Vegas Pauly C: The Casino Debt Crisis Nobody Is Talking About | DSH #1733

on a horrible outcome for the rest of their life by making one or two stupid decisions or getting

associated ones to be able to, you know, it breaks my heart. And I said this on a previous podcast

with you and I'll stand by it with my problem with my deficiency CCAATT and my addictions and my

childhood. And I'm not virtue signal. If I had grown up in an area that was really shitty,

I'd be either dead or in jail. But because I grew up in a privileged area, I became, you know, I'm

the clown, I'm the court jester, I'm the community, I'm the guy who's always broke, I'm the guy,

oh my god. This is what my friends were saying in 1995. Can you believe Paul and Bruce sold that

company and pulled down a million dollars cash? And this ad is broke 10 months later, you know. And

I was always like sort of the clown, the story, but I always had people to go to for support. I always

had people that had economic opportunities. Okay guys, we are at the one drop poker event in

resource world all-elounge with the returning guest today, Vegas, Paulie C. Well, hello,

hello, hello, let's go. I just want to tell everybody I have sunglasses on, not to be cool,

but because I got a little cancer in the right eye and they took it off and it's, you know,

so black and it's bloody and it's okay. I thought you brought them because you were going to play

a little poker. No, no, no. You haven't played poker in a while, right? I played poker at the

game at downstairs, one time they gave me $2,000 to play the game and I just... The video one?

I had Kings. No, no regular poker. Oh, okay. And I had a pair of Kings and I lost a 10-2 off,

something like the win-wall and yeah, yeah, he busted me. Jack, Jack, Jack, too off. I already call

you a Jack, too, off. It's a very loose game down there. Wow. You must have picked up a

tell on you or something. Yeah, the tell is, wow, I got a good hand here. You guys are in trouble.

What's new with you, man? No, it's been about a year since you've been on. So, you know,

I've been at this about three years and, you know, my old stories I've never monetized. I don't

get paid for videos. I thought adventure videos around town where I just, you know, show up,

do them. I did a liquor store the other day. And, you know, I'm just looking to monetize

what's something I like. You know, I get accused a lot on social media of nonsense. There's no

nonsense. Look at my page. You don't see any offshore websites. You don't see any social

casinos. You don't see anything. I'm sure you've been offered those deals. I'm living in poverty

because I don't take the money from them because I don't feel good about them. Like, I don't

know who they are. Like, most of them are unregulated. And then the ones that are in this country,

they're being sued. There was just a big lawsuit, no name, but two very big people in the social

media space are being sued. Well, just promoting them or promoting stake down. Yeah, I think it's

a stake. It might be something else. And I've turned down, you know, all kinds of money because I

just can't feel good about it. Like, how would I know what the hell's going on in some server

and Antiqua? Right. You know what I mean? So if someone prestigious like Venetian or Win approach you

all with that. Yeah. Yeah. Well, I'm working on deals with two hotels right now. Believe it or not.

It's shocking. You know, finally, I've done my three years in the desert. And the one of them,

I really, really, really love. I've always loved. And he's downtown. And you know, I'm Jonathan John.

Oh, yeah. He's supposed to be here, I think. Yeah. He's amazing. And I want to work out something

with him. But I could feel good about the plaza. You know, people say me, well, why do you feel good

about the plaza? You know, true story. I said to Jonathan, I said, you're all told small on your

crop table, pays 150 to one, just like every other hotel on the strip. Used to be 175 to one. They

lowered it to 150 to one. Now 175 to one. The house has a 7% house edge. Yeah. I said to Jonathan,

why don't you be the only game in the world that pays 180 to one? You know, it's like a 5% edge.

He said, okay, Polly, you know, I'm gonna look into that. And he came back to me and he actually

said, you know, I can't offer 180 to one because that layout is not approved by the Nevada

Gaming Commission. Well, he said, but 175 is. And he changed it. And he said to me, look,

if I can make the players happy and still make a profit, I'm gonna give them the better odds.

So if I work something out with them and I'm down there and you see me down there, it's gonna be

for causes because you have a person running the casino who's giving better odds, better games.

He's got singles, zero roulette. He's got full pay on the pop crops, which is also my doing.

I said, Jonathan, why don't you put in pop crops with full pay? Do you know that the salesman

tried to talk him out of it? He said, no, you want to do limited pay? You don't want to do.

