Sunday Morning Coffee — November 2, 2025 — Sunday Morning Scramble
By Roy Berger, Las Vegas, Nevada
Good Sunday morning. So, did you enjoy that extra hour of sleep? If you have no idea what I’m talking about, and you don’t live in Hawaii or Arizona, take a look at your clocks and make sure they match the time on your phone. Today is day one of four months of standard time. Not a fan.
And speaking of that extra hour of sleep, two key Las Vegas casino/resort executives finally stopped hitting snooze and woke up and smelled the Sunday morning coffee. September visitation numbers on the Strip continue to tumble and fell 8.8% compared to the same period a year ago. That marks the eighth straight month of decline. Value perception of a Vegas visit is at an all-time low. Guests feel the resorts are gouging them at every turn. On Thursday Bill Hornbuckle, CEO of MGM Resorts, and Caesars CEO Tom Reeg addressed the issue. Between them they oversee 17 Strip properties, trendsetters among the rest. Reeg said, “I don’t discount that there are areas in our business and in Las Vegas that might have gotten over their skis pricing wise.” Hornbuckle, whose Aria Resort has been slammed for a $26 bottle of water in the room fridge and at the Excalibur $12 cups of coffee in the lobby while room rates were $29 said, “We lost control of the narrative. I think we would all agree to that in hindsight. Shame on us, we should have been more sensitive to the overall experience.” By no means is Las Vegas Boulevard a ghost town or library — things are still popping 24/7 on the Strip — but a steady visitation drop will compound over time as we’ve now seen. A huge turn in the right direction is acknowledging and publicly admitting the problem. The big step comes in the remedy. Now it’s time to make Las Vegas Great Again.
And speaking of making things great again, according to the younger demographic in Central Africa, it’s long past time to Make Cameroon Great Again. Last week in its election for president, to nobody’s surprise President Paul Biya was re-elected. It was for an eighth term. Now 92, he has been bunking in the presidential quarters of the Unity Palace in Yaoundé for only the last 43 years. The younger opposition supporters are demanding change, there was violence and deaths during this election cycle. His opponent, Issa Tchiroma Bakary, maintains he won but no such luck as Biya’s administration counts the votes. Over half of Cameroon’s 30 million residents weren’t even born when Biya won his first term in 1982. However, he isn’t the longest termed non-royal national leader in the world. That designation belongs to Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbaasogo who was first elected to the post in Equatorial Guinea some 45 years ago in 1974. Mr. Trump is drooling.
It took a little while and just as our granddaughter Harley in London was running out of patience, the J-E-T-S rewarded her with their first win of Harley’s 11-week old life. For the Jets first seven games, all losses, she gave mom and dad that now-patented Jets fan scowl. But last Sunday the magic happened. Against Cincinnati, whose defense is as porous as security at the Louvre, the Jets staged a 15 point fourth quarter comeback to break the winless schneid. The game started at 5 pm in London but as the Jets got close, Harley feigned being fussy so she could postpone crib time and watch the end. Rewarded, she and every other Jets fan had smiles all around. And today the feel good continues as the Jets can’t lose. They are on their bye week.
This surprised me, I would have thought there were more. The Wall Street Journal tells us that worldwide there are 3,508 billionaires with a combined $13.4 trillion in assets which is up 10.3% from the year before. The United States accounts for a third of the billionaires and 43% of the collective wealth.
I guess the No Kings protest march didn’t work. Sacramento is still in the NBA and Los Angeles in the NHL.
No matter how much golf you play, no matter how many times you play the same hole over and over again, that hole-in-one remains rare. Unless you are Neil Phillips, a 19-year-old college sophomore who plays for the University of the South in Sewanee, Tennessee. Entered in the Chick-fil-A Invitational on October 20 in chilly Rome, Georgia, Phillips stepped up to the 182-yard par-3 eighth hole and because of the 40 degree temp and heavy air changed his club choice from a seven-iron to a six. “I hit a perfect shot,” he said. “I didn’t know it went in until I got up there and saw what happened.” That ace produced high-fives all around. However, instead of putting the ball safely in his bag for posterity, Phillips teed it up on the next hole and promptly dunked it into the water. He finished the morning round at even par. After a lunch break, the 36-hole event continued. Back on that same eighth tee that he conquered only a few hours earlier, the weather warmed a bit, so Phillips changed his club from a six to seven-iron. Bingo! He did it again. Two H-I-O, same hole, same day. “I was in shock,” he told The Athletic. “I still haven’t fully wrapped my head around it.” Phillips finished 14th in the tournament. Clearly, the other 17 holes on the course were not as kind to him as the eighth.
