This week on Nevada Week , the Oakland Athletics' potential move to Las Vegas.

More on what it entails, and is it in Southern Nevada's best interest?

♪♪♪ Support for Nevada Week is provided by Senator William H. Hernstadt.

-Welcome to Nevada Week .

I'm Amber Renee Dixon.

The Oakland Athletics announced a, quote, binding agreement, end quote, to buy 49 acres north of Allegiant Stadium from Red Rock Resorts.

And on that land, the A's plan to build a baseball stadium reportedly worth $1.5 billion, 500 million of which they reportedly hope to get in public funding.

Joining us to talk about that prospect and whether an A's relocation here is worth it to Southern Nevada are Howard Stutz with The Nevada Independent , which first reported on the land deal; Mick Akers, sports business and transportation reporter for the Las Vegas Review-Journal ; and Steve Carp, Las Vegas columnist for The Sporting Tribune .

Gentlemen, thank you for joining us.

Real quickly from each of you, how sure of a thing do you think this is, this relocation to Las Vegas by the A's?

Howard, I'll start with you.

(Howard Stutz) Got a coin?

We can flip it and see.

It's really now dependent on the legislative process, getting the bill through, as you said for this $500 million in public money.

We don't-- We're taping Thursday morning; the bill may drop to this afternoon or maybe Friday.

We don't know.

Dave Kaval, the president of the A's, was in the legislature yesterday with his consultants and lobbyists and Jeremy Aguero to talk to the Democratic side of the leadership about this.

So it's really going to depend on that.

I think that's the, that's the key right there.

-Real quick: Aguero, his role in this?

-Jeremy's the, you know, from Applied Analysis, is the-- is the financial consultant, kind of looking at the, looking at the economics of this whole thing.

And he's the one who's really been talking the most about the tax package.

-And promoting that this would be a good thing.

-Mick, how sure of a thing is this?

(Mich Akers) I have always been 50/50 this whole way.

But now that they have at least a site, I think it maybe shifts more to 60/40, 70/30.

$500 million, obviously, is the hindering point here.

You have to wait and see what happens there, but I think just saying that we have a site in Southern Nevada now makes it more real.

But still a lot of hoops to jump through to to actually putting shovels into the ground.

-And Steve?

(Steve Carp) I think it gets done, but not without some hand wringing first on both sides of it.

Because, as Mick said, 500 million is a lot of money.

And how are they going to come up with it?

I'm not a big fan of corporate welfare, if you will.

-And that's what you think-- -And when you're talking about a billionaire like John Fisher, he should be able to foot the bill for his own ballpark, much like Bill Foley and AEG footed the bill for T-Mobile Arena.

The only thing they asked the public for was Clark County to help out a little bit with the infrastructure around the arena.

And, you know, this Wild Wild West site, a lot of different structures should already be in place, right, from when they had the casino.

So it shouldn't be 500 million dollars' worth of infrastructure.

-Let's go back to the land aspect.

Howard, I mentioned in the intro that it is a "binding agreement" that the A's are saying, but how binding is it really?

-Well, they haven't-- Red Rock Resorts hasn't disclosed the purchase price.

They're not, because the deal hasn't closed yet.

It's pretty much contingent, closing, on getting the tax package through the legislature.

One analyst estimated it was about $150 million, is probably what the cost to the A's for the site.

We have a story in The Independent posted this morning-- -It's Thursday morning.

- --that says this is one of the sites the A's were looking at.

They looked like 20 different sites in last two years.

They kind of settled on the festival grounds at the north end of the Strip.

And they also were looking at the Rio.

The Rio offered them about 20-plus acres for $1.

In other words, you know, here's a-- This is all you need to pay for the, for the land.

Go ahead and go out and get what you need for the rest of it.

It probably would have reduced the tax package they were seeking-- they're seeking right now from the legislature, maybe.

We don't know.

But that's a speculation on it.

So we'll see where they go from here.

But as Steve said, the lawmakers-- They're gonna try to figure out a way.

They're going to push themselves into such pretzels, trying to figure out a way to approve this deal but not looking like they're giving a handout to the A's.

And the tax package is very different from-- It's similar but different from Allegiant Stadium.

Remember, Allegiant Stadium is 750 million in room tax money.

So that means anytime you rent a room on the Strip, or a hotel room on the Strip, like a small portion of that goes toward the, a tax goes toward Allegiant Stadium.

This will just be a tax on-- almost like a user tax on everything that's on this 49 acres: the stadium, the entertainment district.

