10 Years Of NFBC Stories, Friendships

[Greg Ambrosius]

It's been an incredible ride through our first 9 years of the NFBC. Soooooooo many friendships have been made. Sooooooooo many great fantasy baseball players have been uncovered. Sooooooooo many great champions have been crowned. Just sooooooo many memories since we introduced the NFBC in the fall of 2003.

I have a lot of memories that I need to get down in print (okay, so I'm an old newspaper guy who still loves print) before I die!! And since this is going to be our 10th anniversary season, I'm going to reminisce right here. But don't let me be the only one writing about our memories in the NFBC. I know that Tom has plenty of them and I'm sure you folks do, too. PLEASE post your best memories within this thread and let's all enjoy the last 10 years and create some new memories going forward.

I will lead off with the start of the NFBC:

After 13 years of being the editor of Fantasy Sports Magazine (first was called Fantasy Baseball Magazine) and after 13 years of being the editor of Sports Cards Magazine, in August of 2002 Krause Publications decided to cease publishing Sports Cards Magazine. I hosted the Fantasy Sports Trade Conference in Chicago and was told that I'd be a lead columnist with Sports Collectors Digest, which was a nice honor but not quite the career path I always wanted. I could see that print was in trouble and I needed to think of my future.

A couple of weeks later, I attended the WCOFF at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas and my eyes opened to a new area of the fantasy sports industry. Lenny Pappano and Emil Kadlec had created the industry's first High Stakes Fantasy Football event and I was there as one of the 552 teams drafting for a shot at the $200,000 grand prize. All 46 leagues were held in one cavernous MGM Grand ballroom and the pre-event party was held at the ESPN SportsZone. They rented out the ENTIRE FACILITY and everyone inside and outside the bar/restaurant had fantasy football on the brain. It was an AMAZING event.

I'll go into more detail about this one later, but bottom line is that I created the rules for a high-stakes fantasy baseball event on the flight home and began creating what would become the NFBC. In late November of 2003, Krause Publications decided to go it alone and offer a $100,000 grand prize for the top team among 300 teams in this 15-team format. We put it online and then used our industry contacts to try and spread the word. But we had few email lists at the time outside of our magazine subscribers to recruit NFBC players and no message board forum of any substance.

But our site went live in November and one night we got our first signup: Rey Diaz of Miami, Florida. Right there, $1,250 for a Main Event. The guy from Miami who I never heard of trusted me enough to put his credit card on file and take a team. In return, I offered an autographed Alex Rodriguez baseball to anyone who would be the first signup and I shipped it to Rey the next day. I've never forgotten the guy who first took a chance on us and I hope Rey comes to Las Vegas again this March so I can showcase him to our audience. He will always be FIRST in my book!!

A few days later on a Wednesday night, I was working late while I was writing a fantasy football story for ESPN.com. I got an email from Ken Bales, who I knew from the WCOFB. He inquired about our league and knew me from all of my writings. He told me about a group called Leaderboard Sports and how they were the best players from ESPN.com. They were all looking for a contest with a little more competition and a little more juice. He said that Meat Loaf was among those in the Leaderboard Sports group and they were all interested in learning more about the NFBC. A quick email reply got another quick response and a phone number for a Dave Cushard, who was kind of the leader of the group.

I'm pretty sure I called him that night or maybe the next day and we had a nice talk. This guy named Dyv seemed much nicer than the controversial dude I had seen on the message boards. He also sounded taller than what I saw of him months later!! Anyway, this Dyv guy said he probably had a dozen or more guys who were interested in playing in the NFBC. He soon became my best friend!!

The best part about it is that Dyv and Ken and everyone else I later met through Leaderboard Sports had the same passion for quality pay games that I had. They wanted to grow this space and make it happen. They appreciated my dedication and I appreciated theirs. At the end of the day, we finished with 13 Main Event leagues and three auction leagues and I believe they had 25+ teams among our 228 total teams. I honestly believe that the NFBC wouldn't have survived that first year without the Leaderboard Sports group. Seriously.

The funny thing about that first year is that the NFBC really began to gain momentum after Dyv and several other guys joined the Main Event in early December and we started growing little by little each month. I know that on Super Bowl day of 2004 with Tom and I both in Houston, we got our 69th Main Event signup (you don't forget those numbers!!). It happened to be Glenn Schroter, but we didn't know him from Adam at the time!! But we sure loved him that day.

We grew to 195 teams for the Main Event that year and lost tens of thousands of dollars. But the WCOFB in their second year had only 45 teams and the only way they could keep that many teams was by making a deal with me to keep Meat Loaf in both contests. Meat signed up with us and would play the other event as long as they weren't at the same time. We weren't moving from 10 am PT because we had simultaneous drafts with New York and Chicago and Meat was in our $1,300 NL Auction League and the Main Event. He was so cool and he just wanted to draft baseball players. What a great guy. So WCOFB agreed to go to 3 pm and I split the cost of buses to pick up the Leaderboard Sports group and Meat Loaf from the Rio to take them to the MGM Grand. WCOFB went with a new stat service that year, didn't have overall standings for 2+ weeks and folded after 2004. The NFBC was alone in the space after that until Dustin foolishly set up a $200,000 grand prize in 2010 and folded after 2011, more than $1.5 million in debt to fantasy players.

