Monday, June 16, 2003 | 10:14 a.m.
The face of a team's mascot may stay the same, but more often than fans realize, the soul inside may change.
But when 22-year-old Las Vegan Tony Canepa donned the Cosmo suit for the last time Friday, there was no doubt that many knew Cosmo just wasn't going to be the same without Canepa inside.
"Season-ticket holders that are here every night," says Canepa, "know if someone else is in the suit."
Canepa left Las Vegas Saturday to assume an administrative role at the Frisco RoughRiders, the Texas Rangers' Class AA affiliate in the Texas League. The RoughRiders are owned by Mandalay Sports Entertainment, which also owns the 51s
Canepa, who recently graduated from UNLV with a degree in film and a minor in business administration, auditioned to work as Hey Reb.
"I saw the flier, and thought it'd be a cool way to get involved," said Canepa.
He was hired, and his first job was working the UNLV-Air Force Academy football game in 2000. The next summers, he was brought on to be the first Cosmo for the Las Vegas franchise's first year as the 51s.
"Being Cosmo was neat because nobody had ever done the character before," he said. "Hey Reb had been around for quite a while, so there's kind of a set motif that goes with it. "But with Cosmo, it was kind of a blank canvas, so I could create it however I wanted. I think, over the past two and half seasons, the character itself has come into its own."
Canepa thinks of Cosmo as an extension of his own personality.
"Where Hey Reb is a mean and tough college mascot, I like to think of Cosmo a bit like my personality, only amplified. It's all the craziness that you have to kind of hold back in everyday life, and just really cut it loose when you're out there as Cosmo."
Canepa likens Cosmo to a little kid.
"He's always interested in whatever's going on, and that's how I try to play it. Whatever catches his attention, he's always going to find some way to have fun with it. Any time people look at Cosmo, there's something funny going on. There's a lot of stuff I can get away with in Cosmo that wouldn't be funny in Hey Reb."
Like when Cosmo eats his pet rubber chicken, or is tossing a plunger around.
"The plunger is a new prop. We were walking around Home Depot looking for fun stuff we can use, and the plunger was right off the bat something I wanted," said Canepa. "Some people are terrified of the plunger, and other people just laugh, they know it's part of the show."
Sometimes, though, Cosmo's antics get Canepa in trouble.
He was banned from Cashman Field for eight games last year for a midgame stunt that resembled a scene from "Teen Wolf."
"I flagged down the field crew's cart as they were dragging the field in the fifth inning. I was riding on top of it, and the owners of the park didn't think that was a very good idea.
"But most of the players are really cool. I never go out of my way to distract players from the game, but if they're willing to have fun, I'm always willing to play with them a little bit."
Canepa may not be part of the team, but he said he does consider himself an athlete.
"I've always been an athlete before anything else. I treat this as an athletic thing. It is a sport, the guys that do it well are tremendous athletes.
"What you do in that suit, the stunts and tricks you do, you perform while you're just sweating under all this heat. You're carrying 25 pounds of fur, your vision is cut down by probably 75 percent, given the costume. It's tough a lot of times to do something exciting and not end up killing yourself."
To combat the heat, Canepa says he goes through between a gallon and a gallon and a half of fluids depending on the event he works.
"My very first game that I did, they said that the Air Force sideline in the first quarter was 120 degrees in the sun. I wasn't sure if I was going to make it through that first quarter before the sun went behind the stadium. It gets really, really hot in that suit, especially in July and August. I'd say it gets 20 degrees hotter than whatever the temperature is outside."
But despite the heat, weight, and challenges, Canepa says he will miss being in the suit.
"I'll really miss the fans a lot, especially here at Cashman, where we have great games, and some great fans. They know Cosmo really well, and that's the one thing I'm going to miss a lot, is seeing those people every night, and having fun with them and the kids."
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