To no one's surprise, yesterday the Clark County Commissioners unanimously approved the development agreement for the Athletics' stadium. The agreement laid out a number of regulations concerning the construction and operation of the stadium, including infrastructure costs, air and water quality, and police and fire department posts. The commission's approval was also needed before the A's could begin to access the $380 million in public funding for the project, though first, the team must set the maximum cost of the stadium, finalize other financial requirements, and spend an initial $100 million, which it hasn't done. Yet another "update" on the project, including the team's adherence to the agreement, is expected at the next Las Vegas Stadium Authority meeting in November. Meanwhile, there's the recently announced Bally's hotel-casino plan for the site and if you'd like to read one of the more vociferous and amusing screeds that we've seen in a while, you can click on this link to a post from the other day at VitalVegas.
Rod Stewart will make an encore encore appearance, reprising this year's "Encore Shows" next spring. The 80-year-old Stewart opened his residency at the Colosseum at Caesars in 2011 and logged 200 performances through 2024. Due to popular demand, he returned this year for three shows: tonight, Friday, and Saturday. The six new concerts will take place on May 27, 29, and 30 and June 2, 4, and 6. The presale runs through tomorrow and the general tickets go on sale Friday at 10 p.m. PT.
Here's a roundup of upcoming mini-residencies and concerts. Classic rockers Styx will play five nights at their Las Vegas home, the Venetian, on January 23, 24, 28, 30, and 31. The band will perform its concept album, Pieces of Eight, in its entirety. Also at the Venetian, the Beach Boys will do three shows on October 1, 3, 4; actor and drummer-guitarist John Stamos will join the band as a special guest, as he's been doing on and off for 40 years. Also at the Venetian, the alternative-indie Southern rock band Kings of Leon will close out 2025 with two shows on December 30 and 31. Finally, former member of the English-Irish boy band One Direction and now successful solo artist, Zayn will do a seven-show stint at Dolby Live at Park MGM: January 20, 21, 24, 25, 28, 30, and 31. Tickets for all these shows are on sale now.
A story in the New York Post reveals that Las Vegas' famous underground house is for sale again for $8.5 million. It has some good photos above and below ground and a few details that we've also written about in QoDs over the years, the most recent of which was in March 2024.
The Sahara is running a no-resort-fee special through October 31. You must book by August 10. The waived RF saves you $54.95 per night. And self-parking is still free at the Sahara.
Thanks to all the new apartment buildings going up all over the valley, prices for rentals are starting to drop, almost into the affordable range. A study from real estate brokerage Redfin found that the median rent for all rentals (no matter how many bedrooms) here was $1,475 at the end of September, a 1.5 percent decrease from August. Upwards of 8,000 new apartment units will have opened in 2024 by the end of the year. Signs outside apartment complexes advertise all kinds of move-in incentives, including several months of free rent, discounts on rent, free carpet cleaning, even free gym memberships. According to Zumper.com, the average rent for a one-bedroom apartment in Las Vegas is $1,250 and a two-bedroom is slightly higher than Redfin's inclusive median at $1,497.
Going into today's final round of the U.S. Open golf tournament, Bryson DeChambeau with a 3-stroke lead is the -125 favorite to win. He’s followed by Rory McIlroy at +325 and Patrick Cantlay at +825.
MGM Resorts has definitely gotten into the holiday spirit. In Las Vegas, that means raising prices on the hordes of visitors who come here for Christmas and New Year's and without prior warning, the company raised parking fees on Wednesday for out of towners. Monday through Thursday, it's a flat fee of $18 per day, Friday-Sunday $23. They were $15/$20 for the first four hours, but that opportunity no longer knocks. And like Caesars all the time, the first hour is no longer free. Nevada residents still get the first three hours free, but of course, few locals go to the Strip. We've seen various stories call these "holiday" rates, but nothing has been posted about their rescission. We'll be anxiously awaiting the announcement that the fees have gone back to "normal."