Dave and I have become good friends through the years and we still have top guys like Clark Olson in the event. But we did lose many of the other guys from that debut season. I'll reach out to Ken and others to see if they will make an appearance again. They probably don't realize how important they were to this entire space, but for all of those guys to commit to my event in early December, it gave credibility to what we were doing and helped others later on sign up and commit. Again, without them, I know we don't get to 195 teams and I'm pretty sure my conservative company might have been one and done.

There's your history lesson for today. More to come soon!!

[Greg Ambrosius]

My favorite Meat Loaf story occurred in 2005, our second season at the Rio in Las Vegas. He emailed me pretty regularly that off-season and was excited to compete in a lot of events in Las Vegas. So we put him in the new $650 NL Auction League at 9 am on Friday morning, the $1,300 NL Auction League at 4 pm on Friday, the Main Event on Saturday and the newly created Ultimate Auction League on Sunday. He was ALL IN that second year after cashing in the NL Auction League the first year.

Meat had trouble hearing from all his years in the rock band, so he definitely needed a partner for the auction leagues. He also needed to know how much money everyone had left, which was hard to see on the big board. So he requested that he have a laptop in front of him so that his partner could enter those values in and he could easily see them. He walked into the Rio ballroom with a 50-foot extension cord and I asked everyone in that private league if it was okay for Meat to use it. He already had it set up and rolling before the vote was final, but everyone was happy to accommodate him. Hell, (Bat Out Of Hell, really) everyone was just happy to be in the same league with Meat Loaf.

Meat had a blast and he went from that first auction league to the next one and when he was walking out he told me how much fun he had. He said he could do another auction league right there and then. But he also said he hated the Rio. The long walk from the Convention Center back to the hotel elevators exposed him to a lot of people and those folks bugged him for autographs and handshakes. Nobody at our drafts bothered him.

The next day he drafted in the Main Event and on Sunday he was there at our debut Ultimate Auction League. It was a terrible setup as the Rio had no space that Sunday morning because of a sewing convention (I'm not making this up), so we had to rent space across the street with the Ultimate Draft (which involved a phone hookup) and Ultimate Auction in the same room. I was embarrassed by the setup, but nobody in those two debut Ultimate Leagues gave it a second thought. They knew we were doing something special and just loved being part of such a die-hard group of fantasy baseball owners.

Anyway, both Ultimate Leagues went great and it was a very competitive auction. I believe we had two owners on the phone for the Ultimate Auction and it didn't start well with Brady doing the bidding in Las Vegas and Rocky repeating each bid in New York. It was Brady's big moment to just take complete charge and make this connection work. He was fantastic and the teleconference auction with 13 owners in Las Vegas went very well. It was a great, great league that started a great, great tradition.

Dyv was supposed to be one of Meat's partners in the Ultimate Auction League and unfortunately he had a family emergency that he had to catch a flight on Saturday night. Meat and I were both very concerned for him, but we heard from him during the auction that things were going to be okay. It was cool. During the last break, Meat gave me the news about Dave and then talked to me about how lucky I was doing what I loved doing when he had to work so hard!! He talked to me about some of his financial issues to that point and the real estate he was buying. He just was a very, very nice man and he had no trouble talking with me.

I never ask for autographs from the players or celebrities I meet. I always just felt it was an intrusion of working together. The first year I wanted to ask Meat Loaf for an autograph, but didn't. I didn't again the second year, but on Sunday after seeing him for the fourth time and hearing that he was working on a new album, I decided to hand him a baseball and ask for an autograph. He gladly signed it this way "Greg, give me a %. Meat Loaf" It's a beautiful signature and it shows that he knew we were onto something special. Unfortunately, he went on tour in 2006 and the last time I saw him was at our live football draft in Las Vegas in August of 2005, a year in which he won an NFFC Classic League title. Meat was actually a weekly guest on ESPN Classic in 2005 and the week that he wrapped up his league title, he led off his guest appearance by holding a big yellow sign that said "Las Vegas Champion, $5,000" It was so classic.

I still email him regularly, but I haven't heard from him in awhile. But I'll let him know about our 10th anniversary season and see if he will return. He was a good player and he LOVED the live drafts as much as anyone. He would fit in nicely in 2013, just like he did in 2004 and 2005. I'll do all I can to get him back this year so that he can create some more great memories.

[Bob Enzyte]

I was at the first Ultimate Auction partnering with Ken Magner. We sat next to Meat Loaf and two of his partners. I had brought four CDs of Meat Loaf and asked him before the auction if he would sign them. He shook his head and said he was too busy concentrating on the upcoming auction and didn't want to be bothered. He said he would be happy to sign them after the auction. By that time, I had a plane to catch, but he did manage to sign two of them. The auction didn't go too good for him, as I remember they had $17 left for one player and used it on Latroy Hawkins.

A couple of other things about that auction were Brady Tinker absolutely taking charge with that phone hookup with New York. Ken and I became huge Brady Tinker fans that day. Then there were his two assistants who just loved Brady. I called them the M and M girls because they had a big bowl of M and Ms and kept passing it around the table. Another high light with that auction was a near fight between Lewis Lipski and Kevin Deckel. Deckel's partner was non other than Shawn Childs. Greg was on the spot, settling everyone down before any punches were thrown. It was my most memorable time at an NFBC event.

