What happens in Vegas...does not stay in Vegas!
Posted: Sat Jul 30, 2011 1:17 pmI really have enjoyed reading up on Zike and his journey in Toronto and wanted to start off my own such story. Hope everyone enjoys the following. I wrote this first part from about 1:00 am till 4:00 am so I hope I didn't make that many mistakes...
R-I-N-G...
R-I-N-G...
"Hello" I answered my phone. It was a little earlier than I am use to getting phone calls in the morning. It was my friend Ray, "you actually did it!" he yelled into the phone. "Did what?" I asked still half asleep. "You finished in the top 100 in the MGM Grand Fantasy Basketball Challenge!" I sat up in bed, not wanting to wake up my wife Elizabeth and quietly crept to the living room. "Are you serious? You aren't just screwing around right?" I whispered as I stepped over Thomas the Train tracks that my son had left out. "Go check the website and see for yourself" Ray replied. I told him I would call him later and made my way to the computer.
My friend Ray was right. Sitting there in 34th place was the username cyrisnyte. I couldn't believe it had actually happened. Right after "The Decision" had aired on ESPN I saw an article in a fantasy magazine that MGM was offering the "Fantasy Trip of a Lifetime" to the top 100 owners in their Salary Cap Fantasy League. Being 41, I had been playing fantasy basketball for over 20 years. I still remember running my own leagues in high school where I had to get the box scores out of the paper and manually add up totals to see who would win each week. This league being offered by MGM out of Las Vegas was very different to me.
The concept was simple yet intriguing. You were given a cap of 55,000,000 and had to build a team to play that season. You had injured reserve and such but it was not like most leagues where you could just drop and pick up players. You picked your squad and then you had to keep them for the season. Someone got hurt, you had the minimum salary to add a replacement. It wasn't cheap either! The entry fee was $200 but I talked my wife Elizabeth into letting me spend it since I had won my regular league for 4 years in a row.
The winners, all 100 of us were going to be flown out to Las Vegas for a 5 day "Fantasy Trip of a Lifetime". MGM made out pretty well because they had over 350,000 people sign up for the league. It was weird to put down $200 for something you were uncertain about. I mean come on, Fantasy Trip of a Lifetime could end up being sitting at the sports book watching basketball on TV with some role player who spend two years in the league.
The day had finally arrived to head to Las Vegas. One of the more unpopular aspects of winning, which I found out from many other husbands was the same for them, was that the trip was for 1 person. This meant I had to say goodbye to my wife Elizabeth and two sons, Colton & Chase for a week. The flight was nothing to write home about, Southwest Airlines where it's a cattle call for seats. Once I landed it was a different story though. I was greeted near baggage claims with a man carrying a sign with my name on it and MGM inscribed beneath. I walked over and introduced myself. Felton, the driver, informed me we had one more person heading over with us. His name was Chris Leehy and had also won the MGM challenge.
Once we arrived at MGM we were able to check in and had to be at a seminar for the winners at 5pm at Tom Colicchio's Craftsteak restaurant in MGM. It was 2pm in Las Vegas which meant we had a couple of hours to kill. Chris and I decided to meet up at the bar and had a drink and talk sports before we had our seminar. Chris had came in 66th in the Fantasy Challenge and was in the same boat as me. He almost had not signed up because he couldn't understand putting down $200 on something that he didn't know what the payout was. He figured though that $200 for a 5 day "vacation" to Las Vegas would be worth it. We both headed over to the restaurant to see what fun activities they had planned for us.
The restaurant quickly filled up with the 100 winners of the MGM "Fantasy Basketball Challenge". We were brought menus and given a bottle of wine at each table. There were about 30 tables, 20 of those for the winners with 5 of us sitting at each table. On the table was a packet with each of our names and in bold red letters it said DO NOT OPEN. The other tables had some people sitting at them and one of the people I recognized to be the old UNLV coach and former Spurs coach Jerry Tarkanian. I pointed him out to Chris and he recognized him as well.
