THE BEAR DEN: If I See One More Ed Hardy Shirt, I'm Going To Die

We're in Vegas trying to get work done, but it's hard to focus when we're surrounded by hordes of douchebags in those ridiculous Ed Hardy and Affliction shirts with metal studs and mythical creatures on them. Seriously, where did the idea of a t-shirt go wrong? Less with more, let's stick with that.

I digress. Let's get to the pictures.

It looked like an episode of Storm Chasers on the drive over.

Oh, don't mind me. I'm only hauling the casing for a nuclear bomb.

Upon arrival, we noticed a lot of people wearing cowboy hats. Turns out there's a huge rodeo convention and finals.

We had time to kill before check-in, so we walked to the Bellagio where Baseball's annual Winter Meetings were being held at. If you're not sure what the Winter Meetings are, it's basically the place where all the movers and shakers in baseball convene to make business moves, most specifically trades and free agent signings. For a baseball geek like myself, I'm absolutely jazzed that they just happened to pick Vegas the same few days that I'd be here for. As we were walking through the halls of the Bellag, we were seeing all sorts of baseball people. One minute I'm looking at Hall of Famer Frank Robinson, the next I'm standing right next to Hall of Famer Peter Gammons.

Nuts I tell you. Nuts.

Bryan, trying to process all the stuff we've just seen.

Soon, reality sunk in and we realized we were pretty hungry. Driving down Flamingo Ave, we noticed a troubling picture.

You decide, and tell me what you see.

We settled on a place that had a long line in their drive-thru. Raising Canes won our stomachs and served a pretty mean chicken sandwich. I guess they're known for chicken fingers- anyone else heard of this place?

After our lunch, we headed back to hotel to take care of some business. Before our meeting, Bryan put some serious dough down on the Monday Night Football game. We were Buccaneer fans tonight.

Gambling on sports gets pretty confusing. So confusing it can leave you dreamweaver eyed.

Now it's time for business.

The Bucs needed a miracle to survive, and just when we gave up they scored this sweet touchdown.

Unfortunately, the Bucs ended up losing. After that touchdown, the Bucs failed to convert the extra point which pretty much ended our hopes for a hot wing celebration.

The aftermath.

After a crazy night for myself (I called it in early because of this awful cough that I caught), we started Tuesday off on the right foot and got up early to watch Jerry Springer and Maury Povich. Breakfast of champions.

Afterwards, we took to The Strip and whattdyaknow, the Knievels are here. Big. Whoop.

Back to The Bellagio to spy on the baseball elite. Basically, the Winter Meetings is this: mingle around the lobby, preferably around the elevators, and talk amongst other baseball executives. I don't think there were any official meeting rooms. The extent of most of these deals wither happen upstairs in hotel rooms or downstairs in the lobby.

We saw even more people today. Omar Minaya, Joe Maddon, Clint Hurdle, Jayson Stark, Ken Rosenthal, Terry Francona, Joe Girardi- even my favorite baseball player of ALL time, Nolan Ryan. Unfortunately, I buckled when he walked right past me. I tried to say something, but nothing came out. Remember that part at the end of Titanic when Rose is trying to yell, "help" to the search party and nothing came out. Well, it was pretty much that. My knees nearly gave way.

I should have blown a whistle.

We did, however, find another legend- Tommy Lasorda! Sure he looks bewildered, but give him a break guys. Old Man River is 81 years old, and although you can't see it in this picture 'Ol Tommy's got a poopy stain on his slacks. It's the dementia years.