AFFL and Question to the NFFC

Greg Ambrosius · Post by **Greg Ambrosius** » Sun Feb 17, 2008 2:56 am

Originally posted by BillyWaz:
[QUOTE]Originally posted by King of Queens:
[qb]Thank you for your patients as we are very sorry for the delay."

_____________________________

Neil Wickham
Commissioner of the American Fantasy Football League
( Billy, did you mistype this or did Neil make this faux pas? Look above, it says PATIENTS not patience. Thank you for your patients would be a very sad correlation to what is going on now.

Greg Ambrosius · Post by **Greg Ambrosius** » Sun Feb 17, 2008 3:00 am

Originally posted by Raiders:
I can't see how Neil pulls this off.
Unless I'm way wrong here, why would any company want to take over that mess?

Greg,Tom,Lou or anyone that knows this business please help? I hope he pulls it off, but investing in software right now is not a priority for many industry companies. In fact, companies that currently have this software are cutting back, doing LESS third-party ventures. Right now, it's hard to find companies like STATS to do the back-end support, so maybe he can find the right group who wants to fill this void. But would it be more wise right now to invest $850,000 in software or just pay STATS a flat fee each year to run my leagues?

My money is on the low flat fee that I budget accordingly for each year. I know how much I need to take in each year to cover costs and pay prizes, and how much I need to make a profit. It's actually a pretty simple business plan.

Raiders · Post by **Raiders** » Sun Feb 17, 2008 3:02 am

Thank you for your patients as we are very sorry for the delay.

Was posted.

[ February 17, 2008, 09:02 AM: Message edited by: Raiders ]

Greg Ambrosius · Post by **Greg Ambrosius** » Sun Feb 17, 2008 3:02 am

Originally posted by Diesel:
It's never a good feeling to get increased revenue because of a bad situation like this, but I guarantee that 1-Greg and Tom get another employee this season, or 2-Greg and Tom email SNAKE for some XANAX because of the level of new signups and all of the emails coming in with questions/comments...

2008 is going to go through the roof for the NFFC! I don't know if that will happen Marc, but we are planning to enter the online championships this year with a 12-team format that includes overall prizes. It makes sense considering that this is a proven market and now folks will be looking for a reputable company to 1) provide a great, competitive game; and 2) PAY THE PRIZES THEY'VE WON!!

Greg Ambrosius · Post by **Greg Ambrosius** » Sun Feb 17, 2008 3:03 am

Originally posted by Raiders:
Thank you for your patients as we are very sorry for the delay.

Was posted. Ouch. That's a bad typo.

BillyWaz · Post by **BillyWaz** » Sun Feb 17, 2008 3:26 am

Originally posted by Greg Ambrosius:
quote:Originally posted by BillyWaz:
[QUOTE]Originally posted by King of Queens:
[qb]Thank you for your patients as we are very sorry for the delay."

_____________________________

Neil Wickham
Commissioner of the American Fantasy Football League
( Billy, did you mistype this or did Neil make this faux pas? Look above, it says PATIENTS not patience. Thank you for your patients would be a very sad correlation to what is going on now. [/QUOTE]Nope, that is what he wrote not only on his website, but I believe Football Guys as well.

Typos happen, but this guy has no room to make mistakes without EVERYONE jumping on him.

BillyWaz · Post by **BillyWaz** » Sun Feb 17, 2008 3:32 am

Originally posted by Greg Ambrosius:
quote:Originally posted by Raiders:
I can't see how Neil pulls this off.
Unless I'm way wrong here, why would any company want to take over that mess?

Greg,Tom,Lou or anyone that knows this business please help? It's actually a pretty simple business plan. [/QUOTE]Evidently not for some. That is the biggest issue I have with all of this. He is either...

1) not intelligent enough to run a business (sorry so blunt, but better than what Lenny said

)

or

2) used the money for other things (i.e. stealing) and if things don't get worked out, should end up in prison for fraud.

I would love to say it is #1, but does that really solve the problem, as he is planning to CONTINUE to have the AFFL up and running for 2008????

I hope it all works out, as again, I am one who is owed $$$$, however, there is A LOT of "runaround" on his end for me to feel confident this will get rectified.

[ February 17, 2008, 09:33 AM: Message edited by: BillyWaz ]

Greg Ambrosius · Post by **Greg Ambrosius** » Sun Feb 17, 2008 3:32 am

Originally posted by Diesel:
quote:Originally posted by Coltsfan:
quote:Originally posted by Diesel:
Greg, I would help fix the link that you posted, by putting the "www." in it, but I went on those boards, and the AFFL is getting grilled. It's an ugly ugly messageboard, to be honest, because of the topic. I looked but I couldn't find it. I had never been to their boards but I couldn't believe how active the boards are this time of year. It looks like they may have hundreds of posts per day.

Was the thread removed you were talking about?

Wayne [/QUOTE]Wayne, if you go to the site and click on search, and type in AFFL, you'll find it. Here is the link. I'm not sure if it will work here...

www.forums.footballguys.com/forum/index ... 68&hl=affl [/QUOTE]32 posts have been added in the last day on the FootballGuys.com site about this situation, including a few from Neil himself. Click on the link above by Marc and type in AFFL in the Search button in the upper right-hand corner to find this thread. Again, I point this out because this is where Neil seems to be addressing his situation with the industry.

Greg Ambrosius · Post by **Greg Ambrosius** » Sun Feb 17, 2008 3:43 am

I have to admit, I've never looked at Neil's prize payout or even the structure of his games before, but I just took the time now and honestly I'm shocked at the guaranteed prize levels for each game. Trust me, you need to know how many teams you're going to get in before guaranteeing over $150,000 in prizes, which he did at the Platinum level. He then brought in $136,000 in revenue and had an additional $50,000+ in league prizes to pay out. Just doing the quick math, you can see that this league alone cost him over $75,000 in losses before expenses. When you see that, you pull the plug on a league like that, plain and simple.

His grand prize for his $1,200 entry fee league was $100,000 and his grand prize for his $500 entry fee league was $75,000. I'm not sure how that works, but his $500 league had an even worse financial situation as again too much prize money is in the guaranteed overall prize structure, not the league prizes and he had only twice as many teams there as the Platinum level. He had good participation in the $150 and $100 levels, but that's not where the profit margins are located.

This whole online championship model can be corrected very easily. You need to make the grand prizes reasonable yet attractive and you need to set a total number of teams that you're shooting for at each level. There are break even points in this model just like there are for us and the WCOFF in the live events. There are achievable levels at each price point, but reaching for the moon isn't an option.

Yikes, I'm sad for everyone right now.