They're gonna build around with the restaurants and retail and whatnot.

So that's, that's where the tax will come from.

It's just from people paying to do whatever on that site.

-In this special tax district.

-Right.

-So Steve, the news that Howard broke, what does it indicate about if the A's did deny this $1 deal to get land, instead opting for perhaps $150 million?

What does it show about their priorities?

-I think it says that they liked the proximity of the Wild Wild West site as it pertains to a sports district area.

You're a mile south of Allegiant-- north of Allegiant Stadium.

You're a mile west of T-Mobile Arena.

And so you have this like triangle, if you will, of sports facilities.

And I can even maybe include Michelob Ultra Arena at Mandalay Bay if I wanted to.

You know, it's the home of the WNBA Aces.

My thought is they must have obviously felt there were several built-in advantages to building on the Wild Wild West site compared to building on the Rio.

Whether it's traffic patterns, access, you know, they're trying to get the Tropicana I-15 interchange redone.

Perhaps there's a way where people could go from there to the ballpark without too much grief.

Although, honestly, I don't know how you guys feel.

The idea of being a tourist from Kansas City or Detroit or wherever and your team is playing the A's in a new ballpark in the middle of July and it's 116 out, are you really walking from your hotel to the ballpark?

No, you're probably taking Uber or Lyft.

-And Mick, I think that is a concern, the parking aspect.

Where are people going to park, and then they're-- are they walking?

Or how are they getting to this potential stadium?

-It would probably be similar to Allegiant Stadium's setup.

They have Hacienda bridge, the walkover from the Strip.

Dave Kaval told me that they're potentially looking at building a bridge across the 15, pedestrian, from T-Mobile to the potential A's stadium.

Obviously, with that Tropicana I-15 project, they also have a new access point for pedestrians to access T-Mobile Arena from the Tropicana bridge.

That will be in place.

That can also be a big factor in it.

They also have an additional 8 acres of land, an option to buy that.

That may be if they say, Hey, we need some more land for parking, once they, you know, get their plan together.

So, just looking at Allegiant, much bigger, they figured it out.

It took a little bit, but people, you know, complained about it, and they still will.

But I think just the way that Las Vegas is set up with the tourism, you don't need as much parking as just any other city with a ballpark.

-Okay.

So it's Thursday morning.

There is about a month and a week left this legislative session.

There needs to be a bill that the A's would submit, and that needs to get through this session.

It has yet to be submitted as of this taping.

But Mick, what do we know about political support for what is being proposed this tax district?

-Yeah, everyone's been pretty noncommittal.

They'll just say, We would love to have a new sports team and a new facility in Las Vegas.

But we haven't seen the exact bill, so we can't really comment on that.

So it seems like everyone's said pretty much the same thing.

I've gotten quotes from probably like a dozen lawmakers and-- -On both sides of the isle?

-Yeah.

And they're all saying the exact same thing.

So I think once you see what they're asking and some of the stipulation behind it, I think that's when you start getting real opinions.

And then that's when we'll get the real story behind what this is going to be, the $500 million, and if there's anything else in there.

-Have you heard anything, Howard?

-Same as Mick.

-Same.

-If everybody is taking a wait-and-see approach, sure.

They'd love to see the A's here and Major League Baseball here.

As Steve said, that is-- where the site is, it will be like a sports entertainment district.

You think about other cities that have those type of districts with all these stadiums.

So it makes-- So that's why I think they like that.

Look, they've gotta-- it's got to be accessible to the local crowd.

70% of the fans are going to be locals.

As Steve said, it's not going to-- They say they're gonna get a lot of tourists, but we'll see if that happens.

-Well, that's what Jeremy Aguero at Applied Analysis said.

70% locals, 30% visitors.

-Tourists.

-Are the 70% coming to root for the A's though?

-Hmm.

-Okay?

All right, they're playing the Diamondbacks-- -From Arizona.

- --on a Wednesday night.

You're a Diamondbacks fan.

You have a newborn son.

Are you taking him to the game when he's seven or so when he knows what baseball is?

Is he an A's fan, or is he a Diamondbacks fan?

-I would imagine an A's fan because it's his hometown.

-So we're talking about developing a generation of fans.

This is what the Raiders are dealing with right now.

Their fan base in Las Vegas is somewhat limited.

They haven't converted people over from rooting for whatever NFL team they rooted for before the Raiders came here, to now rooting for the Raiders.

But the Raiders are trying through getting into the community.

