Chat with Greg Ambrosius and Tom Kessenich of the NFFC

  Updated 8/27 by Mark Wimer, Exclusive for Footballguys.com

Mark Wimer: OK, the chat room is open. Hey Tom, thanks for joining in as well!

Greg Ambrosius: Thanks Mark. Myself and Tom Kessenich are here to answer any and all questions your great customers have for us. I'm ready when you are.

Tom Kessenich: My pleasure Mark. Thanks to you, David, Joe and the entire FBG staff for inviting us to take part in the chat tonight.

MW: OK, here's the first question: It was big news in the fantasy community when Fanball and the NFFC teamed up - how is the partnership helping improve the NFFC, in your opinion?

GA: It was big news to the industry and to us as well. I've been at Krause Publications and F+W for 20+ years and never expected to interview for another job. But F+W is more print oriented and Fanball.com is obviously more Internet oriented and the move made sense. There is no question that Fanball.com will bring us more access to veteran fantasy players, more promotional might in print and online, and a freshness to the event. Those guys in St. Louis are EXCITED about the live events area and they have more ideas than Tom and I can handle right now. It's exciting for them, it's exciting for us and it should be exciting for our players.

Here's one example. Last week Tom and I went to St. Louis to meet with Ryan Houston and the gang and Ryan suggested that we videotape our draft process for the $5,000 entry fee Ultimate League. We picked the draft order for that event and the $2500 Super and showed everyone exactly how KDS works. It's now on Fanball.com and viewable for everyone to see how perfectly KDS/3RR works. In the Super, 6 of the 14 owners got their first preference. How cool is that?

So the partnership is working already and it will REALLY work in 2010.

TK: If people are interested in seeing the videos we put together while in St. Louis last week, they can find them on the NFFC's new YouTube page. You'll see the Ultimate and Super draft selections plus an interview with Greg. An interview with me should be posted there soon.

MW: Excellent - it's amazing how quickly video can go from live event to the web these days - just a few years back there was still videotaping going on at the Fantasy Sports Trade Association meetings - how times have changed!

TK: Absolutely. The people on our message boards were pretty pumped to see the videos of the two leagues being selected. As Greg said, not only was it a fun way to present the draft order but it also provided two strong examples of why KDS really works in our format. A high percentage of our owners got the draft preferences they wanted as opposed to simply being randomly selected somewhere in the first round.

GA: We'd love to videocast all of our draft spots in all of our leagues someday and I think eventually we will figure that out with the help of Fanball.com. The NFFC Selection Show has a nice little ring to it!!! But again, it's just one example of how technology and these high-stakes leagues have the potential to push the envelope in a positive direction for all of us. And I think Liberty Media and Fanball.com have a lot of ways they can bring video to this market first.

TK: The NFFC Selection Show has a nice ring to it!!! Absolutely, and I'm not just saying that cuz I thought of it. Ryan, if you're out there you need to trademark that one.

MW: Following up on the drafting element of the NFFC leagues, What is it like trying to coordinate drafts in three major cities - Chicago, New York, and Las Vegas - along with an online drafting component? What are some of the biggest challenges NFFC has overcome during the contest's six-year history?

GA: Well, it's extremely hectic during this final week as we're 1) soliciting old members to come back; 2) soliciting new members and trying to explain all the events we have; 3) coordinating with the hotels; 4) Chasing credit cards!!!; 5) making sure staff is prepared; and 6) getting all the draft spots out and leagues filled.

But who wouldn't want a full-time job like this??? It's the best job in the world and once the leagues come into place and everyone shows up at the live drafts it's Corona time and I can sit back and relax. Then I know that I've done my job and everyone can have fun this football season. Plus it's cool to give out almost $1 million per season between baseball and football. To know that we've given out over $5 million since 2004 in football and baseball is pretty cool. I didn't have 5 bucks to my name when I came here in 1989, so to reach this stage is fun.

Our biggest challenge is our unique format, the 14-team league. I created the 15-team league format for baseball in 2004 and gambled that a bigger sized league for football could succeed. We have grown through the years, but the 14-team league isn't as mainstream as 12-teams. But I think all of our veteran players will agree that this is the best format to determine the best players in the country.

