After more than a year of public silence, Bally’s Corp. is finally sharing its plans for what it hopes to build on its portion of land surrounding the future Las Vegas home of the Athletics.

The company plans to develop 500,000 square feet of retail, dining, and entertainment offerings, including a 2,500-seat theater for live performances, on land surrounding the $2 billion, 33,000-capacity baseball stadium.

The company’s chairman, Soo Kim, said development would start in 2026, with some of the locations open before the first pitch.

A 3,000-room hotel-casino with two towers is included in the plans for the 35-acre site on the corner of the Strip and East Tropicana Avenue, but Kim told The Nevada Independent Friday that the company wants to tap into the non-gaming revenue expected to be generated once the Athletics begin play in 2028.

The A’s and Bally’s will share the site that housed the Rat Pack-era Tropicana Las Vegas, which was closed and demolished a year ago. Real Estate Investment Trust Gaming and Leisure Properties owns the land, which is leased to Bally’s for $10.5 million a year.

“It's not lost upon me that 75 percent of Vegas revenues are non-gaming,” Kim said. “We want to make progress in that area, and we’re doing that now in real time.” 

Kim added, “We are absolutely able to deliver [some of the venues] before the opening of the stadium. That's still up to the market.”

The concept is similar to dining and entertainment districts that surround Major League ballparks, such as The Battery in Atlanta and the Gas Lamp District near Petco Park in San Diego. Bally’s hired JLL, a commercial real estate company, to “curate a mix of dining concepts, flagship retail and immersive experiences.”

“The phasing of this will depend on which partners we're bringing on and when,” Kim said, adding that the company is in talks with an entertainment venue operator for the theater.

He cited other non-gaming attractions in Las Vegas, such as the 400,000-square-foot BLVD Las Vegas, which opened in November 2024 across from T-Mobile Arena and north of MGM Grand Las Vegas, as an inspiration for the stadium site.

“We absolutely believe there is enough demand for retail,” Kim said, adding the company has submitted entitlements for the land to Clark County.

Marnell Architecture is the architect overseeing Bally’s 26 acres. The ballpark is situated on 9 acres.

Bally’s released plans for the site a year ago, ahead of the Tropicana implosion. Kim said those plans were conceptual. The 3,000-room resort — named Bally’s Las Vegas — will have two hotel towers as opposed to three in last year’s renderings. He said a parking component would be included in the development, and that the hotel-casino would have direct access to the ballpark.

Bally’s also released a new rendering showing how the entertainment district would surround the stadium, which will be an enclosed facility with a non-retractable roof designed as five overlapping, shell-like structures. A glass wall in the outfield will offer fans views of the Strip during games.

Bally’s is currently focused on an under-construction $1.7 billion Chicago casino resort, which the company plans to open next year. The company is also a candidate to develop one of three planned New York City-area casinos. At the same time, Bally’s is seeking approval to develop a $4 billion, 500,000-square-foot resort at the golf course it owns at Ferry Point Park in the Bronx, a process that could be decided by year’s end.

“I know we have a lot going on, and we want to move forward,” Kim said. “If demand is slow, then we'll go slower. We're not going to build speculative.”

Kim also said he’s convinced A’s owner John Fisher has the financing to build the ballpark, which has an estimated price of $2 billion. The A’s are using $350 million in public financing as provided through the passage of SB1 by the Legislature in 2023. U.S. Bank and Goldman Sachs are loaning the team $300 million for the stadium’s construction, with Fisher covering the rest. 

Clark County commissioners will discuss the A’s development agreement on Oct. 8 and could vote on its approval, according to the Las Vegas Review-Journal. A move would lock in the stadium’s costs and could allow the A’s to begin drawing on $350 million in public financing.