They're trying to develop that generation of Las Vegas Raider fans through kids and clinics and things like that.

So the A's have to maybe be patient, develop their fan base here in Las Vegas to root for them.

-Howard?

-What could help is what we haven't discussed, is where are they going to play until the stadium is actually built?

They're talking about 2027 Season is when it would start.

So they could play in at least maybe two, maybe even next season, at Las Vegas Ballpark, trying to share it somehow with the Aviators.

They're still trying to figure out that, how that's gonna work out?

But at that point, now you're starting to build a little bit of a fan base.

And that's a wonderful facility, by the way, for a Triple-A ballpark, Las Vegas Ballpark.

So I think that could be one way.

They can start building their fan base.

-But here's the thing: You have the Triple-A team already playing here in Las Vegas.

-Right.

-So the fans who go to Aviator games, they're familiar with these players who get called up to Oakland.

-A very good point.

-So they will have a built-in base to a degree.

Okay?

But Howard's a Dodger fan; I'm a Yankee fan.

We're not going to the ballpark to root for the A's.

When we go, we're going to root for our teams.

Howard has a partial season ticket to the Aviators, so he kind of roots for the Las Vegas Aviators.

Will you root for the Las Vegas Athletics though?

-Not when they play the Los Angeles Dodgers.

-There you go.

You see?

-I want to go back to the 70/30 that is being proposed as the attendance at the potential A's stadium.

Is that what ended up happening with the Raiders, because that was what originally was proposed.

-They were-- At first, they said, Hey, we expect about 27% of fans would be from out of the market.

Now it's ending up more like 50-something percent.

Some of these games, especially like the Chiefs and the 49ers last season, and half of the stadium was in red.

People point it out every time, too.

And you know, there is also fans that come from Northern and Southern California.

Raiders fans come and are part of that.

But people always just focus on the opposing team calling it, you know, not really a home field advantage.

-Right.

-So, you know, it probably won't be as drastic with Major League Baseball, but they'll still get some of those good, like Yankees, come to town.

You're gonna get more than that.

I think that's an average.

About 5,000 per game if you break it down with the 81 games.

So it's not always gonna be 5,000 every game, but some of those bigger games that draw more than that I think could play into that, and you'll actually meet that quota they've been kind of pushing.

-Howard?

-It's like-- You're from Phoenix.

-Yes.

-I've been to a Dodgers/Diamondbacks game in Phoenix a couple years ago, and it was, I want to say, it was more than half the stadium was Dodger fans.

So I mean, that may be what we'll see here for a time.

Steve, I know, wants to point this out: The A's have to get better as a franchise.

-There we go.

-And that will be one key to try to build a fan base here.

-You took my, my job from me for a moment.

Yes.

Do we really want the A's here?

-Not when their payroll is $60 million, I don't.

I mean, we already have a Triple-A team in Vegas.

Why do we need two?

Because if John Fisher is not going to spend money to put a competitive ballclub on the field, what's the point?

-John Fisher is the owner.

Can you tell us more about him?

-Well, they have the lowest payroll in all of Major League Baseball.

It's $60.7 million.

Right?

Baltimore, which is number 29, is almost 65 million.

So we're talking a $5 million gap.

So you're talking about what a middle infielder, maybe, or a corner outfielder who could get paid $5 million and everything.

The median of Major League Baseball payroll is $160 million.

So the A's are nearly 100 million below the median.

The Mets, who are number one, which is shocking when you think about what the Yankees have spent over the decades, the Dodgers, the Red Sox, the Cubs.

The Mets have the highest payroll in all of baseball, $346 million.

Max Scherzer, one of their pitchers, makes almost as much as the entire A's payroll for God's sake.

If you're looking at this as a fan and the A's move to Las Vegas and you know that they're going to be playing, you know, less than 400 baseball over the course of the summer, where's the incentive to go to the game, especially when the prices are going to be double, maybe triple what you pay to go see the Triple-A Aviators and maybe playing almost as good a brand of baseball?

-Okay, right now, as of this taping, the Oakland A's are 5 and 20.

They are the worst team in all of Major League Baseball; however, MLB Commissioner, Mr. Manfred, he makes an argument that they may become more competitive if they do move to Las Vegas.

How so?

-Well, he noted that, you know, A's ownership has spent over $100 million in Oakland trying to get their stadium deal out there over the years.

And he said that's made it more limited for them on the payroll side.

