The marketing was helping, but Joe Blow was my biggest advocate. Much of his customer base was upset with his first year as owner of the site and they slowly filled the FSRU leagues. The new signups also sent out the word to other Triple Play members as his customers jumped ship in droves. To further assist the new site, in Joe Blows first year, he also found reason to throw out a bunch of guys.

 One customer was thrown out of Triple Play for complaining when he did not receive his 1^st place payout two months after the season ended (FSRU always pays out within a week or two). Another for committing Joe Blows pet peeve, which started this whole thing, he cursed on the message board. Triple Play jumpers began bringing me other Triple Play members, one after the other. That first year, every team sold in every league.

And Joe was blowing pretty hard too. He threatened me with legal action for stealing so many of his customers. I laughed. My attorney did too. He said there were no binding contracts in place between the customers and the websites; I was offering a better deal (payouts), sounds like a healthy competitive business environment.
Welcome to America…

 After a pounding that first year: Joe Blow did try to bounce back. The following year he increased 1st place payouts from $350 to $500 (costing him plenty), but he stopped there and would not match FSRU, which offered much better payouts from 2^nd to 4^th place finishers- while he still only pays out to top 3 teams.

I had somehow been blessed with a strong beginning group that first year: some great players, some castoffs, guys just looking for a place to play. It reminded me of Bill Murray in the movie Stripes, standing in front of a rag tag group of soldiers and confidently stating “our forefathers have been thrown out of every civilized country on earth.” It was a committed group and I knew they would provide a strong foundation for the site.

They were a building block. I felt that each of them had put their faith in the new site, and to some degree, in me. I had spent a great deal of money to attract each one of them and probably logged close to 1200 hours in work hours. After the first years baseball drafts, the site had 2 one-year leagues, 2 keeper leagues, and a private league...nothing impressive really.

But the rag tag team of castoffs was trading like crazy and the message boards were way more active than they ever were at Triple Play. It was like only the most active roto nuts had come to play here. And the group was more than just castoffs, they were the guys that expected service and respect. I reviewed the list of names after it was over, and all I knew about each one, and I knew this site was going to be special...….This was the group any hobbyist wanted to play with......This was the group that would make year two a lot easier.