Nearly 22 years after convincing the NBA to take a gamble on a Las Vegas-based Summer League, Warren LeGarie now finds himself watching that bet come full circle.

With the NBA Board of Governors officially approving a vote on March 25 to explore expansion bids in Las Vegas and Seattle, the long-time Summer League architect sounded less like an executive and more like a proud parent seeing his vision finally validated. For LeGarie, what started in 2004 with just six teams has evolved into what Adam Silver once dubbed the league’s “31st franchise”—and now, Vegas is closer than ever to becoming the real thing.

While LeGarie downplayed his direct influence on the expansion push, his belief in the city’s readiness was unmistakable. Speaking to EssentiallySports, he broke down why Las Vegas has transformed into a legitimate NBA market, how Summer League continues to serve as a proving ground, and why fan support this July could quietly play a decisive role in what comes next.

Editor’s note: The following one-on-one conversation has been edited and condensed.

Why is Vegas ready to have an NBA franchise?

LeGarie: “Every time you count Vegas out, it beats your ass no matter what. It’s a place where you think, ‘You can’t build another hotel.’ Then it builds another hotel. ‘It can’t host another pro team.’ Then it hosts another pro team. It’s the proverbial “they can.” They just find a way to make it work. You don’t realize how many people actually live in Vegas. It really looks like a ‘mini-LA.’ If you took the 30,000 foot view of Vegas, it stretches out like LA stretches out for a two or three-hour drive. With Vegas, if you put a product on the floor and you put on a quality event, they’ll come and support it. They really will come. If the Vegas people really want to prove they want an NBA franchise, come out and support Summer League. Vote by participating to our Summer League. Show the NBA this is really, really important to you guys. That’s one way they can really help set the stage for a potential franchise. Adam [Silver] has called us the 31 franchise. But they have a chance to literally be the 31 franchise and take our spot. We’re all for it. But you have to come out, not just for the first weekend when it’s fun, but also the second weekend when the games get gritty and we’re looking for a champion. You get to see the guys that are really trying to do something for their career. If the fans support us, they’re supporting a chance for an NBA franchise.”

When do you think Vegas reached the point that it showed it’s ready to have an NBA team?

LeGarie: “I look back at it three or four years ago when people started taking it seriously. When Oak View Group came in and tried to plant a flag on the far end of Vegas Boulevard and Sunset [Road] and talked about building an arena there, unfortunately things happened that prevented that from happening. But when [Tim] Leiweke is involved, usually there are a lot of positive things. He has built arenas all over the world as well as the one in LA [Crypto.com Arena]. With his entryway in there, I think the conversation got a little more serious that Vegas is a legitimate candidate for an NBA experience.”

During your time in Summer League and being in Vegas, what fan feedback did you get about their appetite for an NBA team?

LeGarie: “You’re not looking to settle for second-best. You want the very best. There were always comments, ‘Hey guys, when do you think there will be a league?’ That’s not what Albert [Hall] and I do. We want to make sure that you’re not going to get an NBA game at Summer League, but you’ll get an NBA experience with our production values and all the things that we do in Vegas. But it’s a constant that the focus on the Summer League during the summer, people are more aware and ask, ‘Why can’t there be an NBA franchise?’ With all of the incredible hotels and all of the incredible experiences, it does seem like a natural fit in some regards. No matter what, you look at that unbelievable stadium that [Raiders owner] Mark Davis built [Allegiant Stadium]. Every time you look at it, it takes your breath away. It’s just so spectacular. It looks like it’s going to take off and come become a part of the ‘Star Wars’ series. ‘The Sphere’ also says that it’s a big-time place. When that thing lights up at nighttime, it looks like a beacon of life. It channels the whole universe into that place. It’s amazing what they can put on there. When you’re in Vegas, there’s never a dull moment. And if you’re bored, go look in the mirror.  There’s your problem (laughs).”

In the last year, I saw some commentary that there were concerns at least in the short term about the tourism rates declining. What perspective do you have on that?

