toured the Raiders headquarters and talked all about what it's like inside, including the practice field. We take you to downtown Las Vegas for the brand new wildfire Fremont and what it's like. Plus, what is your least favorite Vegas hotel and would you stay there for free? All of that plus more news coming up. As a reminder, you can get all of our Vegas content posts, podcasts and videos at mtmvegas.com. And if you're listening on Apple podcast, consider leaving us a five star review, a five star rating, a written review, they help us out tremendously. Thanks so much for listening. Let's hit it. So Mark, did you see those dancing grannies at the link promenade? Having fun getting around? Of course, I don't think they were really grannies, but that's definitely how you do Vegas. What do you mean? You don't think they're really grannies? It looked like a batch for a rep party or something. It looked like a lot of fun. I was kind of shocked at how dead the link promenade was, but I'm guessing it was really late at night. Just looked like a lot of fun. It made me think of Vanderpump rules when all the guys crossed dresses and dresses and went to Nashville and went around the town dressed like women and it was just kind of hilarious. I don't know that I'd ever do it, but all the power to the people, I guess. I never had the thought of you doing it, but I think you'd make a great granny. There you go. I definitely could put some junk in the trunk. Let's get into the show and let's start with TwitchCon 2023. They announced that they're going to move it to Las Vegas. We've talked so much about conventions like going away from Las Vegas, convention attendance not coming up, but on the flip side, we have all these experiences, music festivals, and these other kind of new age conventions, Twitch, of course, a gaming, streaming platform, huge platform among younger kids and Vegas is going to be home to their big convention at least next year. Yeah, it seems like a big get for Vegas and I don't know what kind of numbers there are, but I have to imagine it's pretty big, you know, eat from year to year. And what if they get like Comic Con, the other big one, which I think is in San Diego to come to Vegas, which I think would be a really good fit and that'd be kind of crazy and another big get. That's kind of maybe the future, like moving away from industrial type of conventions and more towards the younger age media type of thing. Vegas is a perfect fit for it for sure. As you say, TwitchCon has been in San Diego like Comic Con and moving to Vegas and I agree with you. I think that Las Vegas is moving into that experience direction, which is going to attract a lot more young people and we've seen all the music festivals, all this stuff. This is sort of part of that, even though it is a convention. So it's gonna be held October 20th through 22nd at the Las Vegas Convention Center. So at the main convention center shows you how big this event is and it's deemed as an epic celebration of the streamers, games, chatters, mods, cosplayers, communities, and more that bring us all together. So you're gonna dress up as a as an orca or something? I don't know. Isn't that a big thing like female gamers dress up as like the players they're playing in stream on Twitch and stuff. So I'm sure it'll be kind of like Comic Con-esque of people in costumes and everything for the gamers and the games themselves. But I think it'll be a fun experience. Something to check out. Yeah, for sure. All right, Mark. So one of the big questions people have is why doesn't Nevada not have a lottery? And I don't think you have to look too far to figure out why Nevada doesn't have a lottery. In fact, it's in our Constitution that we don't have a lottery. And that's mainly I think to make the casinos happy, especially nowadays. But one legislator, he's trying to do this. I think several people over the years have tried to do this, but he's proposing a law to get rid of the ban on lotteries saying that, you know, billions of dollars a year could be going into providing mental health funding for youth. And that's a good point, because if you look at the numbers from other states, like Ohio, I think takes in over like 1.6 billion a year from the lottery, something crazy like that. Unfortunately, because it's a constitutional amendment, it would have to pass the legislature twice and then go on the ballot for Nevada voters. Who I think would approve it. So hopefully this happens. Lotteries are controversial, but everybody's just driving a prim anyway and buying tickets. Yeah, I don't get really why the casinos are against this. I guess you can say like, hey, if they spend $10 on lottery, that's $10 less that they'll spend at the casino. But most of these are local people that would be buying the lottery tickets and they're already leaving the state to do it when it becomes a big draw. You know, we've done that video in the past of people lined up for hours just to buy lottery tickets across the border. So, you know, what are they fighting against here? It's not like the strip casinos are getting their money anyway. Maybe the local casinos, but playing lottery isn't the same as going to casino and doing slots. I think people would do both. I don't think it's