We'd somehow missed this story and had to investigate your question before we could answer it, but it came as no surprise that our good Mayor had made some outlandish bet with someone.
Never one to shun the opportunity to grab a headline, nor to make a wager on pretty much anything at all*, Oscar Goodman in late May bet Mark Mallory, his mayoral counterpart in Cincinnati, that the Las Vegas Wranglers would beat the Cincinatti Cyclones in the Kelly Cup finals.
"If the Mayor of Cincinnati wants to make a bet, I'll bet him the Ohio River for the Fremont Street Experience," said Mayor Goodman.
In addition, Goodman said he'd agree to wear a Cincinnati Cyclones jersey during an upcoming council meeting if the Cyclones won the ECHL national championship, providing that Mayor would agree to wear a Wranglers jersey at a council meeting if Las Vegas was the victor.
When Cincinnati defeated Sin City, the self-proclaimed Happiest Mayor on Earth, looking slightly less than jubilant, made good on at least part of the bet by donning a Cyclones jersey for the June 18 Las Vegas City Council meeting.
Whether Mayor Mallory had accepted the Fremont Street/Ohio River portion of the bet remains murky, but we're pretty sure neither dignitary was actually in a position to bet one of their city's major landmarks, so we're guessing that part of the challenge was voided and that the jersey wearing was all that was required to settle the wager. Last time we looked, the Fremont Street Experience was alive and well in downtown Las Vegas and we figure we'd have heard if anyone had tried to relocate it to southern Ohio.
*The Mayor, whose credits include playing himself in the movie Casino and is the subject of the John Smith biography, Of Rats & Men, once famously stated, "I gamble on anything that moves. I don't participate in the table games, but I love to bet on sports. I bet on cockroaches: if they turn left or right. I'm a big sports fan." Below you can see him sporting the Cyclones jersey, together with some of our other favorite images of the Mayor, courtesy of "Fox5 News," the Las Vegas Review-Journal, the New York Times, and Opportunity Village.