He said, no, I want to do full pay. He did full pay. Wow. Shout out to Jonathan. And he's gonna change

a few other things there because I'm, you know, I'm hammering him. But who else is gonna listen to me

like that? Although the real, you know, I want to give credit to the real same thing. I went in

there spoke with Patrick Miller. I said, why don't you do a better video poker here? No.

Two weeks later, he had full pay video poker on the bar. It's the only place north of Southpoint

that has it. Well, um, he also did the full pay. He put a table there. He put a Vegas policy.

I said, we're gonna put my name on the table. You got to put strip rules. You know, the best

rules. He put the strip rules. So, you know, the real is not really in that position to offer me

anything or to do anything with me. Uh, but if I can work something out with the plaza or

bike or work something out with somewhere else, you know, if I believe in the property, I mean,

you know, I love the Venetian. Yeah. I mean, it's my favorite hotel in business. Your favorite hotel.

I mean, the diversity of food there. And they just added, uh, that one restaurant co-ta,

co-ta. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I did a video from that and Bawa. Yeah. They have six daycauses there.

And you can't say a bird bad word about any of the six. No. And my, my favorite breakfast spot in

Vegas is there too. Uh, Lux Cathay. Not that one. It's next to the VR spot. I forget the name.

Upstairs or downstairs? Uh, downstairs. Uh, damn. I'll, I'll let the Latin place.

I might be, uh, they make a mean croissant sandwich. Okay. All right. Great coffee there.

Cool. Yeah. The food there is unbelievable. Yeah. Um, shout out to the Venetian. Yeah.

It's my favorite hotel. Anytime I do a staycation, I, I prefer the Venetian. Yeah.

Because the rooms are great. You get a sweet. They've got everything there. Yeah. You know, it's

a lot of people don't realize how, how wonderful it is and they come over. They're like, wow.

So the last time you came on a year ago, a couple of casinos were struggling. I know you really

study the numbers. How are the financials looking like right now? Well, you know, I went really deep

into the financials of both, uh, Caesars, MGM, you know, those are the primary two.

The strat now is being taken off the market. So that's no longer, you know, a part of the conversation.

Most of these places are private, but with the Caesars financials being out there and able to read,

and the MGM financials, we'll just talk about Caesars for a second.

The deeper I got into it, the more I realized how lethal the read structure is to Las Vegas.

You know, you have casino executives who signed deals in 2019, 2020, the MGM deal,

and they signed away long-term gain for short-term gain. So what they did was they

mortgaged up all their properties. So if you take the total market cap and all the debt,

including the capital leases for Caesars and MGM, and you add it together, you come up with

$56 billion in debt and about $14 billion in equity as of today. The stocks are up today,

even though they were downgraded by the brokerages today because the stock market was up so much,

MGM and Caesars were both up about 6%. So you have $14 billion in equity. And I spoke about this

on another podcast. I said, you know, you live in your house. You feel good. Your house is worth

$700,000. You know, you come home, you got your wife, your kids, your dog, everybody's happy.

But if you have a $560,000 mortgage on the house, it's a little tight. Anyone who's owned a home

knows that a $700,000 house with a $560,000 mortgage. It's a little tight. Now imagine,

like, and I'm comparing these numbers exactly, but I'm just chopping off zero Caesars and MGM.

Imagine you have $70 billion and $56 billion in debt, which is exactly what's going on there.

You see the parallel between $700,000 and $560,000 and $70,000. But it's worse than that.

It goes up 2%. Not all of the debt. The capital leases on MGM are $25 billion. The capital leases

on ceases are $12 billion. So you have $37 billion out of the $55 billion they owe is in the

REIT structure. Here's the amazing thing about the REIT structure. And we'll just use simple math,

simple example. So they owe $37 billion in REIT money. I'm just going to use 7% because

it's a blended rate. Caesars pays a little higher. MGM did a 5% deal with the cost,

but also some of their debt is at a very low number, it said 5%. But next year, 7%, next year,

it goes up by 2%. Now that sounds like nothing. But that means that your rate next year is not 7%.

