MGM Grand

Las Vegas! The heart and soul of every sort of entertainment. Casino, booze, boxing, fun games you name it. It’s all there in Las Vegas. And at the heat of Las Vegas, there is MGM Grand.

One can’t possibly have the complete taste of Las Vegas without visiting the MGM Grand.

You know, where Manny Pacquiao fights Adrien Broner on January 19 next year? Yeah, he’s coming out of his slumber to take on the American boxer in a WBA Welterweight Championship match.

This is more of a dress rehearsal for his potential upcoming match against Floyd “Money” Mayweather. Anyway, the focal point of today’s article is MGM Grand more than anything else.

There is a lot more to it than what’s visible to the eyes. In this Post, we will talk about 10 most Amazing fact about the MGM Grand that you probably don’t know.

1. Booze Overload on Fight Nights

I hope you are not a stranger to the MGM Grand Arena. This is where all the big fights take place. Hotel staff estimates a whopping 100,00+ visitors passing through the hotel on fight nights. And guess what? They will drink beer like crazy people on that day.

About 50,000 bottles of beer are consumed on every fight night. That’s half a bottle of beer per hand. Remember many of those 100,000 visitors don’t consume alcohol.  In reality, the actual intake of beer is more than half a bottle.

MGM Grand Arena has a capacity of 16,800. So, selling out an entire arena is no small deal at all.

Not too shabby, eh?

2. A small City can Easily Live There

Believe it or not, The MGM Grand can easily fit a small city in there. An estimated 70k visitors pass through the hotel each day. That’s way more than the total population of my hometown. As per the staff of the MGM Grand, this place gets very crowdy every day.

Visitors usually go there to have fun at the casino or the hit the bar or stay in one of 6,852 rooms MGM Grand has. Most of the time people go there to gamble at a poker table (Las Vegas, Right?). However, people also stay there to watch boxing matches.

3. MGM Grand has the Largest Casino in Vegas

The largest casino in Vegas and 9th largest casino in the world is at MGM Grand. No wonder gamblers like to stay at the MGM Grand whenever they visit Vegas.

Now, you might be asking, how big is it actually?

Well, allow me to amaze you. The size of the playing floor is roughly 1700,00 square feet. Let that sink in for a moment. 1700,000 square feet of gambling.

To put things in simpler terms, that is the size of 3 football fields stitched together. Amazing, right?

There are more than 2,300 slot machines along with 20 card games tables.

4. The Busiest Place for Any Hotel Staff

This place is a nightmare for any hotel staff (all the good salary and tips makes it up for them). Every day the hotel staff wash 92,000 lbs of linen every day. That is a lot of clothes to wash if you ask me. You might say it does not make any sense. Why so much dirty laundries?

Well, think of it this way. There are 12,000 guests in the hotel every day. They do all sort of fun stuff and activities. That’s 12,000 potential champagne spills every day (people get carried away pretty easily. This is not unusual for Vegas).

See? It makes total sense now, doesn’t it?

5. It Crazy about Lions

This place is so crazy about lions. The old casino had an entrance which resembled a giant lion. And it was so damn amazing to look at. However, this entrance was changed due to many players complaining about how this could bring bad luck to them (stupid superstitions).

Then in typical Las Vegas fashion, MGM Grand made a giant 100,000 lbs bronze lion statue on top of the entrance (everyone’s happy now).

The casino lobby had a lion pit with 20 lions. The trainer used to feed and play with the lions every night. After 2012 this pit was removed.

6. It is the Home turf of Floyd Mayweather

In 2004 Floyd Money Mayweather made his first MGM Grand appearance as an amateur boxer. His debut fight in the Grand was against Martin Castillo. He has since set 4 of the 5 live gate records at the MGM Grand Arena.

In 2013 his fight against Saul Alvarez topped everything else. The fight grossed over $20m. Think about it. $20m for a single fight. I don’t know about you, But I call that “Impressive”.

The MGM Grand Loves him so much that they advertised his fight with a 20-story wall painting saying “Home of The Champion”.

7. Tyson’s ear biting happened here

Perhaps the most famous and controversial fight in the history of boxing happened in the MGM Grand Arena. On 28th June 1997, Mike Tyson bit off a piece of Evander’s ear at the MGM Grand. This was also a pretty rough match to monitor for the match referee Mills Lane.

8. It used to be on a different location

In 1973, the MGM Grand Garden Arena opened on the site of the Old Bonanza casino and Hotel. At that time around the total cost was a whopping $106m. That more than $500m in today’s economy.

Later in 1985, that site was sold. It’s now the Bally’s. After that, the MGM Grand was moved to the place where it is now. Previously this place was occupied by the Marina Hotel.

9. Staff change costumes more than you can think of

Main floor staff at MGM Grand’s five-floor club and restaurant (Hakkasan) changes the costume for every single resident DJ set. That’s like changing your outfits 4 times every night. People there absolutely don’t tolerate dirt on anyone.

Did someone spill red wine on you? Or You got a little bit of food stain on you? Go change your costume.

10. You can get a suite for absolutely free here

We all know about The Mansion at the back of the MGM Grand hotel. This is where VIPs, guest, and people with big money stay. You can easily book one of these suites for $5000 a night. But did you know you can stay in one of these mansions for absolutely free?

Don’t trust me, right? Well, I’m not lying. You can stay in these mansions for free but there are certain conditions.

The current rumors report that the going rate for a free room here is spending over $500,000 in the casino. No sweat at all, right?

Did You Enjoy the Trivia?

With that, I’ve come to the end of the article? Did you like all the interesting bits about the MGM Grand Stand, Las Vegas? With a big boxing event just round the corner where people will rush to the stadium to watch Manny Pacquiao vs Adrien Broner Live boxing  match this January, I thought it’d be cool to let you in on these tit bits.

Let me know what else do you want to read about in the comments below.  As always, I’ll be covering the slightest bit  of scoop about the fight as it falls my way. Keep yourselves updated by following this website.