So if you go by that, you know, if they're not spending money on something that's not going to happen anymore or have some more cash flow for players, potentially yes.

But you know, once the novelty of having a new ballpark here wears off, you have to be competitive, or you're not going to fill the seats.

And that's gonna be less tax money going into their $500 million if they get that.

So they have to be competitive when they get here, especially to fund that stadium.

-Is there a potential for them to make more money here, though, than they are making in Oakland?

-You would think, although the media market in the Bay Area is number four in the nation or something?

But they're not a factor in that market.

The Giants are the dominant team when it comes to baseball in the Bay Area.

Okay?

Here, Vegas is the 40th largest media market in the country.

So I don't know what kind of deal they can get with a regional sports network.

I mean, we're seeing these RSNs all over the country struggling, right?

-That question now-- So this media now, you came out of TV news.

You know.

I think, you know, with streaming, everything is on streaming services, everything is on cable.

I think, I don't know how important being the size of the media market matters anymore.

-What about with naming rights for the state?

-Well, you know somebody's gonna jump in.

Allegiant jumped in, Allegiant Airlines, T-Mobile.

So you know this will get a naming right.

-That's not going to be an issue.

The issue is going to be: Long term, is this team willing to be competitive and put a product on the field people will want to pay good money to see?

The Golden Knights from day one have spent money to put a good team on the ice, right?

They went to the Stanley Cup Finals in their first year.

They've not been shy to go after the big fish.

Bill Foley has always been willing to spend the money.

John Fisher has not shown any interest whatsoever.

-Will you tell us more about John Fisher and his background?

-But I'm just saying, all right, the guy's a developer.

But Bill Foley wasn't a hockey guy.

-His parents started the Gap, correct?

-Yeah.

-The clothing.

-Which is fine.

You don't have to be a baseball guy to understand.

-But he has money is what I'm saying.

-Yeah, he does.

I mean, otherwise, he wouldn't own a team.

There are a lot of people wish he would sell it and just stay in Oakland.

And there have been a lot of people pushing that idea.

I don't think that's happening.

I think he's staying with it, and I think it's going to happen here.

But the question, the big question will be, are they going to be willing to spend money?

And they don't have to spend like the Mets and the Dodgers and the Yankees and the Red Sox, but they certainly need to spend more than they're spending now.

-Which is against what they have historically done.

But the last question that I want to ask you because we are running out of time, why should Las Vegas want this when, as you have reported, Stutz, Clark County and the state aren't going to see any tax dollars directly from the stadium for at least 30 years?

-Right.

And why should Las Vegas want to?

It would be probably just to have the Major League-- -Just to have it.

-because I think we're gonna get the NBA in three years with this new arena south of town, the Oak View place, the Oakview Arena.

So be one of the few cities with all four major league franchises, you know, teams.

So I mean, that may-- We may see MLS here at some point.

So I mean that's, that's why.

It's a status.

-And an arena, by the way, which will be privately financed by the Oak View Group.

-Right.

-The people who built the Islanders' arena at Belmont Park and the Climate Pledge Arena in Seattle, which is a spectacular building with a cracking play.

So I agree totally with Howard that the NBA is probably more in line with what people in Las Vegas want over Major League Baseball.

-Real quick, Mick.

What happens if the A's do not get this $500 million?

-You figure they go back to Oakland, knock on the mayor's door, and say, Hey, you want to strike this conversation backup?

I think that's the last resort there.

-All right.

Gentlemen, thank you so much for your time.

Now, should the A's relocate to Las Vegas, they would be the fourth major league pro sports team to call Southern Nevada home.

The Vegas Golden Knights were the first.

And ever since their first game in 2017, sports has become a bigger draw for tourists to Las Vegas.

But to what extent?

Well, a new survey from the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority outlines exactly what tourists like to do when they come here, how much money they tend to spend, and a whole lot more.

For this report, Maria Silva talked to the survey's creator and tourists themselves.

-Amber, one of our first stops, of course, LVCVA.

"What happens here, only happens here."

Now, fun fact about the Las Vegas Visitor Profile Study, it's been around since 1975.

So almost 50 years.

And one of the guys in charge of the 2022 study is the vice president of the LVCVA Research Center, Mr. Kevin Bagger.

All right, Kevin.

So excited to talk to you about this report because you recently, board members, you told them that this is a very geeky report.

What does that mean?

(Kevin Bagger) Well, it's a lot of data.

We do a lot of research to understand our visitors.

They represent half of the GDP of Southern Nevada?

