Steve Bellamy Quotes (17 Quotes)

We didn't plan well enough for the weather. I want to plan for the wind and the cold, and I want to make it better for the fans and the players.

I'm a promoter of this sport so if I've ever got somebody who wants to come watch and can't because they can't get a ticket, that's just breaking my heart.

It is just complete, guaranteed, instant credibility. They are two of the most exciting player in the history of the sport. The real magic of our draw is that it is so deep.

We have 16 players who are the No. 1 player in their country. The cutoff to get into (the tournament) was No. 68 (in the ATP rankings). No tournament outside of a Grand Slam has that kind of quality and depth.

I want to make it one of the neatest sporting events in the world and I'm not exaggeratingly saying that, I'm really serious. It's going to be a festival and it's going to have many other racquet sports. Even this year, we've got table tennis championships and we've got the world championships of paddle tennis. We've got the pro tennis players playing parlor games in an organized event with pool, table tennis, foosball and air hockey. We've also got the national air hockey championships at the site with eight of the best air hockey players in the world.

Those two competitors shaped the design of the tournament. Instead of making it just a men's tournament, we came up with this concept of having a big festival with all different kinds of events happening at the same time.

We did a poor job of communication. We need to let people know what's happening out here. We're going to improve the food, offer more things and make it more accessible for fans to get to.

They've got the best hotels, best restaurants in the world. Obviously, the men's players are really into poker now. It was like the stars were in alignment.

Next year, our aspirations are huge. We're going to have the world's biggest tennis tournament next year that's going to have tens of thousands of people that will play all over the country and they will all feed into Las Vegas. We'll have this big, mammoth draw the week before where probably 128 people all play for a chance to get into the main draw of the tournament and we're going to film it (for The Tennis Channel) and we're going to make it like an 'American Idol' type of thing. It's going to be cool.

This could become one of the favorite stops for the players after just one year. They understood how much effort we made to make them feel welcome.

They (Brown and Mayor Oscar Goodman) bent over backwards to make it work. (The city officials) were extraordinarily accommodating and it's been a wonderful experience.

My mission is always to grow the game of tennis. I didn't want to just put on another tennis tournament. I wanted to do something that was different. I wanted to do something that could bring people that wouldn't normally go to a tennis tournament and watch, and then sell them on tennis while they are there.

People don't look down on you -- 'You're still using a Mac' -- like they did five or six years ago.

Outside of a Grand Slam, I don't think there's a tournament in the world that has this many top players representing their countries. It's really remarkable that we have this many No. 1's. And with so many countries being represented, it's going to give the fans from Las Vegas who are from those countries a chance to come out and root for their countrymen.

We'll have another great field, believe me. Even with the bad weather, none of the players complained.

We were just looking to find the best partner that was willing to wrap their arms around the tournament and make a great home for it.

Andy felt bad about it, but he didn't think he had the energy to go the distance here.