like they're going to take money from their casino money and then play the lottery with that. I think it's just they'll be spending more money on gambling. Maybe that's a bad thing, but you know, I do like that they're aiming at mental health for children. And that's of course, assuming that the money actually goes there when if it does ever happen, you know, you never know. Call me skeptical on that. Well, I think they could put it into the law so that the money is legally required to go where it has to go. Then they just changed the law, Sean. That's what they do. That always could happen. Now, if this does happen in the soonest would be 2026 because of all the hurdles and there have been over a dozen different attempts over the years to get rid of this law. So, God, hold your breath. Although the casinos did say that they're willing to participate in a discussion about this and they're you know, so we'll see how it all turns out, but don't hold your breath. But yeah, dear point, we're funding California, right? Yeah, yeah, true. And like California needs more tax money. They don't sell. But point number two, put lottery machines in the casinos, allow them to sell it, allow them to take a rake of it. If they have a winner or whatever they get their cut, whatever it normally works out to for these things, if you give them the chance to sell those, then I think it'd be fine. And that's, you know, something I see in Canada when you go over there, they have like a little lottery spot to buy the regular tickets just outside the casino door. So there's precedent can be done, and then that gets them on board. That's there we go. I've fixed all the problems of Vegas. Once again, Mark, in five minutes has fixed everything that Ailes us here. Let us know what you guys think about the lottery. Is it a good idea? Are we just wasting money sending it to other states, to Arizona, to California? So yeah, let us know down in the comments. Mark, I wanted to do a quick Tillman Fertita wealth update, specific around windstock. We know Tillman Fertita is planning to build a new casino on the south strip on the corner of Carmen in Las Vegas Boulevard. He's consolidated some of the lots down there. And we don't know how much that's going to cost. But back in October, we learned that he took the second largest stake in wind resorts, 6.9 million shares. Elaine, when the only larger shareholder of wind resorts, when he bought that stock, it was $54.48 a share back on October 19th. What do you think it's worth now? Oh man, it's since we're doing the update double. I'm guessing something like that almost exactly double. It's now worth $109 in one cent or as of right before we recorded the show, meaning that he made $376,257,000 since he bought the windstock. Yeah, basically doubling his initial investment, a little bit more than doubling actually. So a good down payment on that new casino. Why weren't we like just jumping in with this guy back when it went down? I know we would have missed like the initial spike, but there's got to be at least an extra 30 bucks. It went up since we first talked about this. So we're dumb. Yeah, and that's why he has so many billions of dollars. And hopefully this is good news for his casino project. This will help him fund it or whatever or the rich keep getting richer. But it's an interesting thing because windstock has rebounded tremendously in just a few months as have other casino stocks. When is winning? There you go. So Mark Meltzer shared on Twitter the odds of who's going to perform at the Las Vegas Super Bowl halftime show in a year. And of course the killers, the hometown favorite of Las Vegas, their odds are probably the worst because they're probably most favored to do it. I was surprised to see all the way on the other end of the list way Newton at plus 3000. I could see way Newton not being a headliner, but I could certainly see them bringing him in. So I don't know what the rules of this bet are, but I would probably take way Newton for a cameo. Yeah, I don't know the killers, you know, besides Mr. Brightside, where they're going to play for 20 minutes, I just don't think that they have the amount of songs to fill it. Maybe they come out for spotting. And it's always, you know, people think, oh, local person, let's, they're going to get it. And rarely ever works out that way. Like we don't see a lot of local performers in their Super Bowl. So I was kind of surprised to see Beyonce on there, since she's already done it. I don't think anybody has anybody ever done it twice? Maybe as I don't know, but maybe as like a backup, you know, with supporting somebody else, you know, usually they have multiple performers. So I'm not sure. But there is one Vegas performer missing from this list of odds. The the magical man himself? Yeah, I mean, I think that he definitely deserves to be on the list and doing something at halftime. Chris Angel plus one million. There you go. Put a dollar on it. I mean, the totally worth that bet, right? I mean, we're doing things have happened. Yeah, I mean, you never know. That'd be great. What if whoever does the halftime show, if they saw that, they should just have him come out for some reason, just have people pay out. Well, we'll we'll lobby to get it. You