Maloof on a Knight, Kings and a Breeze

John KatsilometesÕ complete interview

with George Maloof can be found linked to

lasvegassun.com/kats or by going to tinyurl.com/2fbrsuh.

First, weÕll get the personal stuff addressed and dismissed: George Maloof has no plans to marry and is, at the moment, single.Ardently so.

ÒI donÕt have a girlfriend. I donÕt want one,Ó Maloof says.

Why is this so?

ÒMy schedule,Ó he says. ÒIt wouldnÕt be fair to her. IÕd flake too much. Dinner was at 7? What is it, 8 now? Nine? Sorry!Ó

A man who says he has no hobbies as defined as such, Maloof allows that, ÒThe Palms is my place.Ó

ThereÕs no doubt of that. The hotel opened in November 2001, and during a taping of the radio show ÒOur Metropolis,Ó which I host each Tuesday at 6 p.m. on KUNV 91.5-FM, Maloof talked of his long path from working as a kid in his familyÕs Coors distributorship in Albuquerque to resort ownership in Vegas. He also related his last talk with his father, George J. Maloof Sr., who died in November 1980, and spoke of Las VegasÕ chances of landing an NBA team without a new arena (the short answer from the co-owner of the Sacramento Kings: Not a chance).

ThereÕs more, a lot more, from the 1988 graduate of UNLVÕs William F. Harrah College of Hotel Administration. HereÕs a sampling:You were a reserve defensive back on the UNLV football team when you were in school. Is it true you were a locker mate of Death Row Records founder Suge Knight?Yeah, Suge was right next to me. He was a good guy, he worked hard — he always worked hard. He was always first in the drills, first in sprints. He was always in the weight room and working out when everyone else was not. He was a very hard worker. He was great.Ickey Woods was a teammate, too, right?I played with Ickey, too. We had a lot of great players. Our teams were not as great as our players.When did you actually start working in the family business?At a very young age in New Mexico, about 10 years old. You couldnÕt keep me out of the warehouse. IÕd get up at 6 oÕclock and bug my mom to get me in there as soon as possible. I learned the challenge of accomplishing something and enjoying and understanding business É IÕve always been a workaholic.Your father died in 1980, when you were 16. What was your last conversation with him?It was at my house, I saw him just before I was going out. IÕd just started driving — I got into a wreck that night, actually, believe it or not. It happened just before I heard heÕd died. I did a silly, teenager thing. I was racing my car against someone else and ran into a curb, and had to try and find my mother, who was at the hospital at the time. My last conversation with my father was, he gave me a $20 bill and said, ÒIf you go out, have fun and be careful.Ó And that was it, really. I got some of that right. I miss him all the time.At the time of his death, you owned the Houston Rockets. This was a young family suddenly running an NBA franchise. Who actually ran the team at that point?Gavin, my older brother, took responsibility for the team, and the year my father died was actually the year we went to the NBA Finals and played the Boston Celtics. It was quite an experience.But you soon sold the team. Why did you do that?The following year needed to focus on our beer and liquor business. The NBA was not doing well at that time. When we made the Finals we actually had T-shirts printed up that said, ÒThe Not Ready For Prime Time Players,Ó because the Finals were not on prime time. They were on tape-delay. So we got back into focus, which was our core business.Do you think your dad would have sold the team?I donÕt think so, no. But we were very young and trying to figure things out. This was before (Michael) Jordan came into the league, and before (NBA Commissioner) David Stern took over. We couldnÕt see the future.What led you back into pro sports?At the time we sold the Rockets, we started thinking, ÒUgh, why did we do that?Ó But we pretty much needed to. So our first opportunity to get back into it was with the NFL, in the World League (of American Football). We owned the Birmingham Fire, which was a disaster. We tried that and obviously the league didnÕt work. After that, we wanted to get into one of the top four sports, so we spent about five years looking for a team, and we were really close to buying the Tampa Bay Lightning in the NHL. I mean, really close É But there was a little dissension in the family because we werenÕt all 100 percent behind the deal. We didnÕt feel comfortable with it. We didnÕt understand hockey, as a sport, very well at the time. We understand it today a lot better, and itÕs a great sport. But we didnÕt pursue it.

