Aviators, Summerlin cope with consequences of lost baseball season

Fans hang out by The Hanger as the Las Vegas Aviators take on the Sacramento River Cats at the Las Vegas Ballpark in Summerlin Thursday, June 20, 2019. The Aviators were behind but rallied in the ninth inning to win 11-10.

This summer has been quite different for Las Vegas Ballpark in Downtown Summerlin.

Instead of packing in 9,000-plus fans during a 70-date home schedule, the second-year ballpark for the Triple-A Las Vegas Aviators has sat mostly empty because of the coronavirus pandemic.

On June 30, Minor League Baseball announced what was long expected: The entire 2020 season, which had been postponed, would be canceled.

“The reality of what the pandemic has done has really set in,” Aviators President Don Logan said. “This thing is bigger than baseball. It has put things in perspective. As important as baseball is for so many people—for me, it’s all I’ve ever done—getting through this is much more important.”

Major League Baseball is playing a 60-game season beginning this month. It’s allowing franchises to carry 60 players on expanded rosters, with those not suiting up for big league games participating in an extended camp and on-call to be promoted in the case of injury or a player becoming infected with COVID-19.

That put an end to all minor league baseball, which last year in Las Vegas drew a franchise-record 650,00 fans, tops in all of Triple-A. BaseballParks.com named the new $150 million facility the best ballpark in 2019.

“We had such a great year last year,” Logan said. “I believe we have as good a staff as there is in pro sports. The results from 2019 speak for themselves. At this point, we haven’t discussed making changes, and I hope we don’t have to.”

Logan said no layoffs or furloughs are planned for the club’s nearly three dozen full-time employees, although the 450 part-time ushers, security and concession workers will be out of seasonal work. Being owned by the Howard Hughes Corp.—a publicly traded company that specializes in real estate—is a positive during times of economic uncertainty, Logan said.

The company also owns the ballpark, which sits in the master-planned Summerlin community within walking distance from Red Rock Resort and City National Arena, the practice facility for the NHL’s Golden Knights.

“It’s a well-funded company that cares about its employees,” Logan said. “They understand that this is nobody’s fault and that there’s no game plan on how to deal with this thing from a business prospective. For us, we’re going to turn to 2021 and try to make that as big and successful a season as we can.”

Officials with Howard Hughes weren’t available to comment, a spokesperson said. An earnings report for 2019 said the revenues from the stadium and franchise would contribute approximately $8.1 million to the company’s net operating income, or income after operating expenses are deducted.

The canceled season could also affect business in Downtown Summerlin, a popular shopping and dining destination that benefits from some foot traffic before and after games. But Tom Kaplan of Wolfgang Puck Players Locker, which sits close to the ballpark, said the sports-themed restaurant didn’t seem to receive a ton of business from Aviators fans last summer.

“We did get some traffic from the ballpark, but not as much as we thought,” Kaplan said. “Economic impact for us was limited, though it was better on weekends.”

Kaplan surmised that robust food and drink options inside Las Vegas Ballpark itself—along with the location of the primary game-day parking areas—factored into the general lack of pedestrian spillover from games. Still, he said the loss of a season is a blow for the close-knit Summerlin community, especially for businesses that temporarily shuttered during pandemic closures and are still operating at a limited capacity.

“We feel for Don and his group, because they’ve done so much for Summerlin,” Kaplan said. “Everybody knows they had a phenomenal season last year.”

Fans on social media expressed their encouragement for the franchise following the cancellation announcement. A fan with the Twitter handle @h82Loose posted, “I miss the fun of being at Summerlin Ballpark. Not our teams fault. I’ll just keep the credit for opening game 2021.”

The Aviators, Logan said, are offering spots to 2021 games for 2020 ticketholders. Refunds are available to season ticket holders, with 15% held if they wish to reserve seats for next season.

“This has affected everybody in the world,” Logan said. “We have to get people comfortable just going out period, not just going to baseball games. It’s disappointing, but this is our reality, so we just have to deal with it. Ultimately this will pass, and we’ll get back to playing.”

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This story appeared in Las Vegas Weekly.

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