We do research to understand who our visitors are, where they're coming from, and if they're having a good time and if they'll come back.

-What did we find out?

-A couple things that stood out that were interesting is we had a mix of younger visitors on average.

Historically, Las Vegas has a broad appeal.

We get visitors from their 20s to their 90s.

But the overall average age in recent years prepandemic was about 45 years old.

That dropped to about 40 years old.

And that stands out because it's true, there were two things at play.

One is Gen Z, young visitors, which can be anywhere from 11, which are the kids who are not coming, but the older Gen Zs are 26 years old.

So that's an emerging new segment.

And then we had temporarily fewer older visitors on the Boomer side, because they sort of held back because of COVID.

But that segment is going to come back as well.

-And let's talk about the international visitor.

You mentioned that that's actually on track, little by little getting there, right?

-Yeah.

The domestic market has really filled in the gap through the pandemic.

We've focused heavily on the domestic segments.

International has taken longer to recover.

That's not unique to Las Vegas; that's, in general, for all of the U.S.

But it is improving.

-In 2022, 52.6 million passengers passed through Harry Reid International Airport.

So we are here at baggage claim to chat with some of the visitors to find out, why Las Vegas?

Give your name and where you're from.

-My name is Millie Kilmer.

I'm from Chesapeake, Virginia.

-What brings you to Las Vegas?

-I have been coming here the last 25 years to meet my friend of over 50 years.

-And what do you do when you're in Vegas?

-Gamble.

I love to play the Keno machines.

-We love our international travelers.

Give me your name and where you're from.

-My name is Dana, and I'm from Bogota, Colombia.

-And what do you love to do when you're in Las Vegas?

-Party.

[laughing] -Of course!

And no, I love to do the other stuff like go to the Stratosphere and the other activities, shows.

You can do too many things here.

-Do you want to say something in Spanish to your friends in Colombia about Las Vegas?

-Yes, of course.

[in Spanish] -"Come to Las Vegas.

It's super fun."

She's waiting for you here.

It's always exciting when we can welcome first-time visitors, like my friends here from Michigan.

Give me your name and where you're from.

-Mary.

-I'm Greg.

-So tell me, first-time visitors, what are you most excited to see?

-Everything.

-Yes.

We're gonna go to Hoover Dam.

We're gonna try that.

-Yea!

-We're finding more first-time visitors.

Now, another big thing in that report, it said a lot of them are here to celebrate big milestones like birthdays.

Happy birthday!

Tell me your names and where you're from.

-Adrea from South Carolina.

-Charmaine from Jacksonville, Florida.

-Ah!

And then, why Vegas?

First-timers to Vegas.

Why Vegas?

-Birthday, Usher!

Yeah, baby!

-And what would you like to do here in in Vegas?

-Eat and shop.

-My friends from South Carolina and Florida.

Here we go, my birthday girls.

♪ Happy birthday to us.

♪♪ -In Vegas.

We decided to end our adventure at one of our city's landmarks, the Welcome to Fabulous Las Vegas sign.

We wanted to have a little fun with these visitors, test their knowledge.

On the LVCVA's website, there is a "Frequently Asked Questions about Las Vegas" section.

So let's see how well these tourists know our city.

-I'm here with the Littles from-- -Brooklyn!

-We have Grandma and Grandpa, Mom and Dad, Auntie here.

Okay, so what brings you to Las Vegas?

-Birthday boy.

-Me, really.

-He wanted to go to Vegas.

-So I know you're lucky.

I know you all look fabulous, gorgeous family.

I'm gonna put you to the test when it comes to Las Vegas, a little trivia about Las Vegas.

How many days of sunshine does Las Vegas average each year?

Who wants to go first?

-I'm gonna try like seven.

-Seven days?

-Seven days a week.

-I'm not sure.

-364 days.

-362 days.

-365 days.

-300.

-Okay, here we go.

320 days.

So that wasn't too bad.

How many hotel rooms are in Las Vegas?

-A million plus.

-Too high.

Hotel rooms, yeah.

Too high.

-I'm gonna say about 200,000.

-Oh, I would say about 125,000.

-151,771.

-Viva Las Vegas!

-Visitors to Las Vegas last year sure spent some money.

According to the LVCVA, in 2022, direct visitor spending hit an all-time high of $44.9 billion, far exceeding prepandemic levels.

And that does it for us here at Nevada Week .

For any of the resources discussed on this show, go to our website, vegaspbs.org/nevadaweek.

♪♪♪