It's 7.14%, because 2% of 7% is 0.14. And the year after that, it's roughly 7.3. And this goes up

every year. And if you actually take a huge number, like $37 billion, and then we'll take 7% of that,

so that's 2.1. We'll use 2.5 billion, you know, just as a round number as the amount of money that

they're paying the REIT structure, 2.5 billion. And then that's going to go up 2% next year. So 2.5

billion, 1% of 2.5 billion is 250 million. So 2% of that is 500 million. It turns out to be a huge

amount of money. It just adds up and adds up and adds up. Next thing, you know, you're paying

a fortune to the REITs. So the REITs are, let me revisit that number again, 7.5 billion, 1%

of 7.5 billion is not 7.50 million. It's 75 million. So 75 million twice goes up to 150 million.

So the REITs next year, instead of being 7 billion, are going to be 7.15 billion. So they're going

up $150 million next year. That's a lot of money. I mean, their big corporations, Caesar says 50

properties. MGM probably has 10 or 15. I don't know the exact number. They're big companies. But

still, when you think about the fact that you need to make another half a million dollars every

single day, just to stay even on your rent. They're not doing that right now, right?

Well, you know, the property that stands out, there's always an arc type when you're trying to

make a point. And I'm pretty sure this is the arc type, although I have not looked at all 50

properties that are indebted to the REITs structure. How is Atlantic City? The monthly rent to

the REIT is 5.5 million dollars. And now this is all on New Jersey Casino Control Commission.

It's all published. The monthly gross profit is 3.5 million. So they make 3.5 million profit,

the rooms, the casino, the food, 3.5 million. It's not bad. It's $100,000 a day.

But they've indebted the property so badly they signed a REIT deal for 599 million there

that every month their rent is 5.5 million. 3.5 million in profit, 5.5 million in rent.

How long does that last?

And now some of the companies that did these loans are coming under pressure. You can look at their

stock eight down eight percent, one of them is down eight percent at the year, the other one is

down 12 percent at the year. Wow. I did not expect that because the first time you came on, we were

talking about resource world and found blue, but you're talking about some big dogs now, MGM and

Caesars. Well, you know what happened? I got bored of resource world. And I got bored of

thought and blue. You know, nothing's changed in either places. The same story of resource world

never learned. I realized that we're here. I don't care. And thought to blue gets better and

better. At least they have the ability to learn. They have the ability to put a better product

out there. They open very cold, but they've warmed up tremendously. And I got tired of

resource world because resource world is here and it's not going anywhere and they make a very

marginal return here. They made $18 million last quarter. The run rate on that for the year,

let's just use 80 million. They've a $4.2 billion investment. $4.2 billion investment here.

2% return. Oh my gosh. Well, 80 million is 2% of $4.2 billion. So they make a 2% return.

You know, I grew a little in this job, if you want to call it that. And I went from being just

a total enfonterieble in the beginning to really thinking about the city, thinking about the leaders,

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And the bottom line is this. Genting Burr Hard came to Las Vegas. They gambled $4.2 billion.

The rebillion of it is cash. They wrote it from the parent company. Money that they made in Singapore.

So they made a $3 billion deposit in the Las Vegas economy. They're not making money here.

They're actual interests. They owe $1.2 billion so their quarterly interest is $25 million.

They've $18 million in cash flow. The parent company is still putting money in here.

But the larger point that I want to make is, it's great for Las Vegas. Someone came here,

right? Mine's been when I was a kid. Did you play poker when you were a kid? A little bit.

Okay. So remember the kid that was show up who was rich and had absolutely no idea how to play

poker? A fish, they call it. Yeah. Wasn't he the best? Yeah. Well, that's resourceful.

They came to Las Vegas. They have no idea what they're doing. But they did write a $3 billion

check and stick it in the economy. And they're here and they make their $20 million a quarter in

cash flow. And it's just a boring story because they don't really excel. They don't really

fall apart. They have no success in the United States. Anybody who's following the New York story

knows what they did there. I can't even get into it. It's too deep into the weeks. Maybe try and

stay in Las Vegas. But no success in Catskills, no success in New York. I just read the other day

for the first time that they lost $400 million in a tribal investment in Massachusetts. Really?

I had no idea they lent $400 million. It just came up. When you eat casino.org

and you read iGaming.com and you read legal sports report and you read casino.org, whatever.