Lindy Hinkelman

[Sack]

Lindy - you beat me to the same exact story. The football game started, great round up. To echo your sentiments, the KEY thing to that Ultimate Auction was Brady Tinker. He took control and earned a lifetime of respect. In fact, one of the things I look forward to each trip is spending a moment or two with Mr Tinker if I'm not lucky enough to be in one of his drafts. I remember the wheels spinning out of control with issues on the phone. Brady ended all of that. Greg walked away with a Corona and I heard him say "Never again will we do a high stakes auction event over the phone. If you want to take part, you'll just have to get your ass to Las Vegas!" Great memory.

Looking back, nice to see that the Pig Farmer has enough winnings now to spring for the xtra night in Vegas.


The near brawl between Louis Lipsey and Kevin Deckel was a classic. I think the Mayor, Shawn Childs, wanted to bury his head and hide someplace. Heck, Shawn was working on that golden boy image even back then at our first drafts.

[Captain Hook]

Well time to chime in with a few menories - some 2003 and one where I am not sure of the year.

I was in Las Vegas in 2003 to draft in the WCOFB (which I had told Lenny & Emil not to do, but...) but was also there to get married to my current wife Christine Shield. We got married by Elvis (hey it wasn't the first rodeo for either of us) and Chris' daughter Jaimee and her BFF Shannon were there to help celebrate and we had our wedding night dinner set up with a very good friend & customer of mine from Los Angeles and his new restaurant inside the Venetian Hotel - Valentino's had opened and one of his chefs from LA Lucciano was cooking in Vegas and created a special menu for our party which included my NFBC partner of many years, especially in the auction leagues Gary Cowham and Tom Connors from No Cal. So as I told Greg a few months ago 2013 may be his tenth year of running the NFBC but more important it's my tenth wedding anniversary (actually I asked Chris if she would rather celebrate it in Las Vegas or go to NYC because that would be the TOUT weekend and we will be in Las Vegas ......

Not sure if it was the next year but as Greg can tell you dealing with the casinos in Las Vegas for anything not already specifically in the contract is mission Impossible and Expensive. So we are getting ready to do the auction leagues and there are no electic outlets and to get a hotel in that city to add them means extra union help and God knows what other expenses. But Meat Loaf wants them and he is in our auction so he calls the guy from the hotel over and pays for the outlets for everyone!

The other thing that is most important is all the really great friends I have made in these events over the last eleven years - like Greg I was also in the very first WCOFF event which will be etched forever among great memories for all that was there - the rush for everyone when they opened the doors for everyone waiting was incredible.

Hope to see lots of you in Vegas in March,


PVH

[Greg Ambrosius]

Thanks for the great stories guys. The 2005 Ultimate Auction was definitely my next memory post and you guys set the stage for me!!

Without a doubt, 2005 was the turning point year for the NFBC. After losing tens of thousands of dollars in our debut season of 2004 and finishing with only 16 total leagues, we grew more than I ever expected in our second season. The fact that we guaranteed the $100,000 grand prize in 2004 and delivered despite falling short of our goals helped. So did a solid season from STATS running the game and the camaraderie on the Message Boards. You could tell that this was going to work.

So in 2005 we sold out the Main Event with 300 teams after having 195 teams the year before. We expanded the AL-only and NL-only auctions to two formats: $650 and $1,300, and easily doubled the number of leagues we were doing. We also added a third day of live events with the NFBC Ultimate Draft League and the NFBC Ultimate Auction League. Those leagues were created by you folks, not me and it allowed us to double our revenue in one year.

In the fall of 2004, someone suggested that I offer a $5,000 entry fee league. I said, yeah, sure. If there's demand for it, I'll run it. Within no time there was interest in this format not only for the draft but also the auction. I didn't even have space for this at the Rio because they had a national sewing convention that started on Sunday morning. I pleaded with my sales rep to find just 2 ballrooms for these $5,000 drafts and they said they couldn't do it. I was amazed. So I called next door to the Gold Coast and they rented me one ballroom without any air walls. It worked, but it wasn't ideal.

Remember, this was at a time when not everyone had cell phones. Hell, I didn't even have one. I had a tracker phone and it was up to me to make sure that all of the Ultimate participants made it to the right hotel. I didn't sleep at all that night, knowing that someone would be walking around the Rio wondering what the hell all of these sewers are doing in our draft room. I also was amazed to learn that the room didn't have an air wall and that we'd be doing both Ultimates in the same room with everyone talking over each other. Worse yet, both Ultimates needed phone hookups with owners in New York and Chicago. It was set up for failure, but we were determined not to let it happen.

Brady Tinker, my good buddy from the fantasy sports industry, and Chris Adamski of Krause Publications got over to the Gold Coast early on Sunday morning to set up the room. We had it all done and the room looked great, but I didn't like the two conference phones they gave me. They were these new Polycom phones, which I had never seen before, and I asked for just a straight phone with a speaker phone. The guy came upstairs and said, these are much better and everyone uses Polycoms nowadays. I lost my temper and said "get these f---ing frisbees out of here and get me a real phone!!" He said we don't even have speakerphones anymore; the Polycoms were staying.