A man came up to the podium and introduced himself as the Executive Vice President of Operations of the MGM Grand Las Vegas, William J. Hornbuckle. Well they did make a ton of money off of us, so it was nice to have someone far up the food chain here. "Welcome all of our Fantasy Winners from around the world". An applause broke out around the room. "We hope you enjoy your next 5 days here at the MGM Grand Las Vegas and other places you may travel. We promised you the Fantasy Trip of a Lifetime and we plan on providing just that. It is my great pleasure to introduce to you one of the gentlemen behind this idea, Mr. Sheldon Adelson."
The 10 tables at the front of the room immediately rose to their feet which meant they knew something we didn't. We all stood up and started to clap and I asked Chris, "do you know who that is?" To which he shook his head no. Mr. Adelson walked over to the podium and gave a small wave for everyone to take their seat. "Sometimes you have to take great risks to have great rewards" Adelson said. "I represent a group of owners here in Las Vegas who are going to take a great risk on one of you sitting here tonight. We had over 350,000 people play our "MGM Fantasy Basketball Challenge" and the 100 of you sitting here tonight are the best of the best. I am sure many of you may ask yourself about now, what really did you win? Well for 99 of you, it is a memorable 5 day trip to Las Vegas that you will be able to tell your friends and family about for years, if not decades. For one of you though..."
Suddenly banners fell from all over the ceiling and a huge logo shot up on the wall of poker chips. Adelson continued "...you will be the 1st ever General Manager of the 2011-2012 Las Vegas Aces NBA Franchise!" There was gasping, yelling and I think one guy even passed out. My heart about hit the floor. Being the GM for an NBA franchise. You know how you sit around and dream about things...well this has been one of those recurring dreams in my life for sometime. As if on cue, waitresses came around and started pouring us glasses of wine as most of us needed a shot of anything about now.
"We will be having a great evening but understand that we are here to find our next GM now. Starting tomorrow you will have numerous workshops and meetings to attend. Tomorrow is Tuesday and we will be excusing 50 of you from the selection process by midnight. You will transition over to a fantasy basketball vacation but will no longer be part of the process to help lead the Aces in their inaugural season. I know many of you will have questions and those will be answered over the next few days. The 5 left by Friday will surely have every question you have answered. Good luck everyone, enjoy your food and drinks. Remember, you are in Las Vegas and anything is possible here. Please keep your packet with you at all times and you may now open it at your leisure."
I wondered if Columbus was doing something similar. Chris and I talked about the fact that Las Vegas and Columbus were both getting expansion teams this upcoming season and what it would be like to make it past the first cut of 50. We instantly wondered how much control we would have or if it was just a Las Vegas gimmick and we would be a puppet on a string for a real GM.
I told Chris I was heading back to my room early as I had to call my wife and tell her what was happening. My head was still spinning as I left the restaurant and caught the elevator to my floor.
It was 7:30 pm in Vegas which meant it was already 9:30 pm in San Antonio, Texas. This wasn't going to be a 5 minute call home either. My wife answered and after 45 minutes of convincing her I was not drunk, the reality sat in. Elizabeth was very supportive and told me that she knew I could do it. It meant a lot and I told her to kiss Colton and Chase goodnight for me.
I tried to lay down but couldn't sleep. Where would we play basketball at? Was there already a coach hired? Who would be left unprotected in the expansion draft? I looked over the packet and found the 1st page to be the itinerary. It seems I had to be at a meeting at 8 am. to talk about the Luxury Tax in the NBA. At 10 am I was going to have a meeting with a psychologist till 11 am. From there is was a luncheon with Jerry Tarkanian who was going to talk about his role in basketball on the NBA level. At 1 pm I would do role playing for two hours in regards to human interaction. Finally from 3:30 pm till 5:30 pm I would need to take a team I was given a packet for and come up with a plan of action to either make them a contender or keep them one. I put on Sportscenter and of course it was the top story. Jay Bilis was saying it was the stupidest publicity stunt he had ever seen. Many of the NBA players were saying it was a joke to have someone who didn't know basketball making such important decisions. "I will worry about them if I can survive 99 others" I thought to myself and finally fell asleep.