And you read all these stories, everyone's about to link to something. And I don't think it's

widely known. It was announced on the Malaysian Stock Exchange that they have a $400 million exposure

to this tribe in Massachusetts. And the reason it was a story is because the federal government

just recently revoked their ability to open a casino. So now the $400 million becomes like,

hey, we lent you guys $400 million. How are you going to pay it back? So I think they had to give

some sort of announcement to the Malaysian Stock Exchange on that. But you know, the more you read and

the more you're involved in this, the more you grow and the more you know. So yeah, I'm doing it

every day. So which casino and Vegas do you think is going to shut down next? I don't know that

anybody will shut down as long as they have positive EBITDA. So if you have a property, even if it

is a $10 billion investment, well, let's just use the font of blue cross the street. And I have

I saw the font and lose financials in February of 2024. I have not seen them since then. Hey,

how come nobody sends me the financials anymore? I thought I thought you guys were so disgruntled

over there. Oh, so you had to get it sent to you. It's not public. It disgruntled investor.

Well, what I didn't know was, and I found out later, not only did Jeff raise money,

not only did he raise money from VICI and Blackstone. I know he owes VICI 300 million and he borrowed

500 million from Blackstone. So not only did he borrow 800 million from those two entities and

that's publicly announced because Blackstone and VICI are public companies. Not only did he do that,

he borrowed money from a lot of wealthy families. Wow, private lenders. I mean, I don't know why.

So he borrowed money from and some of them are just gruntled and one of them was sending me the

financials, but not and I haven't seen it, you know, and like I said a year and a half. But let's

just use them as an example because you're asking me who's going to go out of business. So they,

I don't, I'm going to guess they owe $3 billion. It's a guess because I don't know the exact

number. So they owe $3 billion. If they have even $10 million in annual, even in other words,

$10 million in positive cash flow, you wipe out X amount of that $3 billion in a reorganization.

You say, well, they can't carry $3 billion, but maybe they could carry $1 billion. The Revalent

Atlantic City went through two processes like that. Of course, $2.2 billion to open it open in

2012. It went bankrupt. They lowered the debt to about 800 million. Couldn't carry the 800

million. Went bankrupt a second time. The reason the Reval, which was open two years open in 2012,

closed in 2014. The reason the Reval did not reopen, no positive cash flow, no positive EBITDA.

So if you don't have positive EBITDA, it's very hard to continue the operation of a property.

But I would imagine that I know that this particular establishment has $80 to $100 million

positive. So you could say, if Kenting Burhard, Burhad wanted to get rid of this property and has

$100 million in cash flow, an educated buyer would come in and just will just use

round numbers. And he would say, well, you know what? It's worth a billion dollars to me. It's worth

10 times EBITDA, right? Some people try and value these properties at seven times. I've seen deals

at 20, the Caesars 2007 deal. It was 20 times you. I mean, it's all over the map. Getting back to

Fontainebleau, if they even have 10 million in positive cash, well, it's not going to close,

even if they're even it's not going to close, even if they're slightly negative, it's not going to

close because someone's going to, well, someone's going to come in there and say, you know what?

I could put the right people in here and I can turn it around. What about circus circus?

Because there's been rumors of that one closing. He's, he paid $800 million for that property.

He has independent wealth. He's a billionaire. I don't know what his debt is on it.

But he told the world he has $90 million in positive cash flow.

Wow, a year. Yeah. So he's got an 11% return goal. No circus circus circus. He makes

nothing. They're making more than resource world. Yes. Holy crap. Put that together before I

could put that together. Well, I didn't know that because they're, they're kind of like known on

the cheaper side in Vegas. But I guess if you're making $90 million, that's a lot.

I mean, that's what he says. He's clear. He says sales are 20 and nicer. Well, he said,

he said to the public in one of his last statements was, yeah, we have $2 or shrimp cocktail. Yeah,

we got $2 beers. But the public loves it. You know, so he rents all the rooms out. I don't think

he has high operational costs there. I had an executive. I think the executive was joking with me.

So, so don't take this as a fact. No. And I didn't question the executive. He said, yeah,

we spent $20,000 remodeling some of our rooms. He said, circus circus did a remodel. They spent

$300 a room. I think I think he was exaggerating. I'm not surprised. But they did remodel some.

He stayed in one of those rooms. I have been in them. You know, you know, the truth is,

I'm not that bad. Compared to what? But if you compare that to Venetian Excalibur. Okay. It's

kind of similar. I'll give you the Luxor. Yeah, Luxor's not the best. You know, I mean, you know,

you pay for what you got. The rooms are 20. Venetian Palazas, my homegirl. You know what I mean?