And secondly, there was already an established contest out there in 2002 and getting to the party second always is tougher to get the pretty girls!!! Competition in this space is fierce and we know that, but good customer service, a great game format, paying your players on time, guaranteeing the prize money and a solid commissioner product goes a long ways towards a solid event. We're entering our sixth year and ready for big growth in future years.

TK: We've had to overcome a few things. First of all, mother nature. We've had to deal with not one but two hurricanes during the NFFC's existence, including Hurricane Katrina. One of the best stories from the NFFC is about Cal Suer who was in New Orleans during Hurricane Katrina. Cal like many there went through a tough time during all that but he really wanted to get into the NFFC. He couldn't make it to New York but his daughter lived there so she came to the Hilton and we got her set up on a cell phone and she tracked the draft with Cal on the other end and made his picks for him.

The best part? Cal won his league that year and has become one of our best players the past few years.

As far as your first question, it's not as easy making it all work with three cities and the phone/online component as some think but the more difficult part is getting everyone signed up and ready to participate. Once we get them to the city or hooked up on the phone, things run very smoothly. The nice thing about having done this for six years is the operational part has become a very smooth deal. Greg and I have been the point people for Las Vegas and New York so people know us and know how we run everything and it all goes well.

So once we get you into the NFFC's door, you are definitely in for a Grade A level of hospitality. That's a promise.

MW: Everyone here at Footballguys knows that Chase Stuart is playing in the NFFC - if you could give him one piece of advice about the NFFC format, what would it be? What rule can be a pitfall or an edge if a player neglects it (or pays attention to it)?

GA: Well, Chase has competed in the NFFC format before, so he knows how tough the competition is.

First advice would be to get rid of that tie and high-school picture smile he has in that ad!!! He looks too gentle, too nice, too next-door-neighborish!!! He needs to be MEAN to win in this league. Put some eye-black on, wear a baseball cap backwards and put on an NFL jersey for the draft!!!

All kidding aside, Chase needs to really look at Third Round Reversal in the NFFC now and set his preferences in a way that he can plan out his first couple of rounds. 3RR is a different beast, but it's fun. Wide receivers are obviously blowing off the board in our PPR scoring format and in fact I've seen NFFC Satellite Leagues where six wideouts went in the first 14 picks. In our latest ADP from pay leagues last week, Andre Johnson was FOURTH and Fitz was FIFTH. So Chase needs to be ready for WRs going earlier than ever before in the NFFC and prepare accordingly. And then be ready for the reversal in the third round because the bottom of the draft can really start out with three SOLID, SOLID picks.

MW: For all the readers here at Footballguys.com that are participating in the NFFC, what aspect of preparing for the contest over the next week is most important, in your opinion? Mock drafting; staying on top of breaking NFL news; watching/breaking down the week 3 preseason games? How would you allocate your prep time during the week before the contest if you were drafting in the NFFC?

I take it from your answer to the question just above about rules to pay attention to that a fine-tuned list of WRs is going to be crucial, for example.

Any subject that I neglected to mention?

GA: You obviously hit them all. I'd have to say that our owners are certainly aware of the rules and the change that 3RR plays in the outcome. PPR also makes wideouts very valuable and folks have found out through the years that it's now tough to win these days without at least one and maybe two top WRs. Both of our NFFC $100,000 champions last year Tom Yates and Dave Gerczak had THREE solid wideouts and were tough to beat. Tom started off with WR-WR-WR from the 14th spot in his draft and won it all in the NFFC Classic. It didn't hurt that he also picked up Matt Cassel in Week 2, but he gambled with WRs in the first three rounds.

Stay on top of the NFL news, obviously. Mock draft as much as you can after you've received your draft slot. Look at ADPs to plan out a strategy from your draft spot after you've received it. Then have a Plan B and a Plan C and a Plan Z if needed when changes occur in your draft. And of course, grind, grind, grind the free agent wire during the season. In a no-trading league, you must make smart free agent pickups to compete after Draft Day. There are so many injuries that you just can't win with the 19-20 guys you select on Draft Day.

TK: If you sign up for the NFFC you'll also receive our latest Average Draft Position list which comes from the NFFC drafts held on MockDraftCentral.com. So this is a nice bonus for NFFC members to get an early look at where some players are going in NFFC drafts.