As some people can attest, I do get pretty jacked up before drafts because I want everything to go perfectly. I'm not fun to be around then, nor is Tom (even he will admit to that). It's a lot of stess and on this day we had $150,000 on the line and I didn't want to blow it for us or the participants. But these f---ing frisbees had me worried.

Rick Thomas got their early (as he always does) to grab some cardboard for his draft boards. He was in the Ultimate Draft League and he wanted to get set up and get ready. He could tell I was intense and so Brady, Chris and I went downstairs for a little buffet and then came back upstairs to do our best. I told Brady he HAD to take charge and run this auction to perfection. He said "I've got it." Then I told him HOW important it was. He said "I've got it." He actually did his first auction with me in 2004 and I often told him to take more charge, to keep things moving more, to be more clear with the bids. With each auction he did after that, he just got better and better. But I needed him to be AT HIS BEST for this one.

I knew the teleconference draft could succeed, but I started over there as Brady introduced himself to all of the participants, which included Meat Loaf and two other others from Leaderboard Sports. The draft had about 6-7 live drafters in Las Vegas, 2-3 in Chicago and the rest in New York. Tom was in Chicago with George Kleemann and someone else and they were already laughing and having fun. Our guys in LV were also ready to go on time and excited. That draft got rolling with Chris handling the announcement of picks from Las Vegas and we didn't have any problems. I didn't need to spend much time after the start over there.

The Auction was starting slow from the get-go. We had 13 owners in Las Vegas and 2 in New York, so it was manageable. Rocky Landsverk was in New York and Brady took charge in Las Vegas. The Polycom was tough right from the start as New York had trouble hearing us and we had trouble hearing them. Rocky also decided to repeat each bid that Brady got from Las Vegas and it confused everyone. Finally after Brady was pissed at the Polycom and pissed at Rocky he laid down the law. He told Rocky to shut up and only talk when a new bid from New York was coming in. And otherwise he was the only one talking and when he said SOLD the player was SOLD. He just took charge and everyone really knew what he said was the final word. We had very few problems after that, although when it came down to the $2 and $3 players the New York guys were at a disadvantage because LV owners jumped in with "$2, $3" before NY owners really knew who the player was that was up for bid. But we did the best we could and Brady said at the end of the auction "If you have enough money to enter a $5,000 auction then next year GET YOUR ASSES TO LAS VEGAS BECAUSE WE'RE NOT DOING IT THIS WAY AGAIN!!" It was a classic line (although we actually did one more year this way!!).

The Ultimate Auction was going smoothly, but I didn't want anything to go wrong here so I set up a chair near the U, just outside the area between the 10th and 11th spot teams. Lewis Lipsey was in the 9th spot I think and the team of Kevin Deckel and Shawn Childs were in the 8th spot. Lewis wasn't doing anything wrong, but it was obvious that Kevin had no patience for this auction thingee. Kevin and Shawn had already earned a solid reputation in the NFBC as they won their Main Event, finished 3rd overall and won the AL Auction League the year before. They were in two auctions, the Main Event and the Ultimate Auction League in 2005 and folks respected them. Shawn was the one making the picks and bidding on the players, so you knew who was in charge there. In fact, maybe that's what was pissing Kevin off!! Anyway, he was kind of edgy during the auction. Hell, maybe the Polycom was getting under his skin, I don't know.

Anyway, Lewis was taking his time to nominate players, but that was fine. I honestly don't remember what set Kevin off, but he shouted at Lewis and Lewis shouted at him and the next thing you knew Kevin was REALLY shouting at Lewis. Being a parent of three young kids at the time, I knew how to handle this one and I didn't even stand up but shouted over both of them: "STOP IT RIGHT NOW. THAT'S IT. NO MORE OF THIS SH-T. LET'S STOP THIS RIGHT NOW AND GET BACK TO THE AUCTION." I was so mad, but enough was enough. I remember staying seated as if I could break this fight up without using a single bullet and IT WORKED. Kevin sat back down, Lewis nominated a player and Brady took over. Honestly, nobody skipped a beat and we finished the auction without any future problems.

The two things I really remember from that day was 1) How happy all of the participants were to be there. I was stressing about the cheaper Gold Coast ballroom (which really wasn't much different from the Rio). I was worried about the food and drinks we had (they were fine). I thought we'd lose someone over at the Rio (everyone showed up and was fine). I think everyone was just happy to see so many like-minded fantasy baseball die-hards competing at this price level. And they felt good knowing they could trust us to run these leagues right and make it first class. That was a proud feeling. And 2) I just remember how Brady took over and became such a key part of our live auctions. He became the best that day and has run auctions the same way ever since. And I know he appreciates the fact that you guys ask him to do the highest dollar leagues. He really enjoys hanging out with all of us and he comes to Las Vegas on his own dime every year. He's a GREAT friend and we'll get him back for the 10th anniversary celebration. He's been with us for every one.

So that's my 2005 story. I have more where that one came from!!! Damn, I feel like an old grandpa spinning stories on the front porch. Time for me to take a nap now!!