I mean, I don't know what to even say about that. It was my home casino since 2019. The win used to be

my property, but it was too much. It's too expensive, right? Well, what happened was when I showed

about the win in 2017. It's actually hard to tell this story and believe that it's true because

things have changed so much since 2017. But this is a true story. And my casino host over there,

unbelievable woman. I haven't seen her in years because I don't really play the win anymore.

Name's Araselli. When I showed up there in 2017, $30,000, Araselli sent a limo, a Rolls Royce limo.

I had never even been in one before. They gave me a salon suite and my food. If you show up now

with the win with $30,000, I mean, you basically can triple that. Yeah. So now you would have to be

a $100,000 player, minimally, to get, you know, and I don't even know if they'll send the Rolls Royce.

I don't know if they wouldn't for a hundred. Yeah, maybe 250. Yeah, maybe 250. Yeah, you've got to be bald.

Things have changed a lot in Vegas. So I had it. Once that happened, I said, let me find some place

where I would fit in better. And it was definitely the Venetian Pallazza. Yeah.

If you were to win the jackpot tomorrow on slots, say you won like five million, I know you have a

gambling addiction. Do you think you could quit gambling forever? If you won't not amount of money? No way.

No. Well, whether I was broke or had the money, I wouldn't quit. Even if you won 10 million.

Even if I had nothing, I'd scrape $20 together and play $5 watch. Really? Absolutely. Never stops.

So even if you had... Well, look, look, you're very deep. And by the way, thank you very much for

letting me meet and shake Gary Breka's hand. Oh, yeah, of course. You're very deep into Gary Breka.

Me too. Because I found Gary Breka after I had already done all the research that he talks about.

So I was like, oh, here's a guy who has the personality and the charisma to take all of his

information and publicly put it out there, disclose it in a friendly, digestible way. And I was like

blown away. So he'll say stuff like, if you have a child playing video games for 20 hours,

he's child is nine years old. That's not you didn't cause that. Society didn't cause that.

There's a deficiency there. So I told this, you know, revisiting. It's probably the ninth time I

talk about it. You know, it's one with this mutation CCAATT. I don't produce neurotransmitters.

Getting back to Gary Breka. The deficiency for me is dopamine. And Gary Breka, and I've heard him say

that deficiency is the root cause of all addiction. So he knows this. I mean, anybody who wants to

even, you know, get any sort of information that's topic, just go back to your episodes with Gary

Breka on your podcast. Have you been able to find dopamine on other things outside of gambling?

Exercise. Absolutely. Okay. I did do other risky behaviors before I was in a monogamous relationship.

You know, but now I'm in a monogamous relationship. And it's totally worth it. You know, I tell guys,

you know, a lot of guys that have this deficiency with the gambling, they also participate in risky

behaviors. You know, we'll just keep it under that umbrella. And I tell them, you know, there's a

world on the other side of the mountain. That's really amazing. Nice. You know, so I'm in this deep

monogamous relationship. So what happened when I had to give up risky behaviors is gambling became

more important. But by the grace of God and my gratitude is off the charts by the grace of God,

there's so much dopamine in social media. There is a lot. So when you get a comment, a like,

well, I interact, you know, if I put something up and it's got 152,000 views, I'll have 3,400

comments. I'm unable to go in there and really talk it out with people. Yeah. And a lot of times,

I learned stuff. And a lot of times, there's really funny comments in there. And I find myself

one out of every 10 videos. I'll see something that's just a comment that's over there. And I write

right under the person. I say, you won the thread. You know, with that comment. That's cool. Yeah. And

so the interaction with the people that follow me in the comments, I just did New York. I did the

hard rock in New York. And I had met Joe Lupa, who's the president of the hard rock. I waited.

Yeah. Listen, I'm the only guy that's going to tell you what a Desperado I am. And I was saying

two years, but that's an exaggeration. I waited a year and a half to get that DM from Joe Lupa.

Not because I thought he would DM me, not because he should DM me, but because I was dreaming

of him DMing me, because I know the corporation. I know how powerful they are. I know they're

the future of gaming. I know what they've got over there. So I got a DM from him one day.

And, you know, my girlfriend can tell you I was high for a week. Just walking around like,

oh, my God, I'm finally getting into the morat. And then they did. They brought me in.

