Just when it looked like hope was all but lost for Tropicana Entertainment CEO Scott Butera in his quest to regain the Tropicana Atlantic City, some slippery moves by Cordish Co. have put the Trop back in play ... and possibly straight into Butera's arms.

After fumble-prone Trop trustee Justice Gary Stein spurned several purchase offers (including a hefty one from Cordish) last spring, the economy went southward in a hurry and so did interest in the Trop. Cordish, no fools they, lowered their offer to $550 million. UNLV's David G. Schwartz has made a persuasive case that if Cordish's second offer wasn't right on the money it was in the ballpark. However, now Cordish wants a red-tag sale discount of undisclosed proportions, despite claiming to be "absolutely enthusiastic" about its would-be acquisition.

With TropEnt owner William J. Yung III basically neutered (though not yet out of the picture entirely), creditors want the Trop entrusted to Butera. But the New Jersey Casino Control Commission, seemingly blind to reality, has given Stein a fifth extension on his decreasingly fruitful negotiations. The NJCCC and its appointee have handled this interminable transaction with manifest incompetence from start to finish and the vaudeville hook is overdue.

Butera's creditors are owed $1.3 billion. If his 2009 EBIDTA projections (which include the A.C. Trop) are correct, a sale of the whole TropEnt kit 'n kaboodle at 8X cash flow -- an optimistic prospect, I admit -- would bring roughly $1.25 billion. So, in theory, he's within shooting distance of making them whole. Heck, the X factor of being on the Las Vegas Strip for cheap would likely goose the asking price sufficiently to close the gap and then some.

As for Cordish, while $550 million for the Trop may reflect fair market value, trying to discount it to, say, a Trump Marina fire-sale price would be highway robbery. The Trop is a middle-of-the-pack performer on the Boardwalk and its MSRP should reflect that. Of course, to quote Margaret Carlson, the fact that I want a million dollars and a Porsche (in my case, a Mercedes) doesn't mean I'm going to get them.

Still, it seems clear that the NJCCC has two choices -- three, if you include prolonging the galumphing Stein/Cordish song-and-dance act. Regulators can either take their chances in bankruptcy court and risk getting very little indeed -- or simply banish those visions of dollar signs that dance in their heads. I humbly resubmit my sub-solomonic solution: Give TropEnt a one-year probationary license and take it from there.