Darren Viola sent me a link to this article about how Steve Stone has been in secret negotiations to buy the Expos and move them to Las Vegas.

Somehow Stone and his partner, Lou Weisbach, managed to keep their pursuit quiet, at least from the press, telling people only on a need-to-know basis. Of course, they've told Major League Baseball all about their plan. And they've told potential investors.

The mayor of Las Vegas knows. Cubs president Andy MacPhail has known (because, after all, he is Stone's boss) for a while now.

Ownership groups in Washington, D.C., Northern Virginia and Portland, Ore., have been vying for the right to save the Expos from San Juan or Monterrey or whatever foreign city commissioner Bud Selig's dart lands on next. Most people figured the Expos would end up in or around the nation's capital. Not so quick. Quietly, Stone might have gained an edge.

"Discretion,'' Stone said, "has been a priority.''

I don't have a problem with a team in Las Vegas per se, but I do worry about how MLB can possibly keep teams from associating with gamblers if the team is there. What does bother me is that the process of moving the team to Portland or Washington has been very out in the open. It's not clear that either of these cities knew they were also competing with Las Vegas. That's unfair.

I also don't know if baseball will work as an attraction:

Stone wants to buy the vagabond Montreal Expos and move them to Las Vegas. He wants to build them an intimate domed stadium in the desert--say 42,000 seats or so. He wants to see the team become the hottest act in Vegas since Wayne Newton was cool.

I didn't know that Wayne Newton wasn't cool. But teams need loyal fans. If the Las Vegas 7-11's are going to be a successful franchise, they'll need more than tourists filling the seats. But from what I can find, Vegas has a fast growing population, so maybe that's not a problem.

I don't like the way MLB has gone about this, but it would not be a bad place for the Expos to move.