LeGarie: “There’s always a theme going on in Vegas. Once upon a time when we first started, they were looking for a more family audience. Then it became more of a convention audience. Then it became a ‘happening place’ audience. Like with all businesses, they go through cycles trying to figure out who they are and what their audience is going to be. How do they bring the next people? Disney does that, and a lot of these other theme park places. Not that Vegas is a theme park. But it certainly does rely on the ‘wow’ factor. So I think there are in that cycle now where they’re trying to figure out who exactly is their market again and how do they attract them. They believe that if they have a pro basketball franchise, that would attract a lot more people to come in and share an NBA experience, whether it’s overseas or outside the region. You can combine a big-time NBA experience along with a big-time celebrate life experience that Vegas can certainly produce.”

With the Board Governors approving a vote for the league to explore bids and applicants for Vegas, what do you think the next steps will be with this process?

LeGarie: “Part of figuring out if you’re an NBA market is if fans get behind it. Get behind Summer League. Show that NBA basketball is important. ‘We’re going to come out and support Summer League.’ That is your first vote to have a potential to have an NBA franchise. I think that’s important. No matter what, certainly the NBA is monitoring all of the things that are going on in both cities. They want to see legitimate enthusiasm, not fake enthusiasm. They don’t want to see a reaction like ‘Yeah, we finally got it and ho-hum after that.’ They want to see enthusiasm that is genuine. They’ve been supportive enough not just for a year, but for a lot of years. I think it’s huge right now. No matter what, Vegas has to be aware of it.”

The WNBA’s Aces are there. There have been preseason games for both NBA games and USA Basketball. But what do you think Summer League did to make an impression on the league on what Vegas’ potential for an NBA city could be?

LeGarie: “Obviously, I’m going to believe it was all because of us! (laughs). I can’t say that. There’s a lot more factors involved. But with being a proud papa, I certainly want to believe that we had a lot toward our kid being an ‘A’ student. But being realistic, all we were doing was trying to bring the best out of the game over there. No matter what, we never forgot for a day that our job is still to make it about basketball. I’m thinking one of the things why we’ve been able to keep a pretty strong foothold there is that I think the people appreciated the fact that it was about basketball. Yeah, you want to do bells and whistles. You want to keep some other things with ‘the wow factors’. But if it’s a good game, good production value and all of the things that constitute what would be an NBA game, I think we helped provide that. We weren’t like an NBA game. But we were definitely like an NBA experience. Some people felt like in some regards after coming to Summer League, even though we were doing eight games a day, you felt like you had an NBA experience.

I think our contribution is the fact that we took it seriously. To Albert and myself, it was incredibly important that whatever we did, we could stick our chest out afterwards and have a sense of pride and authorship that what we were going to do was going to make a difference. The last thing we wanted to do was that we would only work toward this leading into an NBA franchise. That would be disrespectful to what we were doing on a daily basis. Our job was to make sure that people wanted to come back. What we put on the floor, that would resonate so the following year we would have the same, if not more, support. More importantly, we wanted support from the teams so they didn’t think we got into the ‘fluff’ area too much.

A lot of people would accuse Vegas of having more ‘fluff’ than substance. That’s not true. This is a hard-working community. They’re genuine. Guys bring it every day. Even with our staffing, a lot of the people were from Vegas. They were ‘bring-it-everyday’ people. That’s what some people miss on Vegas sometimes. It’s one of the hardest working communities. It’s a 24-hour day community that’s always working and trying to make a difference. Did we make a difference? Yeah, we hope so. We like to believe that. But are we the determining factor in that? We would be a little over our skis in saying that. But one thing we were told that when we did the All-Star game [in 2007], more people came than they expected. The All-Star game came because of what we put together in Summer League. So that would be the right place to celebrate the game. As far as the franchise, we’re not the sole reason. We’re not naïve to believe it’s only because of us. But we like to believe we’re one of the reasons.”

You mentioned what Vegas is like as a city, but what do you think have been the other reasons?

LeGarie: “What do teams look for when they want a franchise? It’s a grown-up city. It’s a fun city. It’s a place that values entertainment that will try to make the ‘impossible’ possible. When you look in LA and what the Clippers have done in that arena [Intuit Dome], you walk in there and watch the game. But you look at everything else, too. There’s such a ‘wow’ factor. Vegas is known not as a ‘why city’, but as a ‘why not city.’ When you try so many new things and are at so many places that have never been done before, that adds some excitement. It makes it imperative to go to see all of the things that are happening. You want exciting places where people want to be and go. Vegas checks off every box in that regard.”