I love it. And they brought me up in the construction. And they took me up to the top,

which was the 18 four. And some of the great things in my journey are this. And these are small,

great moments for me. And I don't know how many other people are going to get it. But I'm talking

to Joe Lupa. And I very recently met Stephanie, who's the daughter of a thross dean, the movie

casino. So his name in real in real life is Frank lefty Rosenthal. And her name in real life is

Stephanie Rosenthal. And I met her about three or four months ago. And it did a couple of videos

with her. But anyway, her father and interesting. In other words, all of this is coming together.

This is where the star dust originally sat. And her dad, and you can see this in the movie

casino, was the first person who brought sports books into the casino. So he brought the sports

book into the star dust. And Frank lefty Rosenthal ran the sports book at the star dust.

So I say to Joe Lupa, I say great guy, by the way, great guy, perfect guy for this property.

Perfect guy for Las Vegas. I say to Joe Lupa, I say, tell me about your career because when I

meet someone who's at the very pinnacle of Las Vegas, one of the first things I want to know is

where did they start? What were their different jobs? And it's fascinating because a lot of these

guys that are at the top now started in jobs where they were not at the top. Like, for instance,

Patrick McNickels, the president of the Venetian Palazzo, he was an accountant at the Cosmo

Palt. Wow. I mean, how I get a little emotional, I apologize. How effing talented is Patrick

McNickels to go from being an accountant at the Cosmo to being president of the Venetian Palazzo.

You know, and he was chosen for that rule, but for that role by Apollo group. So tying it all

back together, I know I go too far afield. I say to Joe Lupa, what was your career? Joe Lupa was

the director of the sports book at the, well, eventually it was, it was still the Stardust,

when he was there was also the director of the sports book at the Stardust, roughly 25 years

after Frank lefty rose involved it. Whoa. So I'm cluelying all over, uh, Stephanie about her

dad. And then I need Joe Lupa weekly. I'm like, God, I'm like, do you realize we had the exact

same job as Ace Ross Dean from Casino? And of course he knew he did. That's one of my favorite movies.

Right. But isn't that funny that that was Joe Lupa? One of Joe Lupa's stops in his career

up the ladder. And he's a UNLV guy. Uh, and he's not a NEPO baby. Uh, and he didn't have connections.

And it's all talent. Yeah. You think the mobs fully ran out of Vegas? Um,

you'd be the right person to know. I mean,

you know, the, the card game, they're still, I'm pretty certain they're still in the card game.

You know, the, the, you know, the card clackers on the, on the strip. Oh, those, yeah. Yeah.

I say, I think they're still, you know, there's things that they're involved in. I mean,

I don't want to get whacked tomorrow. You know, not really. I mean, I could probably go on a

little bit about this, but I've heard some stories, you know, I've heard a lot of the card clacking

business. I think if you get onto the corner with your card clacking, I think that you might be

stopped. I don't know. Well, I've talked to a lot of locals here that have been here for a while,

and they actually said, uh, they like the casinos when the mobs were running them.

Well, a guy like me doesn't, because I'd be dead, you know, I defaulted on half a million

dollars in markers, uh, in 1995 and the mob wasn't involved. If I had defaulted on half a million

dollars in markers in 1975, you know, they would have sent, you know, the ant spulatro to my house,

especially if I lived in like Cleveland or Kansas City or Chicago someplace that he was going

back and forth to wherever. And, um, you know, they probably would have broken my legs,

sure. You know, instead, they just threatened me with a shirt. So for me, it wouldn't have been good.

And then my big mouth, you know, they would have put me in a hole and they would have, uh, some

bodies coming out of Lake Mead. Yeah, I think they found two or three of them. I mean, I, for me,

it wouldn't have been, I understand why people say that, you know, you have to understand something

about the mob, the mafia, Italian culture, because I am half Italian. The Italian culture lends

itself perfectly to the casino industry, but not that the reasons that you think the reason the

Italian culture lends itself perfectly to the casino industry is because Italians by their

very nature are feeding you known as sauce on Sunday. They're saying, come on in,

get some brazo, shout out to Johnny Sarasani, people that have an inside joke on that they know

exactly what I'm talking about. Uh, come in, have some meatballs, come in, have some spaghetti.

Their grandmothers were all about the hospitality on Sunday, you know, when they were good little

kids when they were growing up. So when they came out to Vegas and when you're involved in gaming

and you love gaming and I'm half Italian, I feel this in my blood. I've had people on my show. Now,

I was, I'm not associated with any casino hotels right now. I hope to be soon. Uh, I've had people

that have done videos from me and I've actually comp them out of my pocket like they've done them.