For the record, 8 am is not the best time to be talking about Luxury Tax in the NBA. Thank goodness Elizabeth had packed me some nicer clothes. Twenty of us filed into a room with 2 gentleman in suits. A lot of the other winners were in shorts and t-shirts. At least I had on slacks and a dress shirt. Chris was no where to be seen so I assumed he was in another meeting. The meeting seemed to take forever. I had brought a tablet and pen from the room and jotted down notes about rookie exceptions, Bird years, soft vs. hard cap. Most of the guys just paid attention or were texting on their phones. I started to get a sense that I better remember as much of this as I can.
Next up was my meeting with the psychologist. This went rather smoothly, as it seemed they just wanted to see if you were normal and what type of baggage you had. Nothing shook me up and I was ready to head off to the luncheon with Tark the Shark.
It was great to hear Tarkanian talk as he had been the coach of the Spurs and since I am from San Antonio had actually gone to a few games while he coached us. He talked about the grind of an 82 game season. The attempt to manage egos and keeping players happy and how much the GM had an effect on that. It gave me a new perspective. Not only do you need the best team on the court but the GM can really influence the feel of the locker room as well.
The role playing was quite interesting as it dealt with a lot of what Tarkanian had just talked to us about. We had scenarios where players demanded to be traded, players were in violation of NBA policies, players were holding out. It keep us on our toes and you could see now why GMs come and go in the NBA so fast.
Now came the moment of truth. I crossed my fingers that I didn't get the Charlotte packet. The season had just wrapped up and they had finished with the worst record at 15-67. My packet was handed to me and when I opened it up I discovered I had the Los Angeles...Clippers. We were told we had the next hour to talk with mock GMs at stations, you had 5 minutes per mock GM. I worked my way around and managed to make a few moves that in my eyes made the Clippers more likely to improve on their 37-45 season that had just wrapped up. We were each moved to a laptop were we had 30 minutes to type up a one year, three year and 5 year plan for your team. Thank goodness I listened because we had to talk about the cap and contract extensions, coaches, assistant coaches all in under 30 minutes. We each handed in our reports and were told to expect a phone call before midnight.
My stomach was in knots as I sat in the room waiting for the phone to ring. I ordered some room service and the minute I bit into my burger the phone rang.
"Hello?" I answered
"Mr. Jeff Shipman?" a voice asked.
"Yes, this is he."
"Congratulations Jeff, you are in the next 50. Please be at breakfast at 7 am. Have a good evening Jeff".
Needless to say another restless night of sleep. The next morning I was at breakfast by 6:45 am. I looked around the room and saw Chris and walked over to him.
"Man, talk about stress" Chris said to me.
"Ha! What if you take over the Aces!" I replied.
We sat down and had breakfast while an overhead showed the 2010-2011 NBA league leaders by category.
Towards the end of breakfast a man walked up to the podium and explained how the day was going to play out.
"Gentlemen, as you know, the Miami Heat are playing the Portland Trailblazers in Portland tonight in game 4 of the NBA Finals. The Heat hold a 2-1 lead over Portland heading into this game. Who here would like to see this game live...in Portland?"
Everyone jumped up and started screaming and shouting.
"We will be using one of the owner's of the Las Vegas Aces private jets to fly to Portland where we will have a suite to view the game. We currently have 50 candidates left for the Aces GM position. By the time we board that airplane gentleman, we will be down to 20."
Murmurs spread around the room. Down to 20, man another cut so fast.
"You will be given from now till 8:30 am to cram for a verbal exam over yesterday's breakouts. You will be called up one by one in front of a panel and if you get the question right you go back in line. If you get it wrong, you will join the other winners from yesterday at your Fantasy Basketball Vacation. When you arrive back at your room, you will have a round number on your bed letting you know where to line up 1 - 50. Good luck gentlemen, see you at 8:30 am."
I rushed to my room and opened the door, there on my bed was the same number as I had came in, 34. I grabbed my folder and started cramming about the salary cap. Then it hit me. I better look up the league leaders for this season as they had been flashing them during breakfast. I powered up my laptop and quickly made some mental notes.
I stood in line and waited before the panel. By the time they reached me, 18 people had been removed from the competition.
"Mr. Shipman, who was this season's NBA scoring leader and what was his average?"
I froze for a second but then blurted out "Kevin Durant at 29.3 points per game".
"Correct, please go to the end of the line".