Kentucky is on deck to start sports betting in three weeks. Retail locations are scheduled to open on September 7 and mobile betting will launch on September 28. Kentucky will become the 35th state, plus Washington, D.C., where sports betting is legal and live; in three other states (Maine, Vermont, and Florida), sports betting is legal, but not yet live. And it looks like Rhode Island will become the seventh state with legal online slots and table games when they go live on April 1. Bally's, which holds a monopoly on casino gambling in its home state with Bally’s Twin River Lincoln and Bally’s Tiverton, will be the sole igaming operator with third-party partner Stakelogic.
A delivery of live lobsters to Barry's Steakhouse at Circa contained a rare orange lobster (they're almost always a mottled brown, only turning bright red when they're cooked). As soon as he saw it, Barry Dukake, the owner of the restaurant, knew how rare it was. Until recently, the odds of finding an orange live lobster were on in 30 million, but two recently turned up at Florida and Mississippi Red Lobsters, so that number has been downgraded to one in 10 million. Still, that's like winning the lottery and Dukake delivered the orange crustacean to the SeaQuest Las Vegas aquarium at the Boulevard Mall, where he'll be on display till succumbing to natural causes. The chances of turning up a yellow lobster are still one in 30 million, a blue lobster one in two million, and an albino lobster one in 100 million.
A poll conducted by the Washington Post and University of Maryland concluded that 66% of Americans support the legality of betting on professional sports. A similar survey conducted in 1993 found that only 41% were in favor of sports betting, while one from 2017, shortly before the Supreme Court overturned PASPA, put the number of supporters at 55%. As far as college sports are concerned, only 49% approved of betting on them. A total of 71% of respondents were either somewhat or very concerned about the danger of gambling addiction; 4% of the random 1,503 people surveyed admitted to a gambling problem. Nearly three out of four worried about games being fixed, while fully 85% of those who'd placed a bet in the past five years agreed that the game was "more interesting" to watch.
The World Series of Poker $10,000-buy-in championship tournament, best known as the Main Event, will begin today, with Flight A launching at 11 a.m. Flight B will start tomorrow, Flight C on Tuesday, and Flight D on Wednesday. Based on attendance at the many WSOP tournaments that began on May 31, this year's Main Event could break the record for number of entrants set in 2006: 8,773. WSOP officials say that registrations for all events have surpassed 100,000 so far this year, with $150 million in prize money. The Main Event final table will run July 15 and 16 at Bally’s Event Center.
The four mobile-betting operators that launched in New York on January 8 combined for a $603 million handle through January 16, the first nine days of legal sports betting in the Empire State. Together, they net $48.2 million, an 8% hold, and will pay upwards of $25 million in taxes at New York's 51% tax rate. The New York State Gaming Commission is publishing weekly results to start and those reveal that Caesars (William Hill) leads the pack with a $258 million handle and 8.8% hold, followed by FanDuel ($200 million and 7.1%), DraftKings ($134 million, 8.1%), and BetRivers ($10.6 million, 4.2%). BetMGM launched on January 17, so its numbers will be reported next week; Bally Bet, PointsBet, Resorts World Bet, and WynnBET have yet to go live, but are expected to soon.
It happened way back in 2011, so Don Johnson's beating Borgata, Caesars, and the Tropicana out of $15 million is a pretty familiar story by now. But this latest coverage in The Atlantic puts the whole saga into one long magazine piece. It's definitely worth of read to get a glimpse into who Johnson is and how (in part) he did it.
The World Series of Poker Main Event started on Monday, with the first three of six starting flights. Yesterday was Day 2 for the players who entered on Monday; it was also Day 1 for the fourth through sixth starting flights, whose Day 2 will happen today. Doyle Brunson, 88, is playing and squeaked through yesterday, while Phil Hellmuth made his usual late entrance, starting at the end of the sixth flight dressed in a flowing white robe, sporting a long white wig and beard, and carrying a staff as Gandalf the White from The Lord of the Rings and trailed by 10 bathing beauties. Totally low key. The player count broke 6,400 last night; the official number of entries will be announced in the next couple of days.
