CruzDude
Senior Member sharing a brew with bajaden
Five reasons you HAVE to come to Las Vegas for summer league:
1- Vegas is CHEAP in July. The cheapest month of the year. Casino hotel rooms from $25 a night. Excalibur, Tropicana, Imperial Palace, Hooters, Stratosphere are but a few that come to mind. Go to "hotels.com" type in Las Vegas and select "cheapest". If you hunt around there are a bunch of "food courts" in the smaller casinos with Subway, Burger King, and a bunch of other spots where you can get breakfast and lunch for $5-$8 or so.
2- The Kings provide a summer league team every year that include their draft choices, FA's and usually a couple of 2nd-3rd year guys who need to work on their game. This year it was Omri Casspi and Donte Greene.
3- There were 22 NBA teams represented this year each with squads of 11-19 players. Miami had the 19, no surprise there. So you can see over 200 different FA's all trying for an invite to a teams training camp in October. Every team is coached by a lead assistant coach with the head coaches and GM's and other execs sitting up in closed off sections watching the action.
4- You get much closer to the action: you can sit one row behind a teams bench or up higher in a 50-yd line seat where ever you want. Most games are in Cox Pavilion, a college gym seating 2,000 which is next to and connected to Thomas & Mack Arena, a 15,000 arena for UNLV basketball. One ticket gets you entry to all games that day in both arenas on a first-come-first-served basis, usually 6-7 games.
5- You can get up close to and literally rub elbows with your favorite players, hob nob with team execs and team owners. Jerry Reynolds, Coachie, Truck Robinson and Jason Ross were all easy access for a brief conversation. This year I had 1-on-1 conversations with JT, Omri, Donte, and could have talked to any of the others as well. Standing around with my wife we got into conversations with the mothers of DeMarcus, Jason & Ryan Thompson, plus Joe and Gavin Maloof, even Momma Maloof. An absolutely delightful bunch of folks.
Whenever the Laker summer team plays the stars, chorus gals, and glamour types show and are quite a scene in their own rights. Four and five-inch stilettos are an amazing show on many of those ladies.
Kids? Summer league is very kid friendly for those who follow NBA teams. Autographs of players are quite easy to get for the persistent, souvenirs abound, soft drinks are reasonable ($3 regular and $4 for the big) as are hot dogs at $6. For 5 bucks you get a program of the rosters of all teams and the master schedule for every game. Not a lot of freebies but some at game halftimes.
6- On a limited budget? The local bus network has constant city busses traveling east-west along TropIcana Blvd as there are along the north-south busses on Paradise Rd. Cox and Thomas & Mack are set back from the intersection of those two roads just off the NE corner of the Las Vegas Airport. Bus tickets are from $2 to $5 with day passes available for multiple use on one day. If you drive here parking at most hotels is free as is parking at Cox/Thomas&Mack. Gas here is cheap too, $2.79-$2.85 vs. $3.09-$3.30 in SoCal.
7- The rookies and free agents at summer league are some of the stars of tomorrow. How cool is that? And some who should be stars can fall on their faces here as well. But you have to be here to see for your self.
1- Vegas is CHEAP in July. The cheapest month of the year. Casino hotel rooms from $25 a night. Excalibur, Tropicana, Imperial Palace, Hooters, Stratosphere are but a few that come to mind. Go to "hotels.com" type in Las Vegas and select "cheapest". If you hunt around there are a bunch of "food courts" in the smaller casinos with Subway, Burger King, and a bunch of other spots where you can get breakfast and lunch for $5-$8 or so.
2- The Kings provide a summer league team every year that include their draft choices, FA's and usually a couple of 2nd-3rd year guys who need to work on their game. This year it was Omri Casspi and Donte Greene.
3- There were 22 NBA teams represented this year each with squads of 11-19 players. Miami had the 19, no surprise there. So you can see over 200 different FA's all trying for an invite to a teams training camp in October. Every team is coached by a lead assistant coach with the head coaches and GM's and other execs sitting up in closed off sections watching the action.
4- You get much closer to the action: you can sit one row behind a teams bench or up higher in a 50-yd line seat where ever you want. Most games are in Cox Pavilion, a college gym seating 2,000 which is next to and connected to Thomas & Mack Arena, a 15,000 arena for UNLV basketball. One ticket gets you entry to all games that day in both arenas on a first-come-first-served basis, usually 6-7 games.
5- You can get up close to and literally rub elbows with your favorite players, hob nob with team execs and team owners. Jerry Reynolds, Coachie, Truck Robinson and Jason Ross were all easy access for a brief conversation. This year I had 1-on-1 conversations with JT, Omri, Donte, and could have talked to any of the others as well. Standing around with my wife we got into conversations with the mothers of DeMarcus, Jason & Ryan Thompson, plus Joe and Gavin Maloof, even Momma Maloof. An absolutely delightful bunch of folks.
Whenever the Laker summer team plays the stars, chorus gals, and glamour types show and are quite a scene in their own rights. Four and five-inch stilettos are an amazing show on many of those ladies.
Kids? Summer league is very kid friendly for those who follow NBA teams. Autographs of players are quite easy to get for the persistent, souvenirs abound, soft drinks are reasonable ($3 regular and $4 for the big) as are hot dogs at $6. For 5 bucks you get a program of the rosters of all teams and the master schedule for every game. Not a lot of freebies but some at game halftimes.
6- On a limited budget? The local bus network has constant city busses traveling east-west along TropIcana Blvd as there are along the north-south busses on Paradise Rd. Cox and Thomas & Mack are set back from the intersection of those two roads just off the NE corner of the Las Vegas Airport. Bus tickets are from $2 to $5 with day passes available for multiple use on one day. If you drive here parking at most hotels is free as is parking at Cox/Thomas&Mack. Gas here is cheap too, $2.79-$2.85 vs. $3.09-$3.30 in SoCal.
7- The rookies and free agents at summer league are some of the stars of tomorrow. How cool is that? And some who should be stars can fall on their faces here as well. But you have to be here to see for your self.
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