LAS VEGAS (KTNV) — 2020 was supposed to be the year the NFL Draft was coming to Las Vegas.
Then the pandemic hit and we are all still trying to get off the floor.
Next year will finally be our turn and our chance to say Las Vegas as everyone knew it is back.
If the 2019 NFL Draft in Nashville set the standard, Las Vegas is poised to smash it.
The entertainment capital of the world colliding with one of the NFL's biggest spectacles is setting the stage for something we haven't seen before.
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Anthony Curtis publishes the Las Vegas Advisor which covers the Strip.
"It's going to be gigantic for the promotion of the city there's no doubt," Curtis said.
How big?
Consider Nashville.
It's estimated more than half a million people took part in the three-day event.
Data analyst Jeremy Aguero helps crunch the numbers for companies like the UFC, Boyd gaming and the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority.
"Do I expect the economic impact to be additive in terms of jobs and wages and salaries and economic output. You bet I do, and I think it's going to be relatively significant. It would have been last year had we had it," Aguero said.
The renderings of what the draft may have looked like here in 2020 are still fresh in the minds of some.
"And then you have all kinds of other things to do while you're here. I think that is going to be additive for us as a community. I think it can be wonderful for the NFL. I think it's wonderful for Las Vegas," Aguero added.
Just as important about who will be here in 2022 is who will not be and at home watching the draft on television.
More than 47 million people watched in 2019 over the 3 days.
"There's nothing like that. There's nothing like a live event. That's why the Golden Knights are so important. That is why the Raiders are so important because you can make commercials all day long but there's nothing like people seeing the real thing you know holy macro nobody's making that up that's real, I see it with my own eyes. I want to go," Curtis said.
We will have to wait to see where the pandemic goes, but it's safe to say the 2022 NFL Draft in Las Vegas may be even bigger and better that the 2020 version would have been.
