In City Of Sportstainment, Bring Tebow Time To Las Vegas So He Can Share 51s’ Spotlight With Finn The Bat Dog

By ALAN SNEL

LVSportsBiz.com

 

In Las Vegas these days, it seems sports have morphed into sportstainment — a word I made up to describe a Vegas-style genre that has fused sports and entertainment into a favorite pastime.

 

If you recall, everyone used the word, “spectacle,” for that event that involved sports entertainers Floyd Mayweather and Conor McGregor wearing boxing trunks and strapping on boxing gloves last summer.

 

And then the Vegas Golden Knights invited Blue Man Group and Cirque du Soleil among other Las Vegas entertainers to T-Mobile Arena throughout the NHL’s team’s magical rookie season and hockey games broke out this past year.

 

And let’s not forget Travis Pastrana going Evel Knievel on Vegas and jumping buses, cars and a fountain at Caesars Palace with his Indian motorcycle this month.

 

And even Las Vegas’ first-year professional soccer team, Las Vegas Lights FC, has the most entertaining goaltender and coach in the United Soccer League.

 

Not to be outdone, the Las Vegas 51s have their four-legged entertainment, Finn the Bat Dog, the furry critter that will be taking photos with fans at a 51s game for 30 minutes from 6:30 p.m.-7 p.m.  July 27. And the cool business angle on this one is that the Finn photo shoot has its own presenting sponsors — Southwest Gas Corporation and Sit Means Sit Dog Training. Finn, a four-year-old black labrador retriever, has captured the hearts of 51s fans with his uncanny ability to retrieve the bats of the hometown players with the speed of a greyhound.

 

Which brings us to the New York Mets’ most famous farmhand, a 30-year-old former Heisman Award winner who won not one but two national football titles at the University of Florida. He even played in the National Football League, throwing a touchdown pass for the Denver Broncos that beat the Pittsburgh Steelers in an overtime playoff game six years ago.

 

These days, Tim Tebow has a season batting average of .272 for the Mets’ Double A team, the Binghamton Rumble Ponies ,and there’s been lots of talk of the Mets moving Tebow from the Rumble Ponies to the Triple A Las Vegas 51s. It’s the Mets’ final season using Las Vegas to host their Triple A affiliate. So with 21 home games to go for the 51s this season, this is the last chance for Las Vegans to see Tebow as a Mets’ minor-leaguer.

 

I hope the Mets promote the six-foot, three-inch athlete known for his strong religious beliefs and elongated southpaw throwing motion as an NFL quarterback.

 

While his overall minor league batting average is a mediocre .243, Tebow was deemed good enough to play in the Eastern League All-Star Game this month, igniting a buzz that the left-handed hitter would make the jump to Las Vegas — and even the Big Show in Queens to play for the Mets in September.

 

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Las Vegas is quite comfortable hosting celebrities like Tebow, known for his good-guy persona and good deeds off the field.  Personally, I would love to see Tebow and VGK’s Marc-Andre Fleury in a Smile Off competition.

 

And Tebow in a 51s uniform would sell tickets for the Triple A ballclub owned by Summerlin master developer Howard Hughes Corp., which is building a new $150 million, 10,000-seat ballpark in Downtown Summerlin for the 2019 season. Here’s a recent 51s game at Cashman Field, where Tebow’s presence would likely attract more fans if he was assigned to Sin City.

 

Having Tebow play in Las Vegas would be a nice farewell to Cashman Field for the 51s, which are being re-branded with a new name to go along with a new parent MLB team and ballpark after the 2018 season.

 

The media would lap up Tebow Time in Las Vegas like a thirsty bat dog and I’m positive good ol’ Finn wouldn’t mind sharing the Cashman marquee with college football’s former top dog.

 

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