Needless to say, I did not have to answer a 2nd question. It was a never wracking experience but I was glad to see that my new friend Chris had made it through.
"Gentlemen, please meet us in the lobby at 1:00 pm for our departure to the airport."
The flight was great and the game was amazing. The Trailblazers evened up the series with a 107 - 104 win over the Heat. Greg Oden poured in 33 points and 12 rebounds while LeBron lead all scorers with 36 points.
On the flight back we were told to be at breakfast at 6:30 am. By the time we landed in Las Vegas it was already midnight so I was off to my room and some sleep.
Wednesday came and I drug myself to breakfast, arriving at 6:20 am. Everyone in the room looked exhausted.
"20 of you remain." said Jerry Tarkanian. "It's Wednesday and by 8 pm we will be down to 10 people attempting to be the 1st ever GM of the Las Vegas Aces. Each of you will be meeting for 2 hours today with one of the owners of the Las Vegas Aces to discuss in detail what you see as a one, three and five year plan for the organization. Please finish your breakfast and head back to your rooms. You will find your time slot on your bed. The 1st round of interviews begin at 9 am."
I headed upstairs and found out my time slot was 1 pm - 3 pm, right after lunch...great. I called up Elizabeth and told her everything that had been going on. She assured me that things were going to workout just fine. I took a nap and watched some Sportscenter, still more about the "lame brain" idea that the Aces franchise was doing.
I headed to my meeting and discovered I was sitting down with Mr. Sheldon Aldeson, the man from the first night. We spent the entire time talking about the NBA and what it meant for Las Vegas. I was assured this was not a publicity stunt and that the person chosen for the job would indeed make all decisions including coaching staff, free agents, trades and daily operations. I spoke in depth about there needing to be a level of understanding in building a franchise from the ground floor up. Mr. Sheldon Aldeson was in agreement with their needing to be patience but that expectations were to see improvement and an aggressive approach to building a name brand for the Aces. Time had come for me to leave the room. I shook Mr. Aldeson's hand and thanked him for his time and the opportunity to express my ideas about the Aces.
7:45 pm and the phone rang.
"Mr. Shipman?" the voice said.
"This is he," I replied
"Great job today, Mr. Shipman, you are in the final 10. Please join us for breakfast at 7:00 am."
R-I-N-G...
R-I-N-G...
"Hello" I answered my phone. It was a little earlier than I am use to getting phone calls in the morning. It was my friend Ray, "you actually did it!" he yelled into the phone. "Did what?" I asked still half asleep. "You finished in the top 100 in the MGM Grand Fantasy Basketball Challenge!" I sat up in bed, not wanting to wake up my wife Elizabeth and quietly crept to the living room. "Are you serious? You aren't just screwing around right?" I whispered as I stepped over Thomas the Train tracks that my son had left out. "Go check the website and see for yourself" Ray replied. I told him I would call him later and made my way to the computer.
My friend Ray was right. Sitting there in 34th place was the username cyrisnyte. I couldn't believe it had actually happened. Right after "The Decision" had aired on ESPN I saw an article in a fantasy magazine that MGM was offering the "Fantasy Trip of a Lifetime" to the top 100 owners in their Salary Cap Fantasy League. Being 41, I had been playing fantasy basketball for over 20 years. I still remember running my own leagues in high school where I had to get the box scores out of the paper and manually add up totals to see who would win each week. This league being offered by MGM out of Las Vegas was very different to me.
The concept was simple yet intriguing. You were given a cap of 55,000,000 and had to build a team to play that season. You had injured reserve and such but it was not like most leagues where you could just drop and pick up players. You picked your squad and then you had to keep them for the season. Someone got hurt, you had the minimum salary to add a replacement. It wasn't cheap either! The entry fee was $200 but I talked my wife Elizabeth into letting me spend it since I had won my regular league for 4 years in a row.
The winners, all 100 of us were going to be flown out to Las Vegas for a 5 day "Fantasy Trip of a Lifetime". MGM made out pretty well because they had over 350,000 people sign up for the league. It was weird to put down $200 for something you were uncertain about. I mean come on, Fantasy Trip of a Lifetime could end up being sitting at the sports book watching basketball on TV with some role player who spend two years in the league.