can't unfortunately bet on that in Las Vegas. I think those are overseas books that are holding those odds. But hopefully, Wayne Newton gets some love though, Mr. Las Vegas himself. I know his voice I've heard is not the best these days. Wayne Newton with Elvis local likes on stage payout doubles, but you can parlay it right there. It doesn't get more Vegas than that. So Mark, I did get to go down to the new wildfire Fremont and check it out your beloved IHOP there and the tacos you got a stack. Did you get a big stack? I did. I was too worried about getting shut down filming. So I was trying to be careful there. Not that I was doing anything that should be against the rules, but you never know when you're in such a small casino, because wildfire is there like micro casino. And so it's all kind of like one big room has a center bar, which is really beautiful TVs, a sports ticker on there. And the design language reminds me of some of their nicer properties like Red Rock, like Green Valley Ranch. So even though, you know, this is a smaller casino in downtown Las Vegas, it looks very, very nice. And the tacos El Perstor more of a fast food place, IHOP is sort of their restaurant. A ton of machines though, a few hundred machines in there. And like I said, that center bar looks like a cool place to hang out. It doesn't look like they were cheap on this. It looks like they built it pretty nice. And it should be a good venue. I also liked that the shopping center that they built next door and the apartments behind there that are also on the show boat land are named after the show boat. So they give a little bit of love to the property that used to be there. Now, size, you know, for us that aren't have been there. What would you say compared to like Ellis Island, the size of the casino is a bigger. It looks bigger from the the walkthroughs I've seen. But what would you say like, you know, twice as big as Ellis Island or or what's your feel on that? No, I'd say it's probably about half the size of Ellis Island. Maybe. Oh, really? Definitely smaller than Ellis Island's casino. The casino knows Island feels so tiny. And for some reason that felt more spacious to be on the videos. But I guess that just shows your video can be deceiving. Yeah, it's not that big. There's a lot of employees there too and security and everything else. There was more, I'd say, employees there than there were customers, although I went like fairly early on Saturday morning. So it wasn't a busy time at all. But no, it's not that big at all. The IHOP sits on one end. The taco's place on the other end. And then, you know, the bar in the middle and then machines. It's just a big open space. So it's not as big as Ellis Island, kind of similar to other wildfire casinos for people who know around town. But yeah, it's really nice. This isn't an area you're going to walk to from the Fremont Street experience. But for locals, this is a great option to avoid the boulder strip and to have something nice and new kind of a neighborhood vibe there. And like I said, the TVs, the bar, the whole setup is very modern. So you're going to get a good experience going there. So I really like it. And I think station casinos did a good job. All right, Mark, our big story of the week is Rio. In fact, a little behind the scenes stuff, we recorded a whole segment about Rio in our last show, only to have the bombshell news about the ballpark rumor coming back. So let's start with this. They're saving the pillows. They're saving money on pillows because they know they're gonna sell. That's yeah, we saw this on Twitter, where apparently they run out of pillows quite often at Rio. You call down, they're like, no more pillows. Too many people are holding big parties there, getting, you know, six, seven, eight people to hang out in the suites. The rooms are pretty cheap. Caesar seems to have one step out the door. So we know something's happening with Rio. We'll talk about that in a minute. But yeah, I mean, I can't believe Caesar's is let it get to this point. Yeah, it's just a shame. It's something so simple. And you know, they're not sold out. So it's not like there's no pillows to be had, but to just tell people we're out of pillows, you can't get extra. And a lot of hotels or casinos will only give you like two or three pillows sometimes. And that's just not enough, especially with how thin they usually are. So it's kind of crazy and definitely shows that either they know something's coming or Caesar's is like, hey, we're at the end of this. We don't really care, whatever. But you know, those are players that you want to get to go to your other casino. So it doesn't make sense to me. Yeah, it seems like ever since that place reopened, following COVID knowing that Caesar's was going to leave, it's just been completely neglected. And Dreamscape did who is the new owners did confirm this week that they will take management possession in 2023. So Caesar's, even though they sold the property over three years ago, and I think they were their original contract was two years with a one year extension. It seems like they're past that now, but whatever they've worked out, they haven't announced. But Caesar's on the way out. Dreamscape just raised $850 million in capital in order