Zouk Nightclub finally made its first appearance over the weekend, with a star-studded lineup of DJs led by Tiësto and a sold-out crowd.
The 36,000-square-foot entertainment venue features three "experiences": Capital Bar, the first room guests enter, with an LED canopy and a 360-degree bar; Empire, which boasts LED paneling and four chandeliers; and the main room, Zouk, with two bars, a 1,000-square-foot dance floor, and the "Mothership," a state-of-the-art lighting system that moves around the room. Like all things Resort World, Zouk is touted as Las Vegas' most technologically advanced nightlife venue, using a booking system for tickets, VIP tables, and guest lists that eliminates all the line-waiting and palm-greasing. Zouk Nightclub is open 10 p.m. to 4 a.m., Thursday through Sunday.
After shutting down its suites Sunday through Wednesday nights last July, then closing them completely in December, the Palazzo is reopening them, starting tonight. Though the rest of the resort's amenities remained open, room demand fell so far short that the Venetian's 4,049 suites easily handled it for the past seven months. It's another sign that the recovery is well under way.
For the first time since November 3, the 14-day positivity rate of new coronavirus cases has fallen below 10% statewide. The Nevada Department of Health and Human Services reported the encouraging statistic, 9.9%, yesterday. More good news: The 301 new cases were well below the 14-day moving average of 377 per day; best of all, "only" four deaths were reported, compared to the 13 averaged daily over the past 14 days.
The prospects for allowing online sports betting in New York continue to improve, with the potential to generate an estimated $20 billion handle. However, there’s concern that the state will run the concession exclusively, disallowing competition from multiple operators, a practice that has proven to truncate results in other markets, e.g., Montana, Oregon, and Rhode Island.
As of yesterday, anyone 21 and older residing in the city limits of Las Vegas can get alcohol, including mixed drinks, delivered to their home addresses by restaurants and convenience stores. Hoping to boost sales at businesses hard hit by pandemic restrictions, the Las Vegas City Council expanded a law that allows supermarket deliveries of alcohol to include restaurants, minimarts, and third-party delivery companies, such as Uber Eats and DoorDash, to make the deliveries. Restaurants and delivery services are required to apply for a special a license to sell booze for off-premises consumption. No deliveries to casinos are permitted.
In a briefing yesterday, Metro police announced that upwards of 200,000 people are expected to gather on the Strip and downtown tomorrow night. Though that's 30%-40% fewer than a normal year, police are deploying the typical number of officers for crowd control, 1,200 along the Strip and 200 downtown. They'll enforce the annual rules: no glass, strollers, backpacks, carts or large bags allowed. The Strip from Spring Mountain Road to Mandalay Bay will go on soft lockdown at 7:30 p.m. and be completely shut down to traffic by 8 p.m. It should reopen by around 2 a.m. The county is in the process of installing 4,000 safety barricades; 26 street sweepers and other maintenance personnel will be standing by for the cleanup.
An intriguing article in today's Las Vegas Review-Journal reports that owners of timeshare units and condos in properties on the Strip are renting rooms via Airbnb and VRBO at substantial discounts off what they'd pay by booking direct from the properties. Though the practice is described as "residents running their own hospitality businesses" and "competition in your own building," it's "technically allowed" by places like Signature at MGM Grand, Vdara, Elara, and the Jockey Club, according to the story, as long as the owner has a Clark County business license and pays applicable taxes. In a call-around, the R-J found that a room rented through the Jockey Club listed for $299, while on Airbnb it was $70, Vdara was $185/$92, and Elara was $160/$70. Airbnb renters can avail themselves of the same amenities, but without resort fees, and get to stay in condos/timeshares with full kitchens and living rooms. It's certainly worth comparing, especially if you're planning on staying for long enough that a larger room and eat-in facilities will be more convenient and less expensive.