The day had finally arrived to head to Las Vegas. One of the more unpopular aspects of winning, which I found out from many other husbands was the same for them, was that the trip was for 1 person. This meant I had to say goodbye to my wife Elizabeth and two sons, Colton & Chase for a week. The flight was nothing to write home about, Southwest Airlines where it's a cattle call for seats. Once I landed it was a different story though. I was greeted near baggage claims with a man carrying a sign with my name on it and MGM inscribed beneath. I walked over and introduced myself. Felton, the driver, informed me we had one more person heading over with us. His name was Chris Leehy and had also won the MGM challenge.
Once we arrived at MGM we were able to check in and had to be at a seminar for the winners at 5pm at Tom Colicchio's Craftsteak restaurant in MGM. It was 2pm in Las Vegas which meant we had a couple of hours to kill. Chris and I decided to meet up at the bar and had a drink and talk sports before we had our seminar. Chris had came in 66th in the Fantasy Challenge and was in the same boat as me. He almost had not signed up because he couldn't understand putting down $200 on something that he didn't know what the payout was. He figured though that $200 for a 5 day "vacation" to Las Vegas would be worth it. We both headed over to the restaurant to see what fun activities they had planned for us.
The restaurant quickly filled up with the 100 winners of the MGM "Fantasy Basketball Challenge". We were brought menus and given a bottle of wine at each table. There were about 30 tables, 20 of those for the winners with 5 of us sitting at each table. On the table was a packet with each of our names and in bold red letters it said DO NOT OPEN. The other tables had some people sitting at them and one of the people I recognized to be the old UNLV coach and former Spurs coach Jerry Tarkanian. I pointed him out to Chris and he recognized him as well.
A man came up to the podium and introduced himself as the Executive Vice President of Operations of the MGM Grand Las Vegas, William J. Hornbuckle. Well they did make a ton of money off of us, so it was nice to have someone far up the food chain here. "Welcome all of our Fantasy Winners from around the world". An applause broke out around the room. "We hope you enjoy your next 5 days here at the MGM Grand Las Vegas and other places you may travel. We promised you the Fantasy Trip of a Lifetime and we plan on providing just that. It is my great pleasure to introduce to you one of the gentlemen behind this idea, Mr. Sheldon Adelson."
The 10 tables at the front of the room immediately rose to their feet which meant they knew something we didn't. We all stood up and started to clap and I asked Chris, "do you know who that is?" To which he shook his head no. Mr. Adelson walked over to the podium and gave a small wave for everyone to take their seat. "Sometimes you have to take great risks to have great rewards" Adelson said. "I represent a group of owners here in Las Vegas who are going to take a great risk on one of you sitting here tonight. We had over 350,000 people play our "MGM Fantasy Basketball Challenge" and the 100 of you sitting here tonight are the best of the best. I am sure many of you may ask yourself about now, what really did you win? Well for 99 of you, it is a memorable 5 day trip to Las Vegas that you will be able to tell your friends and family about for years, if not decades. For one of you though..."
Suddenly banners fell from all over the ceiling and a huge logo shot up on the wall of poker chips. Adelson continued "...you will be the 1st ever General Manager of the 2011-2012 Las Vegas Aces NBA Franchise!" There was gasping, yelling and I think one guy even passed out. My heart about hit the floor. Being the GM for an NBA franchise. You know how you sit around and dream about things...well this has been one of those recurring dreams in my life for sometime. As if on cue, waitresses came around and started pouring us glasses of wine as most of us needed a shot of anything about now.
"We will be having a great evening but understand that we are here to find our next GM now. Starting tomorrow you will have numerous workshops and meetings to attend. Tomorrow is Tuesday and we will be excusing 50 of you from the selection process by midnight. You will transition over to a fantasy basketball vacation but will no longer be part of the process to help lead the Aces in their inaugural season. I know many of you will have questions and those will be answered over the next few days. The 5 left by Friday will surely have every question you have answered. Good luck everyone, enjoy your food and drinks. Remember, you are in Las Vegas and anything is possible here. Please keep your packet with you at all times and you may now open it at your leisure."