If you have HBO/Max watch Task. You won’t be sorry.
So college football coaching is such a high pressure occupation, huh? Hogwash. You want a high stress job— how about air traffic controllers or emergency medical personnel or a public safety officer or a firefighter or even a Jets fan. But to lump coaching football at our colleges and universities in that same category is ridiculous. So far during this season 10 Division 1 coaches have been fired. All received a COBRA envelope and a check for their troubles. Consider—LSU gave Brian Kelly $54 million; James Franklin got $49 million from Penn State; Florida thanked Billy Napier for his time and here’s $21 million to help pay some bills; Mike Gundy flopped at Oklahoma State but took the family out to dinner with some of the $15 million he received; Sam Pittman at Arkansas pocketed $9.8 million; Brent Pry at Virginia Tech pried $6 million to clean out his office; DeShaun Foster was such a flop at UCLA they couldn’t wait to give him $5 million to head for the Hollywood Hills; Trent Bay last at Oregon State got $4 million; former Super Bowl winning quarterback Trent Dilfer, who never coached beyond high school until UAB for some unknown reason hired him, got a check for $2.4 million while Jay Nordell received a comparatively paltry $1.5 million to exit Colorado State. That’s $168 million combined. College football coaches are hired to be fired and then they exit with pina coladas on the Cabo beach while these days air traffic controllers, without a pay check for over a month, have become Uber drivers to keep the family fed. Our world is upside down.
Sad news and good news for some television moms of our youth. Lassie and Timmy’s TV mom June Lockhart, to whom we wished a happy 100th birthday in this space in June, passed on October 23. Ms. Lockhart was able to take her post-Lassie career to Lost in Space and Petticoat Junction. Meanwhile Marion Ross, Mrs. C from Happy Days celebrated her 96th on Monday while her surrogate television son Henry Winkler turned 80 on Thursday. Yes time does fly, too fast. A couple of Charlie’s Angels also blew out the candles—Jaclyn Smith was 80 last Sunday and Kate Jackson 77 on Thursday. Also on Thursday Timothy B. Schmit of the Eagles celebrated his 78 while Gracie Slick turned 86. Friday Dan Rather turned 94. Yesterday golf legend Gary Player, still fit as the proverbial fiddle, celebrated 90. Finally, former ABC honcho Michael Rubin who brought us Lavern & Shirley and Happy Days way back in the happy days is 76 today. Everyone now eats dinner at 4:30.
I’ve been to London almost 30 times and this scares me right down to my bloomers: driving over there is something I would never do. They drive on the wrong side of the street, the steering wheel is in the wrong place, the city is a labyrinth of streets, there are confusing roundabouts seemingly every 200 meters and some streets are so narrow it can barely fit a BMW Isetta. None of that, however, will deter the introduction of self-driving robotaxis. Oh my. Not for me. Send me underground to the Tube, let me mind the gap and be much safer than up above.
Your old favorite bookstore may now be shuttered but that didn’t stop the publication of the 2025 updated version of the Merriam-Webster dictionary. Here are some of the 200 new words added: cold brew, farm-to-table, dad bod, cancel culture, dashcam, side-eye, petrichor and hard pass. Petrichor: the pleasant smell after rain on dry earth. If you didn’t know that you probably need the new edition. I just ordered mine.