MW: That'll be a very useful tool - obviously, participants need to be on their toes before they walk into the drafting rooms!

Fanball also added the F and W fantasy publications to their lineup for 2010 - what can we expect from F and W fantasy publications next year under the Fanball umbrella?

GA: Well, we've had a blast producing the FootballGuys.com Fantasy Football title each of the last five years and we look forward to an even better relationship in the future.

One of the things that people may not realize in this acquisition is that Fanball.com not only acquired the National Football and Baseball Championships, but they acquired Fantasy Sports Magazine (which was the industry's first national newsstand publication in 1989), and all of our custom publishing titles. So Fanball.com will now produce annuals for Rotowire.com, FantasyGuru.com and FootballGuys.com.

I have no problem saying that the Fanball.com fantasy titles are as good as they come, and I've said that long before I started there. Noah and the gang at Fanball were producing all color, all glossy, beautiful titles under Rob and Charch and they've always been a step above even our KP/F+W titles in appearance and bulk. Now hopefully Tom and I can add even more veteran content to their titles and I KNOW that Fantasy Sports Magazine is going to get a face-lift. We will finally have more color and less newsprint in that title, something I've been fighting for for 20 years!!!!

But it's all good. Print is a tough business right now, but Fanball has enough fantasy titles to get good distribution, good contracts at the printer we use (which was the same as the one F+W used) and sell-throughs are still good for all of these titles. We all hope advertising revenue comes back soon, but I'm sure Ryan would agree, we're BULLISH ON PRINT in this space.

MW: It's been interesting over the years to watch the evolution of the media in the fantasy space - I think that the strongest titles (like Footballguys.com's media, obviously) have a multi-pronged approach with outlets that range from hard-copy to twitter and everything in between. There are so many more points of contact between Fantasy Sports businesses and their customers than there were just a few years ago. It's an exciting time to be working in this field, that's for sure.

Thanks for participating in the chat, Greg and Tom. Any parting thoughts for our readers about the 2009 NFFC contest that wasn't covered in the questions earlier in the evening?

GA: Thanks for having us Mark. I'd just like to let your readers know that the NFFC started as the industry's first multi-city, high-stakes event that really catered to one live event that rewarded a $100,000 grand prize. But through the years, we've evolved to include private satellite leagues for as low as $50 per team to as high as $1,000 per team. We've also added different levels of national contests, with our debut NFFC Online Championship League with a $350 entry fee to our NFFC Primetime main event at $750 per team and a $40,000 grand prize. Both of those last two events are 12-team formats and folks can participate online from the comforts of their homes. So now you can draft live with us or win a national title from home, something we didn't have in 2004.

All of us in this space have had to evolve and add and reinvent ourselves to be ahead of the game. We are no different. If anyone wants to learn more about our current events, we have openings through the weekend before we close off sign-ups. Contact me at 1-800-726-9966, ext. 13284 or at greg.ambrosius@fwmedia.com. Or visit our web site at www.fantasyfootballchampionship.com. If you're serious about playing fantasy football this year, then you'll want to check out the competition at the NFFC. There isn't any better competition in the world.

TK: Thanks for having us here tonight Mark.

I'd say that if you're a serious fantasy football player looking for the best possible challenge, the NFFC is the event for you. Not only do we offer the fantasy industry's only "live" football doubleheader but we also have the debut of our Online Championship event which has a $350 entry fee and a grand prize of $20,000.

We have 14-team and 12-team formats and if you sign up for both of our live main events, you also put yourself in a position to win $75,000 if you win both national titles. Think that's an impossible dream? Well you shouldn't because in our baseball event Lindy Hinkleman has a chance to not only win the $100,000 grand prize for the live event but also the $40,000 grand prize for the Online Championship.

So it can happen - and it might just happen in baseball. Wouldn't some of these great FBG members like to make it happen for football too? Of course they would.

All they have to do is go to www.fantasyfootballchampionship.com and sign up today. Or they can contact myself (tom.kessenich@fwmedia.com / 715 445-4612 ext. 13653) or Greg (greg.ambrosius@fwmedia.com / 715 445-4612 ext. 13284) and we'll be happy to get you signed up.

So come on Footballguys, don't let Chase be the only FBG member to have all the fun in the NFFC this year!