to fund their operations, their real estate investment trust, all of their investments. Now we had thought maybe this was going to be used for the redevelopment of the Rio because we hadn't heard a lot about its conversion into Hyatt and everything else. And it still may well be, but then the rumor came that the A's are seriously considering the Rio site as a ballpark site once again. And Dreamscape confirmed that that they've been in conversations basically for years about this. Although they're seriously looking at it now, there are scenarios where you could build a ballpark on the back end of that land and still leave the Rio intact, which I think would be incredible for Dreamscape if they could keep the property with a hotel attached to the ballpark and everything else. So we don't quite know what's going to go on at Rio, but a ballpark is back in the mix and Rio hopefully will get some sort of love, but will it be torn down? We don't know. Yeah, I mean, if I was them, I'd be like, here take this land for free on the backside because it's going to just add value to your property and then bring people in there in a way that hasn't been in a long time. So it'd be cool to see. Now, I went back and looked at the renderings of the park in what they had pitched to do in Oakland, and that thing looks amazing. I'm for that one solely because it looks like the coolest ballpark option, but that was done back in like 2018. So it just seems like it's never going to happen. Vegas is now, you know, Oakland of the southeast, I guess you could say, if they take both the teams. I don't know, but it'd be kind of crazy to steal the whole town's sporting events. But yeah, I think it'd be a good fit. That makes a lot more sense than Tropicana, for sure. Yeah, and the other sort of one that they're still publicly talking about is the Las Vegas Festival grounds on Sahara and Las Vegas Boulevard. That's owned by Phil Ruffin, the same owner's Treasure Island and Circus Circus. Apparently, the rumor is that he Kibosh the deal to do it. So that deal is off the table, or at least that's the rumor. We saw rumors about the old frontier site win West, but apparently that's back out. So there's still a lot going on. They want a couple hundred million dollars in public financing. We don't know if they'll get it. The governor, Lombardo has said he doesn't support raising taxes for it. And I think the biggest issue is that if we do bring the athletics to Vegas, that we should change the name. They should become a Vegas team. I get why the Raiders stayed the Raiders because they have such a history and fandom, but the A's are drawing what? Couple thousand people a game. We need to make that our own team. That needs to be a stipulation, I think. Come on, they have a history. Haven't you watched Moneyball? That's the only notable thing of the athletics, I think. All right. So here's how it's going to go. They're going to pass the law to sell lottery, say it's for the kids, and then immediately amend it to pay for the land for the Oakland Athletics to come. There you go. That's how it works. There you go. Perfect. I think dreamscape could hit the lottery here if they can get that place redone with a ballpark there. And there is a lot of parking on the back end. They may have to take out their convention center, but I think they could keep the core of the property and still build this stadium. It does seem like that from satellites from the amount of space that they have. They also do have several parking garages there, but who knows what the parking situation would be. This is a great location, especially if they can build a pedestrian bridge over the freeway, get people from the strip. It'll work similar to a legion, and I think it's a great solution. And it could be the best possible thing for Rio. For those of us who love Rio and what it was, not only will it get rejuvenated, but people will have a reason to go over there. And there were some speculation that the reason station casinos bought palms way back in the day was they thought that there would be a stadium here. Palms struggled for them. They didn't do well with it. So everything old is new again. And I don't know, this feels the way that the timing and the way this was released felt a little bit stronger than some of the other things we've heard. But again, that public financing is going to be the real kicker here. But if you're talking a couple hundred million, I think that's actually something you could discuss that maybe you'll actually recoup, or a raiders, you're never getting that money back. That's kind of crazy. But maybe they're just doing it to kick off Vegas as a sports arena type of thing. I don't know. It's billionaires asking for handouts once again, just like we talked about with the NFL asking for volunteers. So it is what it is. They get what they want. So Mark, I hate to talk about weather again, but did you see the crazy trash cans blowing across parking lots? We had a huge windstorm like up to 70 mile per hour winds, tons of flights were canceled. And then the next day it snowed all over Las Vegas. So good times in February. Trash cans. Those were poopers, man. Oh, I'm sorry. Yeah, they were. There's only human trash. There's only human trash inside of