I wondered if Columbus was doing something similar. Chris and I talked about the fact that Las Vegas and Columbus were both getting expansion teams this upcoming season and what it would be like to make it past the first cut of 50. We instantly wondered how much control we would have or if it was just a Las Vegas gimmick and we would be a puppet on a string for a real GM.
I told Chris I was heading back to my room early as I had to call my wife and tell her what was happening. My head was still spinning as I left the restaurant and caught the elevator to my floor.
It was 7:30 pm in Vegas which meant it was already 9:30 pm in San Antonio, Texas. This wasn't going to be a 5 minute call home either. My wife answered and after 45 minutes of convincing her I was not drunk, the reality sat in. Elizabeth was very supportive and told me that she knew I could do it. It meant a lot and I told her to kiss Colton and Chase goodnight for me.
I tried to lay down but couldn't sleep. Where would we play basketball at? Was there already a coach hired? Who would be left unprotected in the expansion draft? I looked over the packet and found the 1st page to be the itinerary. It seems I had to be at a meeting at 8 am. to talk about the Luxury Tax in the NBA. At 10 am I was going to have a meeting with a psychologist till 11 am. From there is was a luncheon with Jerry Tarkanian who was going to talk about his role in basketball on the NBA level. At 1 pm I would do role playing for two hours in regards to human interaction. Finally from 3:30 pm till 5:30 pm I would need to take a team I was given a packet for and come up with a plan of action to either make them a contender or keep them one. I put on Sportscenter and of course it was the top story. Jay Bilis was saying it was the stupidest publicity stunt he had ever seen. Many of the NBA players were saying it was a joke to have someone who didn't know basketball making such important decisions. "I will worry about them if I can survive 99 others" I thought to myself and finally fell asleep.
For the record, 8 am is not the best time to be talking about Luxury Tax in the NBA. Thank goodness Elizabeth had packed me some nicer clothes. Twenty of us filed into a room with 2 gentleman in suits. A lot of the other winners were in shorts and t-shirts. At least I had on slacks and a dress shirt. Chris was no where to be seen so I assumed he was in another meeting. The meeting seemed to take forever. I had brought a tablet and pen from the room and jotted down notes about rookie exceptions, Bird years, soft vs. hard cap. Most of the guys just paid attention or were texting on their phones. I started to get a sense that I better remember as much of this as I can.
Next up was my meeting with the psychologist. This went rather smoothly, as it seemed they just wanted to see if you were normal and what type of baggage you had. Nothing shook me up and I was ready to head off to the luncheon with Tark the Shark.
It was great to hear Tarkanian talk as he had been the coach of the Spurs and since I am from San Antonio had actually gone to a few games while he coached us. He talked about the grind of an 82 game season. The attempt to manage egos and keeping players happy and how much the GM had an effect on that. It gave me a new perspective. Not only do you need the best team on the court but the GM can really influence the feel of the locker room as well.
The role playing was quite interesting as it dealt with a lot of what Tarkanian had just talked to us about. We had scenarios where players demanded to be traded, players were in violation of NBA policies, players were holding out. It keep us on our toes and you could see now why GMs come and go in the NBA so fast.
Now came the moment of truth. I crossed my fingers that I didn't get the Charlotte packet. The season had just wrapped up and they had finished with the worst record at 15-67. My packet was handed to me and when I opened it up I discovered I had the Los Angeles...Clippers. We were told we had the next hour to talk with mock GMs at stations, you had 5 minutes per mock GM. I worked my way around and managed to make a few moves that in my eyes made the Clippers more likely to improve on their 37-45 season that had just wrapped up. We were each moved to a laptop were we had 30 minutes to type up a one year, three year and 5 year plan for your team. Thank goodness I listened because we had to talk about the cap and contract extensions, coaches, assistant coaches all in under 30 minutes. We each handed in our reports and were told to expect a phone call before midnight.
My stomach was in knots as I sat in the room waiting for the phone to ring. I ordered some room service and the minute I bit into my burger the phone rang.
"Hello?" I answered
"Mr. Jeff Shipman?" a voice asked.
"Yes, this is he."
"Congratulations Jeff, you are in the next 50. Please be at breakfast at 7 am. Have a good evening Jeff".