In one of the stranger twists in the long and winding Monorail saga, a lawsuit has been filed by the World Buddhism Association Headquarters (WBAH) that could stop the sale until WBAH's contention is resolved. To wit, the Monorail doesn't own some of the land it's selling to the Las Vegas Convention Center as part of the deal. Rather, the Monorail has three easements for property owned by the WBAH at the southwest corner of Sahara and Paradise. The WBAH purchased the disputed property for $17.5 million in 2018 to build a temple, the plans of which are still in the works. No word yet from either the Monorail of LVCVA on the lawsuit.
So far in the city's reopening, it's been hard to find share rides and taxicabs. We're seeing and hearing reports that prospective passengers waited up to three hours over the weekend, especially Saturday night, for rides. Drivers are reportedly reluctant to return to work for several reasons: a reluctance to risk infection, long distances between riders diminish profit potential, and the concurrent reduction in unemployment benefits; The cost-benefit ratio is too high to venture out yet. RTC buses, as well, aren't as frequent as before the shutdown; the Strip Deuce schedule is slow in getting back to normal and residential routes remain on Sunday schedules instituted in late March.
The Tropicana sale/leaseback by Penn National to Gaming and Leisure Properties, its real estate spinoff, was completed yesterday. Penn will continue to operate the Trop for two years or more, unless the property is resold by GLPI; Penn won't have to pay any rent, receiving a credit of $307.5 million. In addition, Penn will share in the net proceeds if the property is sold (75% over the $307.5 million in the first year and 50% in the second).
The 175,000 people expected to attend this week's Consumer Electronics Show, one of the largest tech shows in the world and Las Vegas' biggest convention of the year, will have a direct economic impact on the city of $300 million, mostly from company expense accounts. McCarran Airport will add 50,000 inbound/outbound seats this week, with 60,000 of the attendees arriving from abroad. CES will occupy nearly three million square feet of exhibition and meeting space in 11 different venues. It's a biggie.
For quick guides to what's happening here next week for Christmas and Hanukkah, we have blog posts at VegasWithAnEdge that cover both. Here's the link for Christmas and here's the one for Hannukah. Watch this space for updates as more events and specials are announced.
Reba McEntire and Brooks & Dunn have announced 24 more performances of their “Reba, Brooks & Dunn: Together in Vegas” show at the Colosseum. The new dates begin in April and include shows in June, October, and December. The 2020 shows mark the sixth year of the residency, making the trio the longest-running country-music show in Las Vegas. Tickets for the new shows go on sale December 6th.
The only "brunch dayclub" in Las Vegas (which means it serves food at the party) has returned for another season at Lavo, the Italian restaurant at Palazzo. Every Saturday through March from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m., the dayclub scene moves indoors, with fancy food, DJs, go-go dancers, bottle service, special themed events, party favors, and general Millennial wildness with a 3-1 female-to-male ratio. The menu consists of breakfast (eggs, pancakes, waffles, French toast), salads, pizza, burgers, steaks (including a 12-ounce wagyu strip steak encrusted in 24-karat gold), and seafood, in the $15-$125 range. A great description of what goes on at the Lavo Brunch Party, including several good frugal tips, is found at vegasprimer.com/lavo-party-brunch/.
Dan Krohmer, owner of the highly regarded and reviewed Asian seafood restaurant Other Mama, has opened in his second Las Vegas restaurant. Hatsumi is a Japanese eatery that features robata (skewered food slow-grilled over hot charcoal), yakitori (the chicken version of robata), and seafood, with a full bar that includes large selection of sakes. Hatsumi is open now for dinner, Thurs.-Mon., 5-10 p.m.; it's expected to start serving lunch in the near future. It's located at 1028 Fremont Street in the old Ferguson Motel development.