[Greg Ambrosius]

I thought this would be fun to see the list of league champions from our 2004 NFBC. You might recognize some of these names:

Overall Standings:
1. Artie Rastelli
2. Aaron Seefeldt
3. Shawn Childs
4. Terry Haney
5. Jeff Thomas
6. Eric Peden
7. Emmett Ruland
8. Ari Benjamin

Chicago League 1:
1. Aaron Seefeldt

Chicago League 2:
1. Stanley Kaye

Chicago League 3:
1. Emmett Ruland

New York League 1:
1. Artie Rastelli

New York League 2:
1. Leonard Ringle

New York League 3:
1. Joe Thelen

New York League 4:
1. Stephen Jupinka

New York League 5:
1. Dave Cushard

Las Vegas League 1:
1. Jeff Thomas

Las Vegas League 2:
1. Eric Peden

Las Vegas League 3:
1. Terry Haney

Las Vegas League 4:
1. Shawn Childs

Las Vegas League 5:
1. Clark Olson

New York AL Auction League:
1. Eddie Gillis

Las Vegas AL Auction League:
1. Shawn Childs

Las Vegas NL Auction League:
1. Terry Haney

[ToddZ]

Those who know me "by reputation" might chuckle, those that have met me and know what I look like may do a spit take.

So I'm getting into a taxi at the Vegas airport around 10 or 11 PM. To save some bucks, I am staying at the Motel 6 before moving over to whatever hotel the NFBC is at that year. This is back when the FSTA meeting and NFBC were back to back.

After I instruct the cabbie to take me to Motel 6, he asks if I would like him to arrange for some female company to "do whatever I want"?

I asked him "does she know Excel?"

[King of Queens]

Those who know me "by reputation" might chuckle, those that have met me and know what I look like may do a spit take.

So I'm getting into a taxi at the Vegas airport around 10 or 11 PM. To save some bucks, I am staying at the Motel 6 before moving over to whatever hotel the NFBC is at that year. This is back when the FSTA meeting and NFBC were back to back.

After I instruct the cabbie to take me to Motel 6, he asks if I would like him to arrange for some female company to "do whatever I want"?

I asked him "does she know Excel?"

=VLOOKUP(prostitute,36DD,A1:ZZZ999)

[Greg Ambrosius]

Lindy - you beat me to the same exact story. The football game started, great round up. To echo your sentiments, the KEY thing to that Ultimate Auction was Brady Tinker. He took control and earned a lifetime of respect. In fact, one of the things I look forward to each trip is spending a moment or two with Mr Tinker if I'm not lucky enough to be in one of his drafts. I remember the wheels spinning out of control with issues on the phone. Brady ended all of that. Greg walked away with a Corona and I heard him say "Never again will we do a high stakes auction event over the phone. If you want to take part, you'll just have to get your ass to Las Vegas!" Great memory.

A lot of NFBC owners have gotten to know Brady through the years, but few probably know how important he was to the growth of fantasy sports early in his career. Heck, I knew him well before folks saw him on TV.

In the spring of 1997, I was invited to Dallas to appear on a Prime Sports Network fantasy baseball special with Norm Hitzges (formerly of ESPN, then popular talk radio host in Dallas). It was a 90-minute special, I believe (maybe 2 hours), where we aired position rankings and we talked about the top fantasy players at each position. I got to know Brad Mumm, the Executive Producer, through friends at a card company in Dallas and he knew my name and reputation from Fantasy Baseball Magazine and ESPN.com. He thought I'd make a nice addition to the show, even though I had a face for radio, and put me on the special!!

We taped the show outside at Arlington Park and while the content was pretty good for 1997 the audio was tough because it was so windy that day. Brady was the head of sales for the show and he popped in at the end to tape a sales piece. You could tell he was a big fan of fantasy sports and you also could tell he'd rather be in front of the camera than outside selling the ads. He also had a much better face for TV than me, Norm or anyone else on the set that day!!

Anyway, they liked me enough to ask me to be the industry expert on their weekly fantasy football show that was sponsored by EA Sports. I did the pre-season special with USA Today's Larry Weisman in late August and then flew to Dallas every week to tape the show on Thursday morning. It aired on Prime Sports Network every Thursday night and Saturday morning and I thought it was pretty well done. It was me, Brady and Jim Knox (he's still at Fox Sports Southwest) on the set. Brady and I became good friends through the show then and we've been friends ever since. They asked me to do the weekly baseball show, but flying from the north woods of Wisconsin to Dallas every week with a wife and a 2-year-old back home was no fun, so I declined.

The next year Fox Sports bought Prime Sports Network and built their regional sports network and they upgraded Brady's TV show. James Lofton replaced me on the set and they hired Goose Gossage for the weekly baseball show. After a few years with Goose, they hired John Kruk to work with Brady, Kruk's first real TV experience. Brady says that Kruk was rough, but you could tell he had that little something that would work on TV. ESPN hired him quickly and unfortunately the fantasy weekly shows stopped airing shortly after that. The show was a promotional vehicle for the company's salary cap game, but Prime Sports Fantasy Sports went away around 2001 or 2002.

I began hosting the Fantasy Sports Trade Conference in 2000 and I invited Brady to be on panels a few times. In 2002 after I attended the WCOFF, we talked about creating a high-stakes baseball game together. But he was no longer on the air and I finally convinced Krause Publications to do it, so all worked out well. Brady has been in Las Vegas for all 9 years of both sports and he's worked hard and played hard each time!! His back continues to bother him during those long auctions, but he's gotten better with each one and he moves them along at a good pace. He's a joy to have on our side.