those, but no, that was crazy. And then could you like one gets rammed into a car at the end. At first, I'm thinking, okay, they should have taken bets on this, which, you know, which Portage on is going to win this race. And then secondary, could you imagine coming out in the heaven fly file and insurance claim and tell them like, hey, I got hit by a Portage on. I want to tell you. Fun times though, it actually snowed all over Las Vegas, including like where I live in Green Valley, which it rarely snowed because it's the lower elevations. So it was like 70 degrees, couple hours later, 70 mile per hour winds, the next day snow, just another day in the life of a Las Vegas. Do you think this will be like one of those state farm commercials? Like it did happen in Vegas in 2023. I guess weather is a stressful part of life in Las Vegas. But also the rest of life, apparently, is Nevada was ranked as the most stressful state to live in. They kind of, they looked at like US Bureau of Labor Statistics, Center for Disease Control data, all kinds of government data and came up with Nevada as number one. It's the most stressful place to work, the eighth most stressful place for money, the 11th most stressful state for health. So even though we get this crazy weather, we're not doing ourselves any paper here. Yeah, I should say apologies to JK Simmons. It was farmer insurance, not state farm. So, you know, before the comments kill me. But, you know, this kind of makes sense to me, you know, first off, a lot of hospitality jobs in Nevada, you know, focusing on that, whether it be restaurant, hotel, casino type of stuff. And that's always a very stressful job and, you know, an underpaid job. So you're dealing with money issues and then gambling and all that brings into it for money issues. And I feel like a lot of people I've talked to when I'm in Vegas that, you know, moved to Nevada, do it because they have health conditions before they move there and they move there for the dry air and stuff like that. So, you know, kind of all rolls into one. It's a retirement place or at least it used to be. So, this is the first list that makes sense to me. So maybe all the Californians can stop moving here because it's so stressful. This is just propaganda to get people to stop moving in. Yeah, I mean, I get it, right? This is not the easiest place to live, especially historically. I feel like today it's more of a normal city than ever, but we don't have as bad as traffic as other places. Commutes aren't as bad. This is, of course, talking about Las Vegas, whereas the studies talk about Nevada as a whole. But I like that this actually used data instead of just, you know, randomly surveying 100 people on the street. So yeah, it seems interesting and no doubt Las Vegas is a unique place to live. I can see it being extra fun for some people adding to their life, but a lot of that stuff adds to the stress as well. And we don't have a diversity of industry. We're not as well educated as some other states. So we have some struggles there. And I think it shows through in the data. Yeah, it lines up some, you know, I would think not the most I would think California would be more stressful. You know, parts of New York would be more stressful, but you know, it kind of all plays into one, I guess. If you're stressed out, don't move to Vegas. Yeah, and if you have problems with drugs, alcohol, gambling, anything like that, definitely don't move to Vegas. All right, so the Miracle Mileshops at Planet Hollywood, they announced their major renovations. What about a year, maybe a year and a half ago? And they started renovating it bit by bit. And in fact, the the entirety of it's going to be done by this spring. So they're getting to the end of the renovations. And they announced that the rain show, which has been gone since COVID basically, that's that area where the rain comes out of the sky. One of the better cool, free attractions in Las Vegas, it's been closed. And now it's going to reopen. They have a local artist going up there, repainting it. And they're going to do some sort of light and sound show with it. So upgraded tech, good stuff, good news. As we lose more and more free stuff in Las Vegas, good to see this coming back. Yeah, I was just going to say, you know, we've lost a lot of the free shows. The that unique thing that Vegas always had pretty much every casino, it felt like, had something and one by one, they've gone away. And you know, the volcano is going to be going away at some point soon. And so it's good to see them bring this back. And I always did think, you know, back in the day, going through that mall, it always did feel kind of dark, a little dreary, it was, you know, opposite of what you'd see outside and your eyes would need to adjust. So I like that they're brightening it up and modernizing it, changing the floor and the lighting and all that stuff. So hopefully it makes it more of a welcoming when you come in. But I wish they still had the free parking that that kind of sticks. I don't know why anybody would go shopping there if they're not staying on the strip. The new owners, they have brightened it up a lot. Brand new lighting brand. That's really what their goal is to lighten it all up. There are some things