Maybe the Gaming Control Board had good cause to wonder if we could be duped.
The first couple of days after we took over the casino were nuts. We were running around in a million directions without a moment to return congratulatory calls.
Lorenzo’s brother, Frank, and The Sniffer phoned us again and again, but we were just overwhelmed. “Now that they’re big shots,” Frank said, as he and The Sniffer drove down the highway, “they can’t be bothered with guys like us. I wonder if they’re taking Steve Wynn’s calls?”
A moment later, the phone rang in Tim’s office.
“Hello, Mr. Poster, please.”
“I’m afraid he’s unavailable at the moment.”
“Darling, this is Steve Wynn calling. Is there any way I can speak to Mr. Poster?”
The Sniffer was biting his lip. Frank was doing a flawless Steve Wynn impersonation on the car phone.
“I believe he’s down the hall,” Tim’s secretary said. “Let me go find him.”
A minute later, Tim grabbed the phone huffing and puffing.
“Hello. Hello. Mr. Wynn?”
“Timmy, my boy, how are you?”
“Oh, I’m great, Mr. Wynn.”
“I just wanted to call and congratulate you on your purchase. You’ve got big balls, son. That’s what I like about you. I just want to make sure you’ll take good care of my baby.”
“Don’t worry, Mr. Wynn, I’m gonna take care of your baby.”
At which point, The Sniffer and Frank just cracked up.
“I knew it was you, Frank!” Tim immediately shot back. “I knew it was you!”
Which only caused The Sniffer and Frank to laugh louder.
Which only caused Tim to slam down the phone.
Which only made The Sniffer and Frank laugh even harder.
To this day, The Sniffer claims, Tim will swear he knew who it was all along—even if you put bamboo shoots under his fingernails.
There were many things we learned when Steve Wynn joined us for dinner to celebrate our purchase of The Golden Nugget. One of them was that Steve would never say, “Timmy, my boy, take care of my baby!”
It was kind of surreal waiting for Steve Wynn to arrive as our guest. Steve was one of Tim’s heroes when he was a kid. And I was still trying to adjust to the fact that I was now the owner of a hotel-casino. Even though four days had passed since we’d taken over, I’d find myself walking through the bakery and asking if it were okay to grab a cookie. “Mr. Breitling,” one of the bakers responded. “You own that cookie.”
As we waited for Steve’s car to pull up, Tim begged me to get a grip. “Please,” he said, “don’t say anything stupid!” He never let me forget the day I thought the VIG meant Very Important Gambler.
But one of the things I realized after meeting Steve Wynn was that I truly belonged.
When you think of Steve Wynn, you think Las Vegas. But Steve wasn’t from Las Vegas, either. He’d come from farther away than I did, Maryland, where he’d grown up working at his father’s bingo parlor before going on to study literature at the University of Pennsylvania. Frank Sinatra was not from Vegas. He was from Hoboken, New Jersey. Dean Martin was from Steubenville, Ohio. Sammy Davis Jr. was from Harlem. The executive who helped Steve Wynn lift The Golden Nugget and build the Mirage and the Bellagio, Bobby Baldwin, came to town as a poker player from Oklahoma City. The man famous for running the Horseshoe across the street from The Nugget, Benny Binion, drove to Vegas with $2 million in the back seat of his car along the dusty route from Texas. Las Vegas has always been a magnet for anyone who wanted to take his life to a new place. It embraced anyone willing to take a risk and work relentlessly to make it better.
At The Nugget, I was once again following Tim’s lead. He was overseeing the casino side of the operation. I was in charge of entertainment. Once more, I was green. The extent of my experience in the entertainment business was booking Kool & the Gang for our Travelscape Christmas party. I didn’t do too bad, though. Anytime you can get Tim Poster boogying on the dance floor, you know you’ve hit a home run.