He still has a TV show in Dallas and he used to host Tony Romo's radio show. We are all rooting for him to hit it big someday, but until then "Mike Trout for $48 going ONCE, TWICE..."

[Tom Kessenich]

I didn't start hosting NY events full-time until 2007. The first few years I was in Chicago and Tampa. Two of my memories from those two years:

The first year in Chicago we had a banquet on Friday night before the Main Event the next day. We had some food and drinks brought in and we gave away drink tickets to everyone who attended. There was one particular gentleman whose name I won't divulge (although the first name is "Nathan") who took advantage of our generosity when it came to the drink tickets. I put one of my co-workers in charge of the drink tickets and Nathan hit him up several times for tickets that night. By evening's end Nathan was ... oh let's just say ... feeling no pain and wanted to go hang out with myself and the other workers from Krause. I politely told him we had to plan the next day's event. The last thing I wanted to do was babysit a drunk player all night long.

One year in Tampa we had a phone auction hookup with Chicago. I flew in from Las Vegas where we were hosting a trade conference and made it to the site after the auction had started. Things went as well as could be hoped for with a phone auction until 10 pm came and the lights went out in our room. Turns out the show coordinator who put everything together in Tampa that year didn't ask Greg or I how long we needed the room for that Friday night. So the lights went out and I went scrambling to find anyone who could turn them back on so we could finish things up. Fortunately we were able to get some light back in the room and the rest of the auction went until its conclusion without incident.

Just a couple of my stories from the memory bank.

[Outlaw]

Brady handled my first ever Main Event in Vegas last year and was just as Greg and others have described, Knowlegable, professional, fun, an overall really nice guy. He knew ALL the players and seemingly knew who was going to draft who even before the pick was made, very impressive sports knowledge. We chatted off and on during the draft and for a bit afterwards and I'm glad i got to know him. I hope I get to be in many more future drafts with him....

[Cocktails and Dreams]

Brady is the man for sure. Drafts have a different feel to them when he is in charge. Does the job perfectly and makes it very fun at the same time. Sky the limit for him with his career. Complete package.

[Greg Ambrosius]

These guys have a great sense of humor, so I hope they find this story funny. Plus they just signed up for all three events in Las Vegas as they return for our 10th anniversary season, so I know they're in good spirits!!

In 2004 when we debuted the NFBC, I didn't know many of our customers and I just hoped that everyone who signed up would show up for the live events on time. Our very first event at the Rio in Las Vegas was the $1,250 AL Auction League and the $1,250 NL Auction League. Both auctions were held in the same open conference room at the same time. Meat Loaf was in the NL Auction League and everyone was amazed to actually see this rock star in person.

To my delight, everyone showed up early and everyone was excited to be participating in these debut auctions. I knew a few of the AL participants from our Fantasy Sports Trade Conference, so I asked Brady to auctioneer that one. It was the first time he ever ran an auction and he was a bit nervous, but he showed up in his Kansas City Royals uniform and fit in. He did fine there and our NL Auction League really ran smooth. Meat was holding court over there and having everyone laughing at his comments with every sold player. It was a great, great kickoff to our debut season.

One of the teams in the AL Auction League came just as I had hoped. They were two brothers, Gregory and Phil Glukhovsky of West Hills, California, and they each had New York Yankees jerseys on and Greg had dark shades on so that nobody could see how he was going to bid. They were like poker players at a fantasy baseball auction. I do believe they had a few drinks that day and they had a blast with the participants. Everyone high-fived them afterwards and said "see ya tomorrow" since almost everyone was also in the Main Event, the Glukhovsky's included. Their team name was called the Mad Russians and we told them not to drink too much vodka that night!!

Sure enough, my biggest worry the next day is getting everyone to show up at the Rio, plus making a stupid teleconference league work. We didn't fill up the 6th league in Las Vegas that year and so we hooked up with some participants in Chicago to make a full league. I didn't want to do it, but hey, we had only 195 participants and every single one of them counted. We had to make it work.

Again, it looked like everyone was there on time and I think Tom was running Chicago, so the teleconference league went smoothly. But after I gave my speech to welcome everyone and I started all three cities at once through a phone call, I got a tap on the shoulder that we were missing a team in LV 4. I looked down and it was the Glukhovsky's at like Pick 6. I quickly called the front desk because they were staying at the Rio and couldn't get a hold of them. This wasn't a time when everyone had a cell phone -- including me, unfortunately -- and so we had trouble getting a hold of them. Per our rules, we had to pick off the list in Fantasy Sports Magazine and I set up a Krause's employee to pick off that list until they arrived. Our magazine was pretty dated at the time and unfortunately they got an injured Vladimir Guerrero in the first round and an injured Nomar Garciaparra in the 2nd round. We were well through the first portion of the draft before they walked into the draft room, AMAZED that the proceedings were going on.

They both thought they were incredibly early because they looked at the web site and saw a starting time of 1 pm. However, that was for the New York drafts, which started at 1 pm ET. The Las Vegas drafts started at 10 am PT and they were late. They were angry with themselves, but gamely did the best they could after they arrived and fought all year to improve their team. They stayed in touch and came back the next year and several years after that. Phil is a Dr. now and when he opened a new practice it took away from his time to run fantasy baseball teams, so they missed out on a year or two, but they've been back with us each of the last 4-5 years and will be back in Las Vegas on March 22-24 to enjoy our 10th anniversary together. They are a great, great pair that won a Main Event league title in 2012 and finished 24th overall. They also love the auction format and really enjoy the NFBC XII Main Event as well.