Yeah. So it's just something that's in our blood. So I'm like paying money. I'm like, here's,

here's $200. Go get dinner at, I mean, I remember one specifically. I felt so bad for these people.

They lost $2,500 playing on my show and they were just strangers that popped in out of nowhere.

So I've taken money out of my pocket. But if you're Italian and you want to stand that hospitality,

uh, and you know, the gaming is in our blood, you know, people, this of course is totally subjective.

But the stays with the two highest amount of sports gambling are New York and New Jersey. Why?

There were also the states with the highest percentage of Italian

injuries, just descendants, including me, my whole family on my father's side. They were hanging

out at the OTB from the time I was a little kid. So we're gamblers by nature and we're hospitable.

So it made sense that the mob and the mafia was out here in the 60s, 70s days. Very easy.

Uh, to say, hey, you know, you want to have a shrimp dinner come have some have some shrimp.

Have the fraud the novel or have the muscles marinara. It's unbelievable.

Like when I do that, it's so natural for me. Yeah. So it really makes sense.

Now, I know you don't talk about sports betting too much, but what did you think of the mob being

involved with that NBA betting scandal? Well, I mean, that goes back to the 50s. Uh, and they were

doing that in a city, city college in Manhattan in the 1950s, 1960s. In fact, in the 1974 movie,

the gambler, which James Conn, uh, one of the players on the team, he actually convinces the

player. That's a great movie. By the way, you should see this 1974. He's actually a professor who's

a compulsive gambler, uh, and he convinces one of the players to throw one of the games and to

shave some points in that. And that's based on the city college scandal. And it's just very, very

easy, uh, way easier before the NIL deal, you know, now college athletes get a lot of money.

Um, the most shocking part of it to me is, although it shouldn't be shocking to me because I'm

an addict, but the most shocking part of it to me is, uh, the baseball player who's, you know,

somebody pointed out to me, uh, someone who's very smart, who calls me up with all sorts of

incredible information. No. He says to people that that baseball player who just got in trouble has

four years. He has the same career track as Mariana Rivera, you know, the greatest clothes are

Voltine. And I'm like, and I put that in the video and I'm like, wow, this guy was making $24 million,

I think, over six years or four years. He hadn't come to free agency yet. Um, his name escapes

me immediately. Is there so Tony or someone else? No, it's the picture on the Cleveland

Guardians. There were two pictures on the Cleveland Guardian. I didn't see that one. If we had a

screen here, somebody that producer would look at us. Uh, well, Tony was another big one though.

Yeah, but Tony wasn't directly implicated. Well, his, these guys threw pitches in the dirt.

And they got arrested. Okay. So they're, they're allegedly, you know, they threw the pitches

in the dirt. They've been indicted. They've been arrested. One of them has a closing career. He's

a closer for the Cleveland Guardians. Uh, he has a career that mimics Mariana Rivera, the greatest.

So to me, it's shocking. I understand, uh, the, they call them de-players, right? The de-league

de-league. I understand the de-league player. I understand Janta. I do. He's making what? $400,000

a year. If he can clear, I, I asked somebody that used to work at draftings. What would the

bet was over there on that under? And he told me $100,000. Just, just, I just got that information

in the other day. If he can make $100,000 or him and his friends can make $100,000 on an underbat,

I get it. But a baseball player who's probably going to sign a $20 million dollar year contract,

because they're some of the greatest, they have some of the greatest stats in the closing,

uh, as close as a closer and major league baseball. I must be an addiction thing. That's

right. Because it's not, it's not money at that point. They're already making a ton of money.

It's got to be some sort of addiction or mental thing, right? So the story with the closer, um,

he's from the Dominican Republic and his friends in the Dominican Republic bet $460,000 on these

bets. This is what I read. He's young. He's 27 years old. I think it's, in his case, I don't think

it's addiction and I, my heart breaks for him. I know that a lot of people are going to think

that that's BS, but I've been young and I've been under peer pressure and I've been a gambler.

And you know, when I look at him and what he did, I say, they have the grace of God, go, I,

he has his friends back in the, his friends are probably saying to him, oh, come on, come on,

they're probably working on a night and deck. Just throw a few pitches in the dirt. Come on,

you're set. You got it made. You can imagine what he's hearing, right? And maybe he, he gave

him into that peer pressure and now he'll never pitch in the major leagues again. Wow. That's

effing heartbreaking for a 27-year-old. Yeah, that's, I mean, I don't know how you look like a

young guy. Yeah, I was going to say you look like a young kid. So as a young kid, as a 22-23-year-old,

before you, you know, before you blew up as Sean Kelly, couldn't you see yourself getting involved

in something crazy like that? Oh, sure. I was very susceptible to peer pressure when I was young.