from the desert passage shops, the old days that they've left some of that, the city architecture and some of the desert stuff. It's gotten a facelift top to bottom, the whole facade, everything. And it's good to see that. But for me, I'm really excited about the rain show because it's been a while since I've seen it and walking by it every time just sort of seeing it. And the, you know, the spigots in the ceiling and nothing going on has been depressing. So I'm really happy to hear this. And by April, I think is when they said everything should be done. So you should have the complete new miracle model shops with the new frontage, the brighter interiors and the rain show. Yeah, it's worth pointing out some of the better deals, dining-wise on the strip are in there. And a lot of people don't know it because you walk by it and you're like, I'm in Vegas. I don't want to go to a mall. So why would I go in there? And if you want something cheap, eat good food, they definitely have quite a few options for you. That's definitely the place for people looking for food deals on the strip. Now getting some love also is the project that you don't think is going to happen. The Bright Line train from Rancho Cucamonga to Las Vegas. Last year, they secured the rights along the I-15. So they now have the rights to the land. They're still doing environmental surveys. And this week, they reached a deal with all of the rail workers unions to help get this thing done. So they're behind getting this project. It's still requiring some federal money, I think, to help out. They still have to issue bonds and try to get it. So the financing isn't all there. But this is the furthest along rail project ready to go in the US. So they're looking to get funding to get it going. And Bright Line has built that train in South Florida about to open their Orlando extension. So if anybody can get it done, it's probably them. Still an uphill battle. But they keep knocking these things out. So moving forward. Yeah, I mean, as time goes on, it seems more and more like it's going to happen. And I love the updates because you get to say Rancho Cucamonga or Cucamonga. What? I'd say it sounds nicer than it is. Could you rather say where are you from? Oh, from Nevermind. Yeah. So I'm excited. I think that this is great. I'm actually really excited for the Orlando one to give you another option if you're flying into Florida and you want to check out that area. So if that goes well, I would imagine that helps out in the Vegas Avenue. And hopefully we can relieve some of that stress that's on the roadway. There's the word stress again. And this would help with some of that in the backups that we've seen, and especially with all the construction going on now and which will happen in the future, is that if this was in place, it would help out a lot right now. Yeah, I think it's definitely something that's needed. There are people who say, you know, naysayers of the project because it only goes to Rancho Cucamonga where you'll be able to link up to LA's regional transportation system there. But that's still pretty far outside of LA. So we'll have to see how it all works out there. But you know, I feel like they've had struggles and they're going to have a station in Rancho Cucamonga, one in Victorville and then the one on the South Strip. They've already acquired that land at Warm Springs in Las Vegas Boulevard. They also announced that there's going to be overpasses for wildlife and that they're going to continue to maintain everything that's there because there's already some that are there on the interstate, but they're going to build new ones. So they're really trying to not impact the environment. And hopefully this will be the time that it gets done. Everybody likes to leave comments. I remember Amtrak had a train here or they announced having to bring back their train and it's never going to happen. There have been so many rail projects that have failed, but this one has been going on since the Desert Express days. It's been going on quite a long time. So like you said, maybe at this point, we'll actually get it. All right, Mark. So let's talk about this. This conversation was inspired by a tweet from Vegas introverts basically saying if you could get a free hotel and flight to Vegas, but could only stay in play at your least favorite place in nowhere else, which property is it? And would you go? Yeah, you know, I thought about this for a little bit because Vegas is Vegas. Like, you know, there's not really a terrible place to be. I mean, but if you were like stuck inside that casino hotel, couldn't go outside, couldn't do anything else, you know, which one would be your least favorite. And Caesars was up there for me just because I get confused every time I'm in there, I've been there, stayed there a handful of times and I still get lost and the setup is terrible. And they're not a lot of fun. They yell at me every time. So that was on the list, but I had to go with my, you know, my old hate, monger, uh, hair as because it's just so blah. And if I was stuck in a place, you know, I don't want a holiday and pool to hang out at. And you know, the rest of the restaurants and bars aren't the best. And yeah, so I'd go with Harris and then would I still