Seats are seen empty prior to the start of a Golden Knights game against the Colombus Blue Jackets at T-Mobile Arena Saturday, Feb. 9, 2019.
Thursday, April 23, 2020 | 2 a.m.
Almost every day, Las Vegas Lights owner/CEO Brett Lashbrook holds a virtual meeting with his soccer team’s staff. And almost every day, Lashbrook imparts some version of the same message.
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“We will be back,” Lashbrook emphasizes. “Sports and live entertainment haven’t died forever, in any way, shape or form. We don’t know when we will be back, but we need to be ready to go as soon as we get that green light.”
That mirrors the attitude of most sports organizations, from the minors to the majors, regional to national, as COVID-19 postponements stretch into a second month. Leagues remain hopeful to get back to the playing field and are trying to stay proactive, but remain stuck in a holding pattern while health and safety officials determine a timetable.
“We’re all circling the airport trying not to run out of gas,” says Don Logan, Las Vegas Aviators president and chief operating officer.
There’s a sense that the NBA and NHL, the two major leagues that paused their seasons in mid-March, will set the precedent. Both have worldwide television deals that draw in billions annually—and the playoffs are the most valuable part of the package. The leagues figure to try whatever they can to recoup at least a portion of that revenue, but the exact route remains unclear, as most reports so far amount to speculation.
That’s left teams like the Vegas Golden Knights, in the Pacific Division’s No. 1 seed position when the NHL halted, in a similar position as their fans—waiting for updates to trickle in. The latest briefing saw the NHL extend self-quarantine guidelines for players and team staff from April 15 to April 30, but otherwise, there hasn’t been much news.
“We’re exploring and want to be prepared for whenever the circumstances present themselves,” NHL commissioner Gary Bettman said April 13 on CNN’s Anderson Cooper Live. “We haven’t ruled anything in, haven’t ruled anything out, and we’ll be prepared to go in whatever direction makes sense at the time.” (The Golden Knights had not responded to our inquiries at press time.)
Bettman acknowledged reports suggesting the NHL might stage the rest of its season in Grand Forks, North Dakota—home to several ice rinks as the annual host to junior hockey tournaments—but the commissioners downplayed the scenario as just one possibility. Similar setups have dominated the discourse for other major leagues. Several reports have indicated the NBA is interested in moving its season to Las Vegas, and Major League Baseball is reportedly considering stationing its franchises at their spring-training bases in Arizona and Florida.
Those ideas make sense on one level. They would greatly reduce travel, and restrict attendance to players, coaches and essential personnel only—games would be played without fans. Participants would be subject to regular testing and instructed to quarantine at hotels between competition.
But some local sports executives caution those scenarios are far from certain. Logan, whom Baseball America named Minor League Executive of the Year after he oversaw the Triple-A Aviators’ move from Cashman Field to Las Vegas Ballpark last season, cast particular doubt on the widespread spring-training-site MLB rumors.
“I’ve spoken to a number of Major League folks,” Logan says. “They had a call, and they had a number of ideas floated around, and all of a sudden, that’s the one that leaks out. A few people I’ve talked to aren’t crazy about [that one].”
Logan also isn’t convinced closed-door games are the answer. Resuming without fans might work for the majors, but the minor leagues are more dependent on their live product than TV revenue. The Aviators, who were scheduled to start their season on April 9, drew a Pacific Coast League-best average attendance of 9,299 fans per game last season.
“We can’t have fans in the stands doing anything, but we’re going to have an umpire, catcher and hitter stand in a box that’s 6 feet [wide],” Logan says. “It’s got to be across the board. I don’t think you can say we can’t have any fans because we can’t enforce the 6-foot rule, but we’re going to let the players do it.”
The Lights, who were within two days of the start of their season when the United Soccer League postponed on March 12, are in a similar position. The organization has built its brand around the game-day experience and expected another attendance jump in its third year, after a near-20 percent increase to 7,711 per game last year at Cashman Field.
“People want to come down Saturday night, have a hot dog and a beer, and scream and dance,” Lashbrook says. “I don’t want to sound like a salesman right now, but candidly, that’s where the club makes its money, putting on 17 live events every year.”
Lashbrook sounds confident the Lights will begin their season as soon as it’s safe. Logan sounds optimistic the Aviators could start by June, with some of the games lost in April and May tacked on after its announced schedule concludes in early September.
That could put the Aviators in unforeseen competition with Las Vegas’ newest sports franchise, the Raiders, slated to begin playing at the under-construction Allegiant Stadium during the NFL preseason in August. The coronavirus has thus far not impacted the NFL schedule; the new league year and free agency started as planned on March 18.
The only major change has been the April 23-25 NFL Draft’s shift from a live Las Vegas event to a virtual one. A much larger headache could ensue if Allegiant Stadium isn’t completed on time, but it’s said to be 85 percent done and on target for competition by the end of July.
Whether the Raiders will share their first year in Las Vegas with UNLV’s football team seems murkier. NCAA officials and conference commissioners have made no guarantees on going forward with fall sports seasons and reportedly told Vice President Mike Pence they would not compete if colleges aren’t in session at that time.
That has left the UNLV athletic department in the same bind as its professional counterparts, scrambling on how to proceed and work around an indefinite end date.
“We’re creating contingency plans,” UNLV athletic director Desiree Reed-Francois says. “For the past three weeks, all of our head coaches and our senior staff have been working on how this pandemic impacts us—not just today [and] not just tomorrow. We did a futurist exercise where we mapped out [what happens] if we don’t come back until May 15, which is the end of the academic year, if we don’t come back until June 8, which is second session summer school, if we don’t come back until August 4, which is when football and our fall sports report back. ‘How is your respective team impacted?’”
As with so many things right now, no one really knows.
Mike Grimala contributed to this story.
This story appeared in Las Vegas Weekly.