Right. Meant to fit in. Right. Okay. So that was my insecurity. So I would do stuff that I didn't

want to do. Right. So that guy probably was giving it to peer pressure. I don't think it's an

addiction thing and it, all of these guys, look, when I think about Jante, when I think about the

closest to the Cleveland Guardians, when I think about the other NBA players, whoever it is,

you know, 20-something years old and I'm an old man already. I'm six, gonna be six, you one next

week. When I think about that they cast the die on a horrible outcome for the rest of their life

by making one or two stupid decisions or getting associated with one of your people, you know,

it breaks my heart. No. My heart breaks for them. And I said this on a previous podcast with you

and I'll stand by it with my problem with my deficiency, CCAATT and my addictions and my childhood,

you know, and I'm not purchasing one. If I had grown up in an area that was really shitty,

I'd be either dead or in jail. But because I grew up in a privileged area,

I became the, you know, I'm the clown. I'm the court jester. I'm the community. I'm the guy

who's always broke. I'm the guy, oh my god. Can you believe this is what my friends were saying in

1995? Can you believe Paul and Bruce sold that company and pull down a million dollars cash?

And this idiot is broke 10 months later, you know. And so I was always like sort of the clown,

the story, you know, can you believe? But I never, I always had people to go to for support. I always

had people that had economic opportunities. So I got a lot of, and I was able to stay out of like

serious trouble. I mean, when I was a kid, we did stupid things to support our gambling,

but we didn't end up in a pit over it. You know, if you're, if you're playing dice,

and this is a story I'm just making up, but I know this, you know, and I know this from,

I mean, I know it was an offset who got shot, but who got shot out of the three,

the three guys super talented rappers, take off or one of them do three super talented

rabbis. Oh my god. They're awesome, right? So, you know, some of their songs, the most

verbiage I've ever seen is in their songs, you know, goes for like seven minutes of them just

rapping. He was playing dice. He was playing dice and he got shot. So when we were kids,

if we got caught cheating at dice and I didn't have access to any loaded dice or believe me,

I would have gotten caught cheating at dice. You know, we didn't get shot. Our friends would,

would shun us, you know, for a month or two. You know, it's just, it's just the community that I

live, then you got shunned or you got made fun of or that, but nobody had any weapons. You think

about a 16 year old, right? Pulled out that weapon and shot. Was it offset or take off? I think it

was take off. Yeah. Shot to, and now he's dead. So I have a lot of gratitude for growing up in a

good area and being able to avoid that. Yeah. Did you gamble with Sarasai this week? I know he was

in town. You get the, get the tables with them. Let me tell you something. Johnny Sarasani. He's

the stud. He's the stud of everybody that's doing this. I have so much respect for him. I always tell

this to everybody. I'll say it a million times over. If there were 10,000 John Sarasani's, we could

turn Vegas back into Vegas 1980. Vegas 90 because the energy, the Italianness, you know, I really,

you know, the first time I met him, there's two people that I met in Las Vegas who both looked at me

like, oh, my God. Is this guy going to, you know, this guy going to be an asshole? What's this guy

going to do? Vital Vegas and Johnny Sarasani. When I met both of them, they both looked at me with

trepidation. You know, that looked like, oh, what's this guy going to? And I was like, the first time

I met Johnny Sarasani and also Vital Vegas because I love him. I think he's super talented, great writer.

You know, really dedicated to his craft. Knows more than anybody about Las Vegas.

The first time I met both of them, I was like, guys, some huge fans. Like, I'm a huge fan of

Johnny Sarasani because he's got that energy. And he's got, and you know, even though he's a big,

tall, great looking hunk of a man, he has a certain humility about him, a certain sensitivity.

He's the man. And I love that. Well, Paul, he was great seeing you, man. I'll see you at F1 tonight.

Okay, did I go an hour? Yeah, that was about 40 minutes. Sorry about that. No, you're good.

Okay, I'll see you. I'll see you tonight. Okay, see you guys for your own.

I hope you guys are enjoying the show. Please don't forget to like and subscribe. It

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