Would you ever have interest in being part of an ownership group with a Vegas franchise?

LeGarie: (laughs). “I just looked at my bank account. I’m not sure that I’m in the ‘qualified’ area with the kind of numbers that they’re talking. If they put a value on experiences and things that we’ve done, maybe that could be a part of it. But I’m just happy that they’re finally talking about it. I’m hoping that kind of buzz translates into really understanding what Summer League has meant and that pick up more of the excitement with coming out. No matter what, when you put a lot of years into something, you love to see positive things happening. You love to see right now there is a new buzz and a hope for and willingness to try to do something that has never happened before with having a franchise there. Good luck to Vegas. The best way to vote for a franchise is to come out to Summer League. Every vote counts. Every ticket counts. Let the NBA know how important the franchise is to the city. You never know. It could be something spectacular. It could be that final crown jewel and the final Elvis piece.”

Given that, what was your reaction to the news with the Board of Governors’ vote?

LeGarie: “Albert and I are like proud papas. We watched this thing grow up. In the first or second year, it was kind of cute. Then after the third or fourth year, it became hard work. Then it became a full-time commitment with making this thing something that people feel like they have to go to Summer League or else they’re going to miss out on some incredible Summer League stories. We’ve always tried to make the Summer League about storytelling. You can say, ‘That’s where I saw Jeremy Lin first, John Wall, Russell Westbrook or Kevin Durant.’ We have a wall in the Cox Pavilion that shows all the people that came through and started their careers at Summer League. All of them in last year’s All-Star game played, with exception to LeBron [James]. He didn’t play in the Summer League. But everybody else started in Vegas.

Stephen Curry started in Vegas. One of the best stories is that he was the third-best player on his Summer League team. The guys who thought they were going to be better than him when Don Nelson was the coach? Marco Belinelli, the Italian kid and had way more points than Curry. Then Anthony Morrow set the scoring record until Marcus Banks broke it a few years later. There are all of these great stories. Blake Griffin played against his brother. With Giannis [Antetokounmpo], we couldn’t even put Milwaukee in the Cox Pavilion because they were so bad. It wasn’t a question on whether he’d eventually be an All-Star. It was a question on whether he’d make the team that year (laughs). He was terrible. But Summer League is a way to measure where you’re at in your career in terms of your work ethic and he took all of that to heart. I remember [Max] Strus made his bones in the Cox arena. Same thing with [Duncan] Robinson and Tyler [Herro]. They said, ‘Summer League gave me a chance to be in the NBA. It showed that I belonged.” Last year, contrary to all of the other rookies’ top first-round picks, Kon Knueppel played in four of the five games and earned MVP. He’s about to earn, if not ‘Rookie of the Year,’ at least the ‘Co-Rookie of the Year’ with the way that he has played and carried a team. [Cooper] Flagg is going to be a phenomenal pro. But Knueppel is taking his team to another level. Nobody anticipated Charlotte was going to be this. But they’ve played all their rookies at Summer League. That experience helped them gain a game-time mentality and pro mentality. That ultimately translated into the regular season.”

Vegas Summer League is four months away (July 9-19). But is there anything you can share on what the setup will be this year?

LeGarie: “We’re having a film festival that is going nuts. We’re adding some incredible films. George Karl has a film out this year: ‘Soul Power,’ the one about the ABA. George Raveling has a movie that is going to come out. It’s a documentary. That’s happening during the second weekend. There is a new appetite for ‘1-on-1.’ So we’re going to announce that we’re going to be doing something in the ‘1-on-1’ area to add some more excitement to what we’re doing in Summer League. I think ‘Pop-a-Shot’ is having a championship there. So these are things that are around the game.

But having Amazon Prime involved, there will be a whole new take on the game. They’re going to be doing it with ABC and ESPN. So there should be some new surprises there and some new wrinkles. If you don’t come to Summer League, all you’re going to do is miss out on new and exciting things. That includes some of the new rules that the NBA has talked about implementing. It always starts at Summer League. You see it there first to see if it works or not. As we get closer, I can reveal a little bit more. But we always promise to do it a little bit better than the year before, so it makes it worthwhile for fans to come. I hope to see you there.”

Mark Medina is an NBA insider for EssentiallySports. Follow him on X, Blue Sky, Instagram, Facebook and Threads.