Most folks would have just blamed me for the time snafu and never returned, but Greg and Phil learned a tough lesson that day and never cried about the miscue. They battled back with that time throughout the season and have never been late for an NFBC event again!! I'm looking forward to seeing them in March and congratulating them on their latest league title. And we don't even have to mention what happened in 2004 because all three of us think about that every time we see each other!!

Oh, in that $1,250 AL Auction League in 2004, Shawn Childs finished 1st, Perry Van Hook finished 2nd and Todd Zola finished 3rd. Shawn won the AL Auction League title and a Main Event, while Terry Haney won the $1,250 NL Auction League and his Main Event league title. Some things never change.

[Greg Ambrosius]

Okay, we need someone to tell the Eddie Gillis "I fell off my chair" story from our debut auction in New York City. I think Rocky ran that one, so I don't have any first-hand person to tell the story. Also, if I recollect there was almost a fight with a bigger man and Andy Shane!! Can anyone tell a bit about that one? Where's a good spin from King of Queens when you need one?

[Captain Hook]

Oh, in that $1,250 AL Auction League in 2004, Shawn Childs finished 1st, Perry Van Hook finished 2nd and Todd Zola finished 3rd. Shawn won the AL Auction League title and a Main Event, while Terry Haney won the $1,250 NL Auction League and his Main Event league title. Some things never change.

Good stories, but a painful memory as I lost that league to Shawn in the last week of the season

[ToddZ]

Okay, we need someone to tell the Eddie Gillis "I fell off my chair" story from our debut auction in New York City. I think Rocky ran that one, so I don't have any first-hand person to tell the story. Also, if I recollect there was almost a fight with a bigger man and Andy Shane!! Can anyone tell a bit about that one? Where's a good spin from King of Queens when you need one?

Pretty sure this was football unless Eddie fell twice (which is a distinct possibility).

I was there for the football folly but don't recall the details, sorry.

[Sack]

i was a participant in the draft with Eddie Gillis that first or second season. It was in New York City and I'll have to check with Chip to see if it was the first time he joined me. Quite sure it was an Auction format, because it was in the
evening. Amazing that it was so long ago,

I remember in those early years, trying to size everybody up as they entered the room. Some friendly, some not
much for conversation. I remember Glenn Schroter ( aka KOQ ) was running around with a laptop. Back then, most people
had a magazine and some cheat sheets. Anybody having the pleasure of meeting Eddie Gillis for the first time, he commands
respect the second he enters the room. He doesn't have to say anything, certain people just carry themselves a certain way
and it just says "Don't mess, I mean business". Eddie walked into the NY Hilton that night with a tag team partner that made Eddie look short. Eddie is 6'4", if i had to guess. Eddie introduced his partner as simply "Shag" or something very close.

The night moves forwards and the beers are flowing. Pretty sure Eddie had a few lined up and his partner was knocking out some snacks and offering them to anybody that was interested. I was seated directly across from Eddie when
all of a sudden he leaned back a tad to far and all one could see was this hulking figure going ass backwards and crashing to the floor. Legs pointed to the sky and one loud thud. Dead silence is my memory. Eddie popped back up, we could all tell rather quickly that he was ok. Eddie just adjusted the chair and wanted to get back to business. Because we were all still new to one another, there was no ball busting that I can remember. That and the fact that big dude "Shag" or "Shad" was seated next to Eddie and would have spit us out for lunch. The best thing was that he wasn't hurt and we just kept the draft going. Knowing how popular Team Gillis is today, he would never get away with going ass backwards today without a full stoppage that was sure to be followed with some serious ball breaking. Again, the friendships that have formed over the years are priceless. A year later, I sat next to Eddie during the NFFC Main Event. I had remembered his chair plight, but didn't think he knew I was across from him that evening. No need to remind the big guy about that fact. We've battled in baseball in the NFBC. Eddie is a class act, I can call him a friend ten years after the chair flop. He always greets me with a big "Hey Sack" whenever we meet. It never gets old. He can probably tell the story better than I. I'm sure I messed up some of the facts, but I can lay claim to being across the table: "The night the wheels went out on Good Ole Eddie Gillis."

[Sack]

Perry:

"Good stories, but a painful memory as I lost that league to Shawn in the last week of the season"

Never realized you came that close to winning a league PVH?
Sorry, couldn't resist.

[Greg Ambrosius]

Okay, I have to get my facts straight so that history has this correct!! You never know, there might be a movie or reality series about the NFBC some day and I want the facts straight!!

I just talked to Mr. Eddie Gillis and he said the only time he fell off the chair was in the debut NFFC Auction League. Some of the guys had first met at the NFBC event in March, so they kind of knew each other and were busting each other's balls about some of the auction values. Eddie said that Tiki Barber came up and he expected him to go for $20. When the bidding got into the $30s, Eddie leaned back further and further with each bid and the next thing you know the big man was flat on his back with his size 15's pointing straight in the air!!