Needless to say another restless night of sleep. The next morning I was at breakfast by 6:45 am. I looked around the room and saw Chris and walked over to him.
"Man, talk about stress" Chris said to me.
"Ha! What if you take over the Aces!" I replied.
We sat down and had breakfast while an overhead showed the 2010-2011 NBA league leaders by category.
Towards the end of breakfast a man walked up to the podium and explained how the day was going to play out.
"Gentlemen, as you know, the Miami Heat are playing the Portland Trailblazers in Portland tonight in game 4 of the NBA Finals. The Heat hold a 2-1 lead over Portland heading into this game. Who here would like to see this game live...in Portland?"
Everyone jumped up and started screaming and shouting.
"We will be using one of the owner's of the Las Vegas Aces private jets to fly to Portland where we will have a suite to view the game. We currently have 50 candidates left for the Aces GM position. By the time we board that airplane gentleman, we will be down to 20."
Murmurs spread around the room. Down to 20, man another cut so fast.
"You will be given from now till 8:30 am to cram for a verbal exam over yesterday's breakouts. You will be called up one by one in front of a panel and if you get the question right you go back in line. If you get it wrong, you will join the other winners from yesterday at your Fantasy Basketball Vacation. When you arrive back at your room, you will have a round number on your bed letting you know where to line up 1 - 50. Good luck gentlemen, see you at 8:30 am."
I rushed to my room and opened the door, there on my bed was the same number as I had came in, 34. I grabbed my folder and started cramming about the salary cap. Then it hit me. I better look up the league leaders for this season as they had been flashing them during breakfast. I powered up my laptop and quickly made some mental notes.
I stood in line and waited before the panel. By the time they reached me, 18 people had been removed from the competition.
"Mr. Shipman, who was this season's NBA scoring leader and what was his average?"
I froze for a second but then blurted out "Kevin Durant at 29.3 points per game".
"Correct, please go to the end of the line".
Needless to say, I did not have to answer a 2nd question. It was a never wracking experience but I was glad to see that my new friend Chris had made it through.
"Gentlemen, please meet us in the lobby at 1:00 pm for our departure to the airport."
The flight was great and the game was amazing. The Trailblazers evened up the series with a 107 - 104 win over the Heat. Greg Oden poured in 33 points and 12 rebounds while LeBron lead all scorers with 36 points.
On the flight back we were told to be at breakfast at 6:30 am. By the time we landed in Las Vegas it was already midnight so I was off to my room and some sleep.
Wednesday came and I drug myself to breakfast, arriving at 6:20 am. Everyone in the room looked exhausted.
"20 of you remain." said Jerry Tarkanian. "It's Wednesday and by 8 pm we will be down to 10 people attempting to be the 1st ever GM of the Las Vegas Aces. Each of you will be meeting for 2 hours today with one of the owners of the Las Vegas Aces to discuss in detail what you see as a one, three and five year plan for the organization. Please finish your breakfast and head back to your rooms. You will find your time slot on your bed. The 1st round of interviews begin at 9 am."
I headed upstairs and found out my time slot was 1 pm - 3 pm, right after lunch...great. I called up Elizabeth and told her everything that had been going on. She assured me that things were going to workout just fine. I took a nap and watched some Sportscenter, still more about the "lame brain" idea that the Aces franchise was doing.
I headed to my meeting and discovered I was sitting down with Mr. Sheldon Aldeson, the man from the first night. We spent the entire time talking about the NBA and what it meant for Las Vegas. I was assured this was not a publicity stunt and that the person chosen for the job would indeed make all decisions including coaching staff, free agents, trades and daily operations. I spoke in depth about there needing to be a level of understanding in building a franchise from the ground floor up. Mr. Sheldon Aldeson was in agreement with their needing to be patience but that expectations were to see improvement and an aggressive approach to building a name brand for the Aces. Time had come for me to leave the room. I shook Mr. Aldeson's hand and thanked him for his time and the opportunity to express my ideas about the Aces.
7:45 pm and the phone rang.
"Mr. Shipman?" the voice said.
"This is he," I replied
"Great job today, Mr. Shipman, you are in the final 10. Please join us for breakfast at 7:00 am."