Draft/Auction Second Weekend - Great Job!!

[JETS SB]

I cannot say enough about how the drafts and auctions went this weekend. Not only was everything done without a hitch, including a difficult 2 city Auction on Friday night, but today's Primetime and Classic drafts were both done in 2 hours with Steve facilitating all 3 of my events this weekend. It was the best live draft experience I have had in a very long time, if not ever. Sure, I do miss a bunch of live drafts happening all at once, like the old days, but considering the fact we had some big time names in our drafts, the competition could not be any better and no matter how many leagues are in the room, I can only do one draft at a time, and my weekend was filled (along with the Super last weekend - Great job, Andy)

And, a side note, the FOOD in NEW YORK was AMAZING today. Yes, we all missed the twice cooked frozen pizza from the baseball drafts, but the spread was just awesome, desserts were also (unfortunately) great, other than some strange looking green cannolis.

Tom, you outdid yourself this year and I don't care if there are 10,000 online teams next year, I am spending my money on the live events again... Nothing beats the experience and great to see some familiar faces and some new ones. And yes, Sandman and myself sat down for a little non-heated discussion about Tim Tebow.

Thanks again and good luck to everyone this year!! Alan Greenberg

[BubbasHouse]

I will state the same for the Chicago drafts - there is nothing like live draft experience. Although Chicago is the forgotten brother for 2012 those that chose that site were still provided a great venue with quality amenities. I hope and pray that labor day weekend events come back to Chicago which allows for many that were forced to LV will return for first weekend events.

[BigBlueNation]

I will state the same for the Chicago drafts - there is nothing like live draft experience. Although Chicago is the forgotten brother for 2012 those that chose that site were still provided a great venue with quality amenities. I hope and pray that labor day weekend events come back to Chicago which allows for many that were forced to LV will return for first weekend events.

I concur with Daryl and Alan on their comments. The 14 team DC got off to a slow start, but considering there were five live drafters in Chicago, three live drafters in LV, and six drafters at six other locations, once we got started, it went rather well. There were a couple times the online people weren't sure who was up, but all-in-all, it went smooth.

After the DC, I will be the first to admit I was skeptical about the two location auction. I'm happy to admit my skepticism was unfounded. The auction went great. We finished in about 4 hours 20 minutes, and that includes the 15 minute lunch break PLUS a friggin' FIRE ALARM for which we had to evacuate for about 20 minutes.

Great job from Dean, Eric, and Rob facilitating the Friday events and the food was OUTSTANDING. Like Alan said, the online championship is a great idea and will only get bigger and better, but the live events are what makes it so much fun for me. The trips to the cities (I AM just a country boy), the camaraderie, bantering and developing friendships is what it is all about.

Thank you NFFC/Stats, Greg and Tom

[76erfan]

One more vote on how well the two city auction went. I was stuck on 19 players for an hour but it was worth the wait! Nabbed alfred morris for 4 bucks to finish the draft. Didnt start him week one tho! Duh!

[Greg Ambrosius]

Thanks to everyone these past two weekends for making our live events such a pleasant and fun experience. I've heard nothing but positive reviews from all three cities, and although we all wanted more live drafters we made the best of the situations and continued the regional drafts. Nobody else is trying to bring live drafts to three parts of the country and the reason is simple: Technology is making it simpler to draft in big money events at home.

Well, guess what? We understand that and still want to grow our regional events. We learned an awful lot this year and have some ideas on how we'll approach these regional sites going forward. All of that will be discussed in the coming days.

But for now, I just want to say a BIG THANKS to everyone who participated in Las Vegas, New York and Chicago for making the live experience so much fun. From me and Dennis in Las Vegas to Tom and Mike in New York to Dean, Eric and Rob in Chicago let me say THANK YOU for making our jobs so easy and so much fun. We all really did enjoy working the live drafts because meeting so many good people is what it's all about. I got more hugs in Las Vegas from men than I did from women!!! Don't think the worst, it was all good and I'm sure Tom and Dean got the same kind of warm receptions.

We know what we can do with the regional drafts and it's probably less than what we could have done 9 years ago. There's many, many reasons for that. But we're not about to abandon all of our local regions. We just know that we have to approach them differently and make Las Vegas our home base on the Second Weekend. We have a very special home at the Bellagio and I think we can make the Second Weekend very, very special going forward for our NFFC events. We'll discuss all of that shortly, but for now THANKS again for what was a great season of live drafts.

[Greg Ambrosius]

I will state the same for the Chicago drafts - there is nothing like live draft experience. Although Chicago is the forgotten brother for 2012 those that chose that site were still provided a great venue with quality amenities. I hope and pray that labor day weekend events come back to Chicago which allows for many that were forced to LV will return for first weekend events.

And a special THANK YOU to those of you in Chicago who came to the Hyatt Regency O'Hare and participated in four live drafts. It was my decision to give Chicago the benefits of a late Classic and Primetime draft date and I really felt that moving off of Labor Day weekend would benefit the Windy City venue. It didn't and it's something we won't try again.

We will definitely have meetings in the coming days and weeks about what we did right and what we did wrong in 2012. At one time we felt that we could grow our live events regionally to more and more cities, but the technology has become so good that folks have no problem drafting $1,500 teams online. We tried to expand with live events while we were with Fanball and that didn't work and now we've tried to expand regionally with two weekends of events in New York and a Second Weekend event in Chicago and neither decisions were home runs.

Going forward, I don't see the same plan we had for 2012 happening in 2013. I could definitely see Las Vegas being the only live event venue on Second Weekend and New York and possibly Chicago being available on Labor Day weekend. All of this will be discussed soon.

We did our best to make sure Chicago and New York live drafters had a good experience and even though we combined Auction and Draft Champions Leagues via teleconference, all went well. If we could have avoided the fire alarms being pulled at the Hyatt Regency, all would have been good!! What is up with the fire alarms at that hotel? It happens everytime we do something there. I can remember staying at that hotel a decade ago for the National Sports Card Convention and having the fire alarm pulled at 2:30 am. Enough of that place!!!

For those in Chicago who loved the Oakbrook Marriott -- and we did too -- please know that our first call in Chicago each year is to that side of town. Unfortunately, that venue is a hot spot for weddings on Labor Day weekend and we've been unable to secure that spot for space. But we'll try again and move to that side of town if we can. Thanks for all your feedback to Dean and we'll look into all of these suggestions.

[wayne123]

I would like to post a quick note of appreciation to Greg, Tom, and all the players who made the Vegas drafting experience outstanding again this year! I understand that the economics lean toward on-line drafting. But, if you have never experienced one of the NFFC live drafts....put it on your bucket list! Nothing beats the instant camaraderie you encounter with your fellow fantasy drafters and each draft (I did three) went smooth. Also, there was excellent food and drinks provided at each draft! You just don't get the same experience at home drafting from your computer. It is worth every penny to make the flight or drive to Las Vegas and participate in person!