go heck yeah, if I can get away from the kids and I can drink beer, I'm going to go. I mean, because Harris isn't that bad. That's why you'd still go, you know, put yourself in like, in somewhere that's really bad. I, for me, I had to think about this because, you know, I don't hate anything on the strip, but I think Excalibur would be the place just because I am such a hotel room guy and the rooms there are very, very much out of the old Vegas playbook. So even like the lower end hotels and much of the rest of the strip have been upgraded, or they're more modern, but yeah, the rooms that Excalibur aren't really doing it for me. And the whole casino is kind of old and not updated. And so I feel like that's probably my least favorite property, although I have a lot of great memories of being there as a kid. So, but yeah, I would go. I mean, why not? You got something to do. There you go. Yeah. So yeah, I mean, it's good stuff, but I wonder what everybody out there because people have such like hatred for certain properties. I don't really have that, but there are people who say I love that property. I absolutely hated that property. So I'd love to hear what people say down there. And then if you did it and it was all free, would you still go to your least favorite property? I think Vegas introvert said Park MGM, which is a little shocking to me, but I think it's a terrible call. Park is pretty nice. I mean, it's a little ball for sure. Yeah, I thought it was kind of crazy, just because you have Eataly there, you have Nomad, you know, they have quite a few nice restaurants and bars. And it is a newer feeling hotel casino, you know, brighter, all that stuff. So I'm kind of I was surprised by that. But you know, that's what like we've said, everybody has their things usually based on something that happened while you were there, whether it be losing money, bad experience, bad dealer, bad waitress, like, you know, I rip on the Bellagio all the time for the service I got there. I won't go back because of that several that happened several different times. So maybe that's the one I should say that I don't want to get stuck in really trigger some folks. Yeah, I mean, we both have bad stays of Bellagio. So I could see putting that there, but not not quite to the level of hatred at Bellagio. But yeah, it's an interesting things. I'd love to hear the comments, what everybody has to say about that. What is your least favorite place and would you take a free vacation there? Now, one of the biggest things in Las Vegas has been the change over the last few years of separating out the land and the management of a casino. We saw MGM and Caesars sell off pretty much all of their properties and then just maintain expensive leases to operate them. And there was an interesting article in the review journal this week talking about how some companies are not going that route, specifically boy gaming station casinos and fountain blue, all kind of saying that they prefer the flexibility that they don't need the money for that type of financing that maybe there's better ways to operate their casinos. And even station casino says that their average customer comes five times a month, meaning that they have to have better control over the building so that they can renovate and keep it updated. And that's something that's been interesting with these sales is how are they keeping up with maintenance. We've talked about how Vegas hotels are falling apart. Is that why? Because you have separate operators and managers. It does seem like a roadblock and it's good to see there's a few companies that at least for now are keeping their land. Yeah, it definitely seems short-sighted to me as a business model. And I understand if you need cash flow or you want to expand this is a way to do it and recuperate some of that value that you have in your company. But down the line, what's this going to look like when rents go way up? This is something that when I worked at Kmart and college, they had signed a 30 year lease where they're paying $3,000 a month. And then it came up towards the end of when I was working there and it jumped up to $30,000 a month. Well, they couldn't handle that and they end up closing the store. And they're like, well, it was such a good deal back then. But if you had built it, then you'd still own it. So it will be interesting to see how this plays out in the future. You don't have total control. You can't do whatever you want to the property. You need to get approval for things. So it'd be frustrating on that aspect too. And do you invest as much money and infrastructure and all that if it's not your own? So I think it's going to hurt us. They won't be as unique or updated. And then it'll hurt them long term when when those rates rise. And then we've also seen the phenomenon where most of the strip is now owned by either Blackstone or Veachy properties who is the largest land holder here. And they hold land across different casino operators. And you know, they're making those decisions on the maintenance and everything else. Or at least they have something to say with it. So yeah, I think it's not good long term. We'll see financially how it works out. It seems to have worked out okay for some of the companies now. But