I’m not sure about his fiscal acuity but the kid sure has balls: as mentioned a few months ago, my nephew Robby, 32, is a social media influencer with Bob Does Sports on Instagram and YouTube. He has over a million followers. Last Sunday he bet a five leg NFL parlay on DraftKings for $300. Win all five legs and cash in for a cool $90,843. Improbable is an understatement. It’s tough enough to win a two-team parlay, never mind five. Curtis Sliwa has a better chance of becoming NYC mayor on Tuesday. On Robby’s ticket he had four plays, all prop bets, in the early games window: George Kittle of the 49ers to score a touchdown. He did. Chase Brown of the Bengals and Saquon Barkley of the Eagles to each score at least two touchdowns. They did. The most likely of those four legs was Josh Allen of the Bills to find the end zone. And he did. That’s four for four. So now it all rides on the Sunday night game—Green Bay and Pittsburgh needing Romeo Doubs of the Packers to score a touchdown. In the four hours between the end of the early games and the Sunday night kickoff, DraftKings offered Robby $26,945 to cash out. Or he could refuse and hang in with a chance to win $90K. Needless to say he got some great social media play, which is crack to a social media influencer. He asked me what would I do? Take the payout or stay in? Told him it had to be his decision. He was leaning toward staying in and going for the bundle. That was no surprise. His thought process wasn’t fiscal - it was professional. Robby figured he could get some great ‘content’ and exposure during the three hours of the Packers and Steelers game. I told him if he could stomach being this close to $90K and forget about the $27K offer, then go for it all. He stayed in. He live streamed the entire experience on something called Twitch. I don’t know what Twitch is but do know if I was in that situation I would have a bad case of the twitches. Someone told me there were 100,000 fans watching Robby’s reactions on the stream. The Packers scored 35 points beating Pittsburgh 35-25. Andi and I sat glued to every Green Bay possession. I was sure after Robby won he would remember his oldest, and probably favorite uncle, with a nice little gift. However, not among those 35 Packer points was a Romeo Doubs touchdown. Robby left $26,945 on the table to chase $90,000. He wound up losing $300. That’s some damn expensive ‘content.’
My wagering isn’t that exotic. I bet Toronto to win the World Series. I thought the Dodgers were better but at 2-1 odds I had the Blue Jays as a live underdog. They squandered opportunities to win in marathon Game 3, Game 6 and in Game 7 with the World Series championship run on third base and one out in the bottom of the ninth. Champions find a way to win and the Dodgers did. They are worthy repeat champions. But the big World Series winner was baseball and baseball fans. Each game and every scenario of the game inside the game was tremendous. It was compelling for eight days. My NFL season bet sucks. I have Atlanta over eight wins; they’ll be lucky to get six. So midseason I jumped back in on a couple of other terrible teams— I bet the Jets over 3.5 wins, mainly to see Harley’s smile, and the Raiders over 4.5 wins. In winter sports my son Jason is my NBA guru and he touted San Antonio over 43.5. They’re off to a 5-0 start. In the NHL I like the formula I bet last season— a young team on the rise—as Montreal was a year ago. Hoping to duplicate that I have Anaheim over 82.5 points — so far so good for a team that’s fun to watch. I also stayed local with a play on the Golden Knights to win their division.
And finally, before we take an SMC bye week next Sunday, something really bothers me about the Trumps’ renovation of the White House. I understand it’s 224 years old and certainly needs a touch-up. And a cool $300 million gets a ballroom and in the process guts some of the East Wing. That’s fine it was getting kind of dated anyway. However, what really irks me, and at the same time makes me really envious, is how did they get HOA approval so quickly?
I’m proud that Medjet is sponsoring Sunday Morning Coffee. I spent 20 wonderful years with Medjet in Birmingham, Alabama, and can tell you unequivocally they are the standard-bearer for medical assistance membership programs. A talented staff, who cares about its members, is at the forefront of the company’s success. Whether you are traveling for business or pleasure, domestic or international, a Medjet membership should be an important part of your travel portfolio before you leave home. Check out the Medjet website at medjet.com or just tap on the Medjet logo and you’ll be able to get a look at Medjet’s services, rules and regulations, pricing, and an overview of the organization. And remember, any opinions expressed in Sunday Morning Coffee content or comments belong to the author and not the sponsor. Safe travels with your Medjet membership! — Roy Berger
Hey there! Also a very happy 100th birthday to phenomenal actress Lee Grant! And watch out for Da Bulls!!!
Lots to like in this week's edition. Had no idea you were such an expert on Central African issues, as you may know, my son Danny spent 5 years in third world Africa for the state department