It’s going to be another “five, 10 minutes” for arena update

By Ron Kantowski

Monday, July 14, 2008 | 2:31 p.m.

NOW:

Remember that episode in "Seinfeld" when the gang was waiting for a table at a Chinese restaurant and the maitre d' kept saying it would be "five, 10 minutes?"

Well, that sort of reminds me of the new sports arena and Jon Bon Jovi concert hall that was supposed to be going up by now in back of Bally's on the Strip.

Only it's going to be "two, three weeks."

Until we get a word from Anschutz Entertainment Group corporate headquarters, that is.

"We hope to have an update in two or three weeks," Michael Roth, the vice president of communications for AEG, told me today.

As for the misleading information about the Las Vegas arena -- five paragraph signs with an artist's rendering of a different project -- that went up on the AEG Web site last week, that was just a mistake. Nick Burns, the company computer guy, apparently came by the next day and fixed it.

And just to set the record straight, Roth did return the voice message I had left Wednesday on Thursday night, when I was watching the 51s miss the cutoff man. Then he called back twice more over the weekend. He sounded a little irritated the first time but when we talked this morning, he was OK.

I told him I spent the weekend watching the future stars of the TBL -- Turkish Basketball League -- hoop it up at Cox Pavilion, and that the Vegas NBA Summer League crowds were outstanding. And that, who knows, maybe Las Vegas is an NBA city after all.

Roth said he wondered if the league shares my enthusiasm.

Jumping from Point A to Point Z, my guess is that when AEG gets around to making its bed here, there might be a hockey team sleeping in it.

Then again, it might take another five, 10 minutes.

----- When Lou Amundson started his UNLV career, he sported a nearly shaved head. He looked like a marine. By his senior year, he let his hair grow pretty long, and he sorta looked like one of the Hardy Boys. Or Rick Springfield. Now, having had a cup of NBA coffee with the Sixers and trying to catch on with the Warriors, he has sprouted a tiny ponytail that was sticking out from the top of his head on Saturday. He looked like Samurai Power Forward. Or European. Maybe he thinks that's where he's going to wind up playing this season.

----- So I guess Brett Favre is un-retiring again. If this keeps up, he's going to break Sugar Leonard's record of five (or so) comebacks. How many rocking chairs does a guy need, for cryin' out loud?

----- Before she became Miss Universe over the weekend, Miss Venezuela said something about men think the faster way to get to a point is a straight line and women know it's faster to "go to the curves." Unlike her countryman, Chicago White Sox manager Ozzie Guillen, I think I know what she was trying to say.

----- Venezuela, it would appear, is the Yankees of beauty of pageants. The country has produced four previous Miss Universe winners and five previous Miss Worlds. As well as Carlos Zambrano, who has never won a beauty pageant.

THEN:

----- I wonder where Ray Fosse is going to watch the All-Star Game Tuesday night. And if his shoulder still hurts.