yeah, it's a it's an interesting phenomenon. Good to see them speaking out. And we do have some new owners coming in. Hopefully Tillman for Tita he'll own the land. Ganting owns the land where where resource world is. Of course, I said fountain blue. But we have an interesting redevelopment in Hard Rock where they don't own the land. So we'll see how that whole process plays out as they have to work with the land owners to get everything done and to get it all there. So interesting stuff. Chime in in the comments. Let us know what you think about this. Is this all going to end badly? And then finally, Mark, I wanted to talk about the Raiders practice facility. I talked about it on the last show that I would discuss it. They had an open house, I guess, for sweet holders and club ticket holders. Basically, where you were able to come, they had like a free gift and you got to tour the practice facility. And as far as I know, this is the first time the public has been allowed in the practice facility, just basically because of COVID. Maybe they have had some events there, but it hasn't been something that a lot of people have been able to do. And it's a really cool facility. It's over in West Henderson, nearly Emory Zord. What's really interesting is it's surrounded by dirt still. So you have this kind of state of the art facility, these huge outdoor practice fields and just beyond it is just dirt. So it just looks like anywhere else in Las Vegas. Yeah, I'm surprised that they have outdoor fields at all, you know, because during training camp and everything, it's pretty hot in Vegas. So I wouldn't want to be out there. But I guess, you know, as the season goes on, they can get out there and practice some. But yeah, it looked, you know, I looked at the pictures and stuff that you guys posted and it looked pretty amazing and everything in the NFL state of the art. So it's cool to get a little peek behind the scenes and see what kind of facilities they get to deal with every day and all the pampering they get and all the, you know, high tech stuff they get to recuperate. Think about like 30 years ago in the NFL, if you got hurt, you didn't have any of the stuff that they have now to get back on the field quickly. Yeah. And as you said, this place is state of the art. There were a few places where they didn't let us take pictures or videos. We got to go inside the locker room, which is cool because this is their main locker room. Right? This is the one that they're using every day, not the one at the stadium where they only use it on game days. So that was cool to walk around. Unfortunately, no videos or pictures in there. But you had like the areas where the players hang out. You got to see all their lockers, which was neat. The place does have like a lot of interesting stuff in the gym and has cold plunges and all that sort of stuff. State of the art workout equipment. Again, we weren't able to take pictures in the gym. There's an outdoor swimming pool there, but the real cool part, I guess for any fan or anybody is just going on the indoor field. And it's basically a full football field plus another 40 yards at the end. So like one and a half fields so that they can, you know, practice in different ways. You have the full goal pose. And you know, it's just like being on a football field inside, I suppose. But it was cool. All the offices sort of overlooked that. Raider staff super friendly gave us some Raiders cookies and some hot chocolate. It was a fun time and I was excited to do it thanks to my friend for inviting me since I don't have season tickets. Unfortunately, but it was a good time. And I think that this is maybe if they ever open this up for tours, this could be a more interesting tour than a Legion. It's cool to see the big stadium, but to see the like behind the scenes of all the training and everything else, the press room, all of that was really cool. Yeah, I think for any, you know, big time football fan though, they would rather see the practice facilities. The stadiums are cool and check out just to say you've been in the stadium, but you don't get, you know, as much of the day to day stuff you get. Now I wonder, you know, did they charge for the snack machines? Did you notice like they're doing moneyball or was it free for all the players? I didn't. So they do have a full cafeteria there, which was closed. We couldn't go inside of it, but a full cafeteria where they have a chef or multiple chefs on staff, they said that make the players whatever they want. So I think everything in there is free for the players and it's a huge, good at football. Dang. It looks like a cool place to work and hang out and, you know, all the offices for all the front office staff and everything else, but it looks like a neat place. It's about 10, 15 minutes from a Legion stadium. Most of the players live up in that area, so they're pretty close to home. And now we just need to know if Aaron Rodgers is coming. Hey, if you want them to come to our Pito, your team, there you go. Well, he already forpeded up my other team. So what else can I do? Thank you for listening to this episode of the MTM Vegas podcast. As a reminder, you can find all of our Vegas content at mtmvegas.com. Thanks for listening. Have a great week.