Live Chat With Greg & Tom: Tuesday, 3 pm ET

[Greg Ambrosius]

Greg,

Never said the addition of different types of events was a bad thing. I think it's great. So there's no need to apologize for adding them. Why would you think that ?

You view niche as a bad thing? I don't mean it as such and maybe my characterization is wrong ? Are new players flocking to the ME ? (I don't see it). Is it growing in popularity or are there more opportunities for the same individual to enter multiple teams propping the #'s ? It seems that way. So to me it becomes a contest for a certain type of player. That's what I mean by niche. Now why wouldn't you want 2500 entrants ? Talk about a rush. You old timers always talk about the 1st WCOFF with 1000 players in one room. No one seemed to care about those odds. But I don't think that'll happen here in the ME. So if it's going to be the same 350 individuals every year then let's spice it up.

I hardly think increasing the contest fee puts a stake through the heart of the event. I'm happy there is an overall event of this magnitude and would love to see it grow. It's just an observation. Hey the floor was open. Should I be asking how many HR's Braun might hit this year

Nah, I don't need any puffball questions. After Mikey hardened me this morning, I'm ready for anything!!

I don't consider an event that generates close to $700,000 a niche event, but now we're arguing over semantics. With an 80 percent return rate, that means we are adding 80+ new teams per year to the Main Event and hopefully this year we get more than that. We are adding hundreds of new teams to the Online Championship and Draft Champions Leagues, so I do think we are adding more players each year to the NFBC than ever before. They just aren't all going to the Main Event. But sure, we'd like 2,500 teams in any event, I guess. I'm just surprised that all owners would want that because that seems like your odds of winning are almost lottery-esque.

WCOFF had 552 teams in 2002 in one room. They peaked at 780 teams in one room in 2008. Pretty cool. Yeah, it would be great to do that again, but those days are likely over with Online drafting so strong these days. But I'd gladly take 1,000 teams for any Main Event I run and grow the grand prize like you said to $150,000 or $200,000. Growth is good. But as Tom said, we've come a long way in improving the league prizes -- the Main Event winner now gets $6,500 -- and hopefully we can grow the grand prize shortly. Thanks for the feedback. It's always welcome.

[76erfan]

You should put that Dobies guy on the radio on some random Wednesday. He can school the world on auctions(as long as he doesnt give away our secrets for 2013).

Ok that wasnt a question.......it was a comment.

Here is the question.....Is Hotel Penn the host for all NFBC/NFFC for forseeable future in NY? We have bounced around from Citifield to Mahwah to Hilton(home of Delmon Young's drunken racial slur incident last year)...at some point you called Javits Center your host. Are you settling in long term with hotel Penn?

[Greg Ambrosius]

Greg/Tom,

Can you share with us any technology enhancements we will see this year? Live Overall scoring, Smart Phone App, etc.

Thanks

Jason

Okay, here's a few more IT items we should have for you soon:

We will have the dropdown link on your team pages that will allow you to quickly move from team to team whether it's for standings, free agents, etc. Right now we have that for Live Scoring and Set Lineup, but we'll make that across the board by Opening Day so that you can easily navigate from team to team. Now, BUY MORE TEAMS!!

We might not have this by the start of the season, but the goal is to create an accounting page for all owners to see what has been charged and what is still owed. That will be a nice feature to add going forward.

We also might not have this ready right away, but we will look at adding the date and time of free agents who are added to your league's FAAB lists. We did have this previously at Fanball and it was a nice feature that folks could use to save time looking for free agents who were added during the week. This was an easy sort and look on the free agent page. We created a special page for Free Agent adds during the week, but some have said this is an extra step in the process. So we'll look at making the time-stamp part of the free agent listing this season.

Thanks for the input folks.

[Tom Kessenich]

Here is the question.....Is Hotel Penn the host for all NFBC/NFFC for forseeable future in NY? We have bounced around from Mahwah to Hilton(home of Delmon Young's drunken racial slur incident last year)...at some point you called Javits Center your host. Are you settling in long term with hotel Penn?

Do not remind me of the Javitts Center year. I still remember Gekko and I walking through a blizzard after the Friday night auction trying to find our hotel. Brutal.

I'm talking to the Hotel Penn for football as we speak and they have space available. I would very much like to have one location we can go to every year in NY. That's been difficult because the places we've primarily gone to such as the Sheraton and Hilton often booked those weekends quickly. Citi Field was a decent experiment but was problematic for a number of reasons. I was very happy with the Hotel Penn for the NFFC and I think it will meet our needs for both the NFBC and NFFC this year. But if we can have one place set in NY each year for both events that'd be great. That's always been the goal. Just been tougher to make it work.

[Quahogs]

Yeah get Dobies on there ! He'd be perfect. He'd have a lot to say .. and some might be about how he owns the auction circuit !

[Captain Hook]

Sorry Greg, bad form in answering Steve during your Live Talk...

Do you see Mark Rogers in the Brewers rotation this year?

No, it's fine to answer each other here. This is an open live chat. I look forward to Steve's response back.

Rogers has a chance to be the 5th starter early in the season. Chris Narveson is coming back from shoulder surgery and might not be ready in April. I think Wily Peralta will be the 4th starter in the rotation and I like him.

Rogers has a good fastball, but he's obviously been hurt most of his career with shoulder injuries. It's been that way with Brewers' pitchers for 20+ years. I saw him pitch last spring and I was surprised by his fastball. He looked good. In 7 starts with the Brewers last year, he went 3-1 with 41 strikeouts in 39 innings, while posting a 3.92 ERA and a 1.28 WHIP. He needs to pitch regularly, so if Narveson wins the No. 5 job Rogers will go back to Triple-A and get called up sometime during the year. He's too injury-prone for me to take in fantasy, but I'd definitely keep an eye on him during the season.

IF Rogers goes back to AAA it will be with another team - he is the only one of their young pitchers vying for a spot in the rotation who is OUT of options

[ALL-IN JD]

What makes you think I would give away any secrets? I might pull a Seinfeld and do a half hour on "nothing"!

[76erfan]

Sorry Jeff. You would be limited to 12 minutes on nothing. You will have to cut down your material to fit that time slot. You arent that special. LOL

[Greg Ambrosius]

Should I be asking how many HR's Braun might hit this year

After tonight's news, yeah, that would have been a good question today?

[Greg Ambrosius]

One interesting note with these Draft Champions Leagues: We have now sold out at least one full league for 15 straight days, and sometimes two in a day. I don't think we've ever seen demand like this for any product and that includes the Online Championship. It's crazy, but it's great to see so many people drafting continuously in the months of January and February. March should just be WILD!!