Just about a year later this opportunity with the Kings came along, where we could buy controlling interest of the team, and we took it. We tried buying eight different NBA teams, and they are hard to buy because there are only 30 of them and the owners never want to sell. ItÕs an emotional thing.And fans in Sacramento are concerned you might be moving the team to Las Vegas.From the damn day we bought that team until today, the story never ends. It never ends. IÕve been asked the question from the day we bought it 16 years ago: ÒAre you moving the team?Ó The fans in Sacramento have been great. We need a new arena, that is clear. ItÕs not fair to them that we donÕt (have one). But you canÕt build an arena yourself. Nobody does. You need some public help É ItÕs happening here, too.Will there be an NBA team in Las Vegas?There wonÕt be a team in Las Vegas unless thereÕs an arena. ItÕs not going to happen. I think we need an arena. I think it would be good for the city.Would public money be required for any arena in Las Vegas?Some. I have so much knowledge about how these things happen, and you canÕt build it without public money. At the end of the day, itÕs an amenity for public use. If itÕs state-of-the art, people are going to enjoy it, and there should be some public money spent. It would bring in a lot of events. Obviously, now is not a good time to be asking for money to build an arena. But ultimately É we would need it.Are you curtailed in your ability to speak freely about an arena in Las Vegas because of your position as owner of the Kings?IÕm not holding back on my opinions. I wouldnÕt do that. But when I start talking about an arena, the first thing people think about is the Sacramento Kings moving to Las Vegas. ThatÕs the reason IÕve always shied away from that discussion.

ItÕs kind of a two-pronged story for me. If I talk about an arena being built in Las Vegas, it doesnÕt really give the fans in Sacramento a lot security, you know, when weÕre telling them (Sacramento) is our city and this is where we want to be — which is true — and then George Maloof is telling everybody how much Las Vegas needs a new arena.CouldnÕt you say, ÒWe need a new arena in Las Vegas even if we have to use public funding, but I am keeping the Kings in Sacramento,Ó which would leave open the possibility that some other NBA team would move to Las Vegas?(Laughing) ÒI havenÕt thought it through that much, but taking that into account, IÕve just stayed away from it. This is the most IÕve ever spoken about it É People have opinions about the public money part of it, and my opinion is, sure — at the right time. ItÕs been such a brutal time. I donÕt know if itÕs a good time to ask everybody to foot part of the bill for an arena. It doesnÕt make sense right now. It would be very difficult.You opened the Fiesta in 1994 in North Las Vegas. How did that come about?Being in school here, and knowing that I wanted to open a casino some day, I spent a lot of time in SamÕs Town, Palace Station, the Gold Coast. I had a sense of the local market and knew that people who live here do gamble, and I carried that message back to my family. I spent a good year looking for the right piece of land, and the people of North Las Vegas were very welcoming. Rancho separates Las Vegas and North Las Vegas, and on the east side of Rancho was a gaming district. All you needed to build was 100 rooms.

But I looked all over the city, every location, for a full year. The idea was to create other Fiestas around town, but then there was another opportunity near the Strip IÕd heard about. We sold the Fiesta to (Station Casinos), and we worked on our plan for four years, going through some very challenging zoning to get the land that became the site for the Palms.Why did you name it the Palms?The first name that I came up with (laughs) — uh, it was called the Breeze. That was the working title for about a month, until I told my sister (Adrienne). And she said, ÒGeorge, you canÕt name it the Breeze.Ó There is a female product that, at that time — I donÕt know if it still exists — was also called Breeze (a line of indoor tanning products for women). Thank God for sisters. So we changed it, we nixed that É I happened to be at lunch at the Gold Coast one afternoon with the architect, John Jerde, and we just said, ÒWhatÕs a simple name that isnÕt related to an area around the world, that just has its own name?Ó And we liked Palms.kats@lasvegassun.com / 990-7720