Of course, Tiki went on to rush for 1,518 yards and 13 TDs, while also catching 52 passes for 578 yards and 2 more TDs, making that $37 bid look like a bargain. Eddie has never forgotten that one and everyone there on Draft Day has never forgotten it, either. Good stuff.

[King of Queens]

Okay, we need someone to tell the Eddie Gillis "I fell off my chair" story from our debut auction in New York City. I think Rocky ran that one, so I don't have any first-hand person to tell the story. Also, if I recollect there was almost a fight with a bigger man and Andy Shane!! Can anyone tell a bit about that one? Where's a good spin from King of Queens when you need one?

Greg, can you find the list of owners from the original New York AL-only auction from 2004? I remember a few of the names, but not everyone.

Glenn Schroter
Eddie Gillis
Alan Zimmerman
Gary Sobov
Andy Shane
Jeff Dobies

Bonus question: who was the former major league baseball player that appeared on Friday night?

The infamous Cliff Lee story soon to come!

[King of Queens]

Eddie introduced his partner as simply "Shag" or something very close.

Bad Shad was an INSTITUTION. Bring that guy back!

[Tom Kessenich]

I just talked to Mr. Eddie Gillis and he said the only time he fell off the chair was in the debut NFFC Auction League. Some of the guys had first met at the NFBC event in March, so they kind of knew each other and were busting each other's balls about some of the auction values. Eddie said that Tiki Barber came up and he expected him to go for $20. When the bidding got into the $30s, Eddie leaned back further and further with each bid and the next thing you know the big man was flat on his back with his size 15's pointing straight in the air!!

Of course, Tiki went on to rush for 1,518 yards and 13 TDs, while also catching 52 passes for 578 yards and 2 more TDs, making that $37 bid look like a bargain. Eddie has never forgotten that one and everyone there on Draft Day has never forgotten it, either. Good stuff.

I was running NY and remember that auction very well. That was the first time I had met Eddie since I ran Chicago that year for the NFBC and Rocky Landsverk was handling NY so I didn't meet him for baseball. Eddie made an impression on all of us that year.

[rockitsauce]

In 2010 I made the trip back East to see my brother Joe (aka Cobb aka Harry Crumb) and good friend Kelly (aka Sugarbear aka only black guy in NFBC ) compete in Atlantic City. I was hired by Tom Kessenich (aka the greatest beat writer in Packer history) to work one of the 3 Main Event drafts. It was the easiest (and most fun) $100 I made in my life. My co-worker that day was good buddy and fellow Phillie fan Andy Saxton (Andy was the Vanna White to my Pat Sajak ). I think Joe had competed against Steve Jupinka (aka Quahogs aka former $100K Champ aka Hall of Famer) before so he knew Steve and introduced him to me. He struck me as a very nice guy, humble for all his obvious accomplishments. Big Eddie was there w/ his son Dom, another great guy (even if he is a Cowboys fan )It was alot of fun seeing so many NFBC guys in person.

Edit: How could I forget meeting the one & only - Mark Srebro (aka GEKKO ) ! And one of the guys in the draft that I worked, Bob Particelli (aka Hells Satans). I recall Bob remarking to me that I must've thought they (the competitors) were just a bunch of nerds. I laughed and I think said far from it. Inside I knew I hoped one day to be one of those "nerds".

Flash fwd to March 2012 and Joey decides he's gonna head out West to Vegas baby, Vegas While there I finally get to meet the Hall of Famer himself, Shawn Childs (aka CC's Desperados). Shawn has always been very gracious to me. He gave me advice and his No BS opinions right from the start, just shooting the shit as if I've known him for much longer. I met the man who initiated me w/ a true ass whooopin' in my 1st satellite in '07, Rick "Roundtrippers" Thomas. And of course the quiet man, Dave Potts (aka Low Talkers aka your defending CHAMP) Dave obviously benefited from talking w/ me prior to the 2012 Main Event...I'm sort of a good luck charm

Can't forget meeting the Founder & Commish. of my fav. league (MLBC aka Salary cap lge) KJ Duke. A famous fantasy sports writer (inside joke) Scott Keikoan (aka Kamikaze) was there, later in the evening Greg introduced us to Glenn Schroter (aka King of Queens). I'm sure I'm forgetting someone but in just a few wks you can remind me. Must mention my disappointment in the absence of Message Board Legend Doughboys, but that's ok b/c it appears that EVERYBODY is gonna be in Vegas the 1st wkend THIS yr.

Heck I may just decide to throw my hat in the ring

The following are some pic's taken from last yr -

Low Talkers, Rockit, RT, & CC

2012 Vegas $.jpg (218.41 KiB) Viewed 7736 times

And another w/ our fearless leader Greg (aka SHEESH aka the Stache )

Greg & gang

2012 Vegas.jpg (222.91 KiB) Viewed 7736 times

[Greg Ambrosius]

Dave, that first picture makes it look like you have your arms around two cue balls!! Sorry, had to do it Dave and RT!!

Nah, that was great meeting you at the Bellagio last year and we all had fun sitting around and watching that Ultimate Draft League and the Super League. We had some great drafts that First Weekend last year. But this year in Las Vegas is going to be like a big fraternity reunion. Come join us and even partake in the big dance on Saturday if Joe can lend you some money